Your emails land in Gmail's spam folder

What it means

Gmail accepted your email but put it in the Spam folder instead of the inbox. Gmail decides this using many signals. They fall into three families:

• Authentication: does the email really come from your domain (SPF, DKIM, DMARC)?
• Reputation: how did Gmail users react to your past emails? Did they open them, or mark them as spam?
• Content: does the email look like typical spam (misleading links, a single large image, aggressive wording)?

Why it matters

Very few people check their spam folder. An email in spam is almost the same as an email never sent. And each email that lands there and is ignored can make the next ones go there too.

How to check

• Send a test email: on the home page, copy your unique test address, send it a normal email from the mailbox or tool you want to check, then open the report. Look at authentication, blacklists, reverse DNS and the SpamAssassin content score.
• Open Google Postmaster Tools (free). Add and verify your domain, then look at the spam rate and the authentication charts. Data appears only when you send enough daily email to Gmail users.
• Look at the email in Gmail. Gmail often shows a short reason in a yellow or grey banner, such as "This message is similar to messages that were identified as spam".

How to fix it

1. Fix authentication first. SPF and DKIM must pass, and DMARC must pass with your own domain. This is the most common cause and the easiest to fix.
2. Check blacklists. If your IP or domain is listed, see the blacklist guides and use /blacklists to look them up.
3. Clean your contact list. Remove addresses that bounce and people who have not opened anything for months. Never use bought lists.
4. Make unsubscribing easy. A person who cannot unsubscribe clicks "Report spam" instead, which hurts much more.
5. Improve the content.
   • Write a clear subject that matches the content.
   • Balance text and images, and add a plain-text version.
   • Use your own domain in links, not link shorteners.
   • Avoid capital letters everywhere and many exclamation marks.
6. Be consistent. Send from the same domain and the same From name, at a regular rhythm. Sudden big sends after a long silence look suspicious.

Ask people to help

If you are in a recipient's spam folder, they can click "Report not spam" and add you to their contacts. It only helps for that person, but it is a good signal for Gmail.

Check that it is fixed

Send a new test email from the home page: the report should show no authentication or blacklist problem and a low spam score. Reputation changes slowly, so expect days or weeks of good sending before Gmail fully trusts you again. Follow the trend in Postmaster Tools.

More help: Google Postmaster Tools and Google email sender guidelines.