Email Client Market Share in April 2022

Here’s a look at the most popular email clients of April 2022, plus the shifts that took place with email client market share between March through April 2022.

Top email clients

Before we get started, there are two things we always like to note:

1. As of fall 2021, the category “Apple” includes Apple iPhone (iOS Mail), Apple Mail (macOS Mail), Apple iPad (iPadOS Mail), and Apple Mail Privacy Protection (Apple privacy-impacted opens). Learn why in this blog post.
2. 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.

With that being said, the top 3 most popular email clients for April 2022 are Apple, Gmail, and Outlook.

1. Apple: 57.2%
2. Gmail: 29.5%
3. Outlook: 4.2%
4. Yahoo Mail: 3.4%
5. Google Android: 1.9%
6. Outlook.com: 1.0%
7. Samsung Mail: 0.4%
8. Windows Live Mail: 0.08%
9. Web.de: 0.06%
10. GMX: 0.05%

Apple was the most popular email client of April, with 57.2% of overall market share, despite a 3.5% decrease over the past month. (In March 2022, Apple’s share was 60.7%.) This brings things back to how Apple’s share looked like in January 2022, when it was also at 57.2%.

Here’s a closer look at each Apple subcategory:

1. Apple Mail Privacy Protection: 50.2%
2. Apple iPhone (iOS Mail): 3.7%
3. Apple Mail (macOS Mail): 2.9%
4. Apple iPad (iPadOS Mail): 0.4%

Except for Apple iPad (iPadOS Mail), each Apple category has decreased over the past month. Apple Mail Privacy Protection’s share dropped from 53.1% to 50.2%. Apple iPhone (iOS Mail) and Apple Mail (macOS Mail) followed suit, decreasing from 4.2% to 3.7% and 3% to 2.9%, respectively.

As a result, non-Apple clients saw an increase. Gmail, in second place, grew from 26.5% to 29.5%, while Outlook grew from 4.1% to 4.2%.

For more data and trends, check out our email client market share site, which includes Apple’s MPP data, pre and post-MPP launch.

Opens by environment

With Litmus Email Analytics, we’ve been able to track MPP since October 2021.

With that, here are the most popular open environments for email:

1. Apple Mail Privacy Protection: 49.7%
2. Webmail: 35.9%
3. Desktop: 7.1%
4. Mobile: 6.3%
5. Other: 0.9%

When comparing March 2022 to April 2022, Apple Mail Privacy Protection dropped from 52.6% to 49.7%. This change is similar to what happened with Apple Mail Privacy Protection when we looked at each Apple subcategory in relation to all email clients.

Something to highlight here: Desktop has now taken the third-place spot at 7.1%, which was previously occupied by mobile, now at 6.3%—a shift that could be related to MPP.

Most popular mobile opens

The most popular mobile email clients are still Apple iPhone (iOS Mail), Google Android, Apple iPad (iPadOS Mail).

1. Apple iPhone (iOS Mail): 58.1%
2. Google Android: 30.3%
3. Apple iPad (iPadOS Mail): 5.8%

Apple iPhone (iOS Mail) continues to take the top spot for mobile, but it has been slowly declining over the past few months. Its peak was in August 2021, where it had 90.5% market share. As of April 2022, it’s at 58.1%. This decline—similar to the decline we saw with mobile as a reading environment—could also be attributed to MPP.

Most popular webmail opens

As for webmail, the most popular clients remain the same: Gmail, Yahoo Mail, and Outlook.com.

1. Gmail: 86.8%
2. Yahoo Mail: 10.0%
3. Outlook.com: 2.9%

After months showing a slow decline, Gmail is back up a bit, increasing from 86% in March 2022 to now 86.8%. Still, it remains the most popular email client by a landslide.

Curious about why we categorize Gmail as webmail? Learn how Gmail opens are reported in Email Analytics.

Most popular desktop opens

Let’s take a closer look at desktop: The top 3 are Outlook, Apple Mail (macOS Mail), and Windows Live Mail—same as last month.

1. Outlook: 58.1%
2. Apple Mail (macOS Mail): 40.5%
3. Windows Live Mail: 1.2%

Outlook’s reign in the top spot is relatively new, occurring in January 2022. This spot was previously occupied by Apple Mail (macOS Mail). In April 2022, Outlook continued its growth from 57.1% to 58.1%. On the other hand, Apple Mail (macOS Mail) saw a decrease from 41.6% to 40.5%.

Together, Outlook and Apple Mail (macOS Mail) account for much of desktop’s overall share. When added together, they own 98.6% of desktop’s share. In contrast, Windows Live Mail accounts for 1.2% of desktop opens.

Light Mode vs. Dark Mode opens

Before we look at Light Mode vs. Dark Mode, we’d like to note that 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.

1. Light Mode: 73.7%
2. Dark Mode: 26.3%

Light Mode holds a majority of the share at 73.7%, increasing one percentage point, between March to April 2022. Dark Mode accounts for the rest at 26.3%.

What about your audience?

Although email client market share holds powerful insights on a macro level, the real power lies with your audience. The data points discussed above are best used as a reference point while you look at your own subscriber insights.

We’ll be back to share what shifts took place next month.

Where did we get all this data? Our email client market share stats are pulled from over a billion email opens, anonymously collected, and aggregated with Litmus Email Analytics from April 1-30, 2022. It highlights global trends across all industries and verticals. Some email clients may be over- or under-represented, particularly with mobile and webmail. This is due to image blocking or image caching, most notably with Gmail. Still curious? Learn how we get this data.

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