How To See If Someone Reads Your Email: Guide

Seeing who has read your emails—and when—can help increase your productivity, especially if you work in sales. While email clients don’t always offer read receipts as a default option, there are a few easy ways to set up this feature. In this article, you’ll learn how to see if someone reads your email by enabling a read receipt to elevate your cold email outreach efforts.

Read Receipts: How to See If Someone Reads Your Email

A read receipt (MDN/DSN) asks the recipient’s mail app to confirm an open. It’s not guaranteed—many apps block or ignore it. This feature differs from email validation, which ensures the person you are trying to reach has an active email address.

Use email validation to confirm the address exists. Use read receipts or tracking pixels to estimate opens—but both have limits and can be blocked. While a return receipt is not a 100% guarantee that the recipient opened an email, it indicates whether the message was opened.

Track only the emails that matter to avoid noisy alerts. You’ll know whether or not the email you’re interested in was received and read without being overwhelmed by notifications for every email you send.

Limits: Apple’s Mail Privacy Protection and Gmail’s image proxy reduce or distort open tracking. Recipients can also decline receipts. Treat opens as directional, not exact.

6 Easy Ways to See If Someone Has Read Your Email

In sales, timing is everything. You need to know when your prospect is ready to buy to make the sale.

Use opens to time follow-ups, but don’t treat a single open as buying intent. Enabling your email client’s read receipt feature can enhance your outreach results.

Many major email platforms offer the ability to turn on read receipts, and some even allow for additional features. For example, you can turn on read receipts for just a single message or for all of your incoming emails. 

Here’s a look at some of the best ways to see if someone has opened your email using the read receipt feature.

1. Outlook

Outlook makes it easy to enable read receipts in a few simple steps: 

1. Open your Microsoft Outlook email account
2. Windows (new message): Options → Request a Read Receipt.
3. All messages: File → Options → Mail → Tracking → Read receipt.
4. Outlook on the web: Compose → Message → More options → Request a read receipt.

Note: Outlook.com (free) can respond to requests, but you can’t always request receipts in the web app. Recipients can choose not to send a receipt.

You may not get a receipt if you emailed a group address, the recipient’s app blocks MDNs, or they decline the request.

2. Thunderbird

Here’s how to configure Thunderbird to request a read receipt on a per-email basis:

1. Select ‘Write’ to open the compose window
2. When you’re done typing your email, select the ‘Options’ tab in the top Menu bar.
3. Select ‘Return Receipts’ or ‘Delivery Status Notification.’
4. Click ‘Send.’

To set up an automatic return receipt for all emails on Thunderbird, you can access Tools > Options > Advanced > General. You can also select how to handle return receipts when they arrive in your inbox, such as adding them to your sent folder. For default behavior: Tools → Options → Advanced → General → Return Receipts.

You may not get a receipt if you emailed a group address, the recipient’s app blocks MDNs, or they decline the request.

3. Gmail

Gmail allows you to enable read receipts via their web platform. To request a read receipt in the Gmail workspace:

1. Open Gmail
2. Compose a new email
3. Select “More options” at the bottom right. 
4. Choose “Request read receipt” from the drop-down menu. 
5. Once you’ve composed your email, press “Send” as usual. 

Gmail (Google Workspace accounts only)

Compose → More options (⋮) → Request read receipt.

Your admin must enable read receipts for your domain.

Read receipts don’t work for Google Groups or mailing lists and aren’t available in the Gmail mobile apps. Read receipt request is desktop-only, not in Gmail’s mobile apps.

You’ll receive an email alerting you that the message has been seen. Sometimes, the recipient will have to approve the read-receipt request. Prefer a desktop app? Use a Gmail-compatible client for Windows or Mac.

You may not get a receipt if you emailed a group address, the recipient’s app blocks MDNs, or they decline the request.

4. Yahoo

While many email providers offer read receipt requests and open tracking to gauge your messages’ success, Yahoo does not offer this feature through its webmail interface.

