2022 Email Client Market Share: Year in Review

2022 Email Client Market Share

We analyzed over 19 billion email opens in 2022 to determine where subscribers are reading emails. Here’s what we found.

Web.de

Orange.fr

Windows Live Mail

Samsung Mail

Outlook.com

Google Android

Yahoo Mail

Outlook

Gmail

Apple

0.05%

0.07%

0.1%

0.3%

0.9%

1.7%

3.2%

4.0%

27.6%

59.8%

53.7%

Apple Mail Privacy Protection (MPP)

3.3%

Apple iPhone

2.5%

Apple Mail

0.3%

Apple iPad

The top 10 most popular email clients

Based on more than 19 billion email opens from January through December 2022

Reflects Litmus Email Analytics data from January through December 2022. Some email clients may be over- or under-represented, due to image blocking or image caching, most notably with Gmail. Still curious? Learn how we get this data. 2Apple Mail Privacy Protection (MPP) hides device data so we aren’t able to differentiate between iOS, iPadOS, or macOS. Additionally, the new OSes don’t differentiate between MPP and non-MPP in the user agent data it passes.

Apple's Mail Privacy Protection (MPP) impacts Apple Mail users on iOS 15, iPadOS 15, and macOS Monterey devices, regardless of email services. Gmail is Google’s free email service, commonly accessed as secure webmail, although clients exist for popular mobile platforms like iOS and Android. Outlook Microsoft Outlook is often the de facto email client for most businesses; Litmus tests for its 13 most popular versions. Apple iPhone represents the native “Mail” application that ships with the iPhone and iPod Touch mobile devices (aka, iOS Mail). Yahoo Mail A web and cloud-based email client that can be utilized on a variety of devices. Apple Mail (or Mail.app) is the default email client native to Apple’s popular desktop and laptop operating system, macOS.

How do we define the most popular email clients? Read our definitions

How MPP has impacted Apple clients

What this means for email marketers: On average, 35.4%* of subscribers using an Apple email client uses Dark Mode. Be sure to optimize each email for Dark Mode to ensure ever subscriber has the best experience.

This report aggregates data across all industries. Individual industries and company's data can vary widely from the averages in this report. Keep in mind: the value lies with your audience. Get to know your subscribers—including how they read and engage with your emails—with a free trial of Litmus Email Analytics.

What about your subscribers?

Learn more about Litmus Email Analytics

Light mode vs. Dark mode ranges in 2022

Jan

Feb

Mar

April

May

June

July

Aug

Sept

Oct

Nov

Dec

Dark Mode

Light Mode

100%

75%

50%

25%

Our Dark Mode data is based only on the Apple Mail app for iOS 13, macOS 13, iOS 14, macOS 14, iPadOS 14, iOS 15, iPadOS 15, and Apple Mail privacy-impacted devices.

65.9%

65.8%

63.9%

66.4%

66.3%

66.0%

66.6%

66.2%

64.1%

63.4%

60.6%

59.9%

34.1%

34.3%

36.1%

33.6%

33.7%

34.0%

33.4%

33.8%

35.9%

36.6%

39.4%

40.1%

Reflects Litmus Email Analytics data anonymously collected and aggregated from January through December 2022 using email opens tracked with Litmus Email Analytics. Some email clients may be over- or under-represented, due to image blocking or image caching, most notably with Gmail. Still curious? Learn how we get this data. Apple's Mail Privacy Protection (MPP) hides device data so we aren’t able to differentiate between iOS, iPadOS, or macOS. Additionally, the new OSes don’t differentiate between MPP and non-MPP in the user agent data it passes. Due to image caching, we can not distinguish between Gmail or Yahoo desktop and mobile opens, so we’re unable to further breakdown where these email opens are taking place

Web.de

Orange.fr

Windows Live Mail

Samsung Mail

Outlook.com

Google Android

Yahoo Mail

Outlook

Gmail

Apple

0.05%

0.07%

0.1%

0.3%

0.9%

1.7%

3.2%

4.0%

27.6%

59.8%

53.7%

Apple MPP

3.3%

Apple iPhone

2.5%

Apple Mail

0.3%

Apple iPad

Based on more than 19 billion email opens from January through December 2022

The top 10 most popular email clients

Indicates ranking compared to December 2021

Combined

MPP peaked with 1.2 billion recorded opens in November—also known as the busiest month for subscriber engagement, according to our latest Trends in Email Engagement report.

Apple MPP ● January 2022: 644,470,614 ● February 2022: 753,176,585 ● March 2022: 952,142,703 ● April 2022: 761,442,597 ● May 2022: 800,958,889 ● June 2022: 782,879,924 ● July 2022: 704,236,703 ● August 2022: 783,754,541 ● September 2022: 920,850,835 ● October 2022: 977,930,390 ● November 2022: 1,275,744,563 ● December 2022: 993,481,714

Apple iPhone ● January 2022: 111,756,350 ● February 2022: 87,751,343 ● March 2022: 75,843,412 ● April 2022: 56,289,686 ● May 2022: 43,643,418 ● June 2022: 34,443,598 ● July 2022: 28,222,494 ● August 2022: 26,406,194 ● September 2022: 32,330,649 ● October 2022: 41,970,409 ● November 2022: 51,938,619 ● December 2022: 49,853,917

Apple Mail ● January 2022: 61,460,349 ● February 2022: 54,246,180 ● March 2022: 53,428,458 ● April 2022: 44,007,423 ● May 2022: 39,746,833 ● June 2022: 36,357,574 ● July 2022: 30,136,031 ● August 2022: 31,578,204 ● September 2022: 33,042,953 ● October 2022: 33,369,608 ● November 2022: 34,990,669 ● December 2022: 25,916,242

Apple iPad ● January 2022: 7,826,352 ● February 2022: 6,988,490 ● March 2022: 6,718,201 ● April 2022: 5,584,248 ● May 2022: 4,760,480 ● June 2022: 3,998,230 ● July 2022: 3,515,266 ● August 2022: 3,430,536 ● September 2022: 3,450,434 ● October 2022: 3,736,983 ● November 2022: 5,041,659 ● December 2022: 4,029,307

Click + to see the numbers -

Apple's Mail Privacy Protection Apple iPhone Apple Mail Apple iPad

Opens

Jan Feb Mar April May June July Aug Sept Oct Nov Dec

Apple Gmail Outlook Yahoo Mail Google Android

80% 60% 40% 20% 0%

A closer look at the top 5

Jan Feb Mar April May June July Aug Sept Oct Nov Dec

1.5 Billion 1 Billion 500 Million

Jan Feb Mar April May June July Aug Sept Oct Nov Dec

Opens

This ranking is compared to June 2022, when detection for Orange.fr was added.

*Our Dark Mode data is based only on the Apple Mail app for iOS 13, macOS 13, iOS 14, macOS 14, iPadOS 14, iOS 15, iPadOS 15, and Apple Mail privacy-impacted devices.

6.0%

Annual increase in Dark Mode usage: