Tracking Opens and Clicks
Understand how Distill tracks email engagement metrics.
Distill tracks two engagement metrics for every newsletter issue you send: opens and clicks. These metrics tell you how your subscribers are responding and help you improve your content over time. Understanding how the tracking works helps you interpret the numbers accurately and address any privacy considerations with your subscribers.
How open tracking works
When you send a newsletter issue, Distill inserts an invisible 1×1 pixel image into the HTML of every email. This image is hosted on Distill's tracking servers. When a subscriber opens the email, their email client downloads the image, and Distill records the open event — logging the subscriber's ID, the issue ID, and a timestamp.
Open tracking only works for HTML emails. Plain-text email clients cannot load images, so opens in plain-text mode are not counted. Most modern email clients render HTML by default.
What affects open tracking accuracy:
- Apple Mail Privacy Protection (iOS 15+) — Apple pre-fetches email images in the background, even before the subscriber actually opens the email. This means Apple Mail users will appear as "opened" even if they never read the email. Open rates for lists with many Apple users will be inflated.
- Image blocking — Some corporate email clients block all remote images by default. Subscribers using these clients will not register as an open, even if they read the email.
- Email forwarding — If a subscriber forwards your email to someone else and that person opens it, it may register as an additional open for the original subscriber.
Open counts are best understood as a directional signal rather than a precise measurement. Consistent trends over time — not individual issue numbers — are what matter.
How click tracking works
When you include links in your newsletter, Distill rewrites each link to pass through a redirect URL before reaching the final destination. When a subscriber clicks a link, the request hits Distill's tracking servers, the click event is recorded (subscriber ID, issue ID, original URL, timestamp), and the subscriber is immediately forwarded to the original destination.
The redirect is fast — typically under 100ms — and subscribers never see the intermediate URL.
What click tracking captures:
- Which links were clicked
- How many unique subscribers clicked each link
- How many total clicks each link received (one subscriber can click the same link multiple times)
Click tracking is more accurate than open tracking because it does not depend on image loading. A click represents a deliberate action.
Where to view engagement metrics
After an issue sends, open and click metrics appear on the Issue Detail page in Distill:
- Go to your workspace dashboard.
- Click the Newsletters icon (Newsletters) in the sidebar.
- Click the newsletter containing the issue.
- Click the specific issue to open its detail page.
The metrics panel shows:
| Metric | Description |
|---|---|
| Delivered | Total emails successfully delivered (sent minus bounces) |
| Opens | Number of unique subscribers who opened the issue |
| Open rate | Opens divided by delivered emails |
| Clicks | Number of unique subscribers who clicked at least one link |
| Click rate | Clicks divided by delivered emails |
| Bounces | Addresses that rejected delivery |
| Unsubscribes | Subscribers who unsubscribed after this issue |
For issues that are still sending, metrics update in near-real time. Most engagement happens in the first 24-48 hours after send.
Privacy considerations
If you publish a Privacy Policy (required under GDPR and CAN-SPAM), disclose that you use tracking pixels and link tracking to measure email engagement. A brief statement like "We use email tracking pixels to measure open rates and click-through rates for our newsletters" is sufficient.
If your subscriber list includes recipients in the EU, your Privacy Policy should explain your legal basis for processing engagement data. Most newsletter senders rely on legitimate interests for analytics.
Distill does not share individual-level engagement data with third parties. Tracking data is used exclusively within your account for your own analytics.