However, it does support Internet Message Access Protocol (IMAP), meaning you can still access the read receipt feature if you use an email client like Outlook or Thunderbird to check your Yahoo email.  

While this may be more work than using the webmail interface, it’s still a good option if you want to take full advantage of Yahoo’s email capabilities. Yahoo Mail’s web interface doesn’t support read receipts. You can still use an IMAP client (e.g., Outlook, Thunderbird) that supports MDNs.

5. Email Tracking Software

Read receipts can be enabled with most email tracking software. These programs will notify you as soon as an email is opened. In addition, many email tracking software programs will inform how often the email was read and how long it was accessed. 

Email tracking software can also help prevent important messages from getting lost in a crowded inbox. By keeping tabs on which messages have been opened, you can follow up on any that have been ignored. Several email tracking tools can enhance your communication productivity.

Note: Apple MPP preloads images and Gmail proxies images, so ‘open’ counts can be inflated or under-reported. Use clicks and replies as stronger signals.

Right Inbox

Right Inbox is a Gmail add-on that lets you see whether or not the recipient has opened your email. This tool has unlimited email tracking, reminders, templates and more in the paid version. Right Inbox is a great starting point if you’re looking for an easy way to keep track of activity regarding emails to your recipients.

Pros: 

• Unlimited tracking in the paid version
• Templates are easy to use 
• Includes send later feature

Cons:

• Only for Gmail 
• Limited features

Pricing: 

• Personal: from $7.95/user/month (annual)
• Team: from $16.95/user/month (annual)
• Free tier available

SalesHandy

SalesHandy is a powerful email tracking software that helps sales professionals manage their email communications. The tool is priced per month and includes a 14-day free version.

Pros: 

• Schedule sequences in advance
• Personalization through merge tags
• Easy integration with Gmail and Outlook

Cons: 

• Support is not robust
• Less user-friendly on mobile devices

Pricing: 

• Outreach Starter: $36/user/month (monthly) or $25 billed annually; 7-day free trial
• Agency/Custom: contact sales

Mailtrack

Mailtrack is a Chrome extension that helps you to keep up with your opened emails on Gmail. The paid plans include link tracking and complete tracking history. This feature shows users the number of times an email was opened or clicked.

Pros:

• Real-time notifications of the email read receipts
• Daily Report regarding email tracking
• Unlimited tracked emails in a basic free plan

Cons:

• Only available as an extension on Chrome 
• Only for Gmail 

Pricing:

• Premium: from $2.99/user/month (annual) or $5.99 monthly
• Free plan available

Streak

Streak lets you view who has seen your email so that you can be on top of your outreach performance. It also helps you automate your pipeline follow-up in Gmail. This CRM tool can power your mass email campaign with detailed data.

Pros:

• Users can customize templates with snippets
• A wide range of team features like shared pipelines
• Includes CRM and mail merge

Cons:

• Not user-friendly
• Less affordable than other options

Pricing:

• Pro: $49/user/month
• Pro+: $69/user/month (14-day trial)
• Enterprise: $129/user/month
• Free plan available

MailTag

MailTag is an email tracking software that lets you see if someone has read your email. The tool has one pricing tier with a free trial.

Pros:

• You can see when your emails are opened and view link-click performance
• Dashboard with email performance insights
• Easy to use

Cons:

• Only for Gmail
• You can’t look at email history unless you use the paid plan

Pricing:

• Pro: $12.99/user/month (annual discount available)

6. Follow Up the Right Way

If a key email shows as opened but there’s no reply, send a short nudge after 2–3 business days. If it’s time-sensitive, call. Use opens to time outreach; use replies and meetings to judge interest.

How to Tell If Someone Reads Your Email: Closing Thoughts

Compliance: In the UK/EU, tracking pixels can fall under PECR/ePrivacy rules and often require consent. Check your local law and your company policy before enabling tracking.

Read receipts and tracking help you time follow-ups. Pair that with a clean, targeted prospect list for better outcomes. If you need verified B2B contacts, try UpLead’s free trial.