You may have heard about Apple’s Mail Privacy Protection (MPP) or noticed that some of your emails appear not to have been opened, even though you are sure your supporters are reading them. Here is what is happening, and how Bonterra is addressing it.
1) What is Mail Privacy Protection (MPP)?
Apple introduced Mail Privacy Protection (MPP) as a way to protect the privacy of users who check email through the Apple Mail app.
When MPP is enabled (which it should be by default), Apple automatically downloads all email images from its servers, regardless of whether the recipient has opened the email. This behavior can trick email systems into thinking someone opened a message, even if they did not.
2) What does this mean for your Open Rates?
Without safeguards in place, MPP would make it look like all Apple Mail users opened your email, even if they did not. This inflates open rates and provides you with misleading data about real engagement.
To protect you from these “false positives,” we have implemented a filter via our email delivery partner to detect and exclude opens triggered by Apple’s automatic preloading. That way, your stats reflect real user behavior as much as possible.
But there is a tradeoff…
While this filtering improves accuracy overall, there is a downside:
If a supporter reads your message using Apple Mail with MPP, we cannot differentiate between them and a fake preload. So to avoid inflating your stats, their open may not be counted at all.
In short:
Real opens by Apple Mail users may not show up
But false opens from Apple’s image preloading are blocked
This is the best available balance for accurate reporting in today’s privacy-first email environment.
How should you measure engagement?
We recommend using email open rate as a general directional indicator, not a precise measure. To get a better picture of how well your emails are performing, focus on metrics like:
Click rates (e.g., when supporters engage with links or buttons)
Responses or follow-up actions
Amount raised from email-driven outreach (which is automatically tracked and displayed in your email blast stats!)
These metrics are not affected by MPP and give you better insight into what is working.
Does this affect all emails on Apple devices?
MPP only applies when someone checks their email using the Apple Mail app, regardless of the email account (e.g., Gmail, Yahoo, work email).
It does not apply when using other apps (like the Gmail or Outlook app) on an iPhone, iPad, or Mac. So a Gmail user reading your email through the Gmail app on their iPhone will not be affected by MPP.
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