The Gmail message 'Images in this email are hidden' appears when Gmail suspects spam or the sender's reputation is low, or because of user or Google Workspace administrator settings. It reduces engagement, click-through rates, and conversions by preventing images from displaying. Image proxy usage by Gmail also affects open tracking accuracy. To mitigate this, marketers should focus on improving sender reputation via SPF, DKIM, and DMARC, optimizing images (compression, format, alt text), using responsive design, providing plain text versions, and balancing layout with clear text and background colors. A/B testing and awareness of user privacy settings are also crucial.
10 marketer opinions
The Gmail message 'Images in this email are hidden' can appear for several reasons, including low sender reputation, suspicion of spam, or user/administrator settings. This negatively impacts email marketing by reducing engagement, click-through rates, and conversions. To mitigate these effects, marketers should focus on improving sender reputation through email authentication (SPF, DKIM, DMARC), maintaining clean email lists, and avoiding spam triggers. They should also optimize images by compressing them, using appropriate formats, and adding descriptive alt text. Designing emails that look good with or without images, using responsive design principles, and providing a plain text version are also recommended. A/B testing different approaches is beneficial to determine what resonates best with the audience.
Marketer view
Email marketer from Email on Acid explains that image blocking in Gmail can lead to broken or missing content, which can damage the user experience and reduce conversions. Marketers should use responsive design principles to ensure their emails look good with or without images, optimize alt text for accessibility, and test their emails in different email clients to understand how they render with images blocked.
23 Aug 2023 - Email on Acid Blog
Marketer view
Email marketer from HubSpot Blog explains that designing emails that look good with or without images involves using a balanced layout with clear text, strategic use of background colors, and ensuring that key information is conveyed through text as well as images. Responsive design principles should be applied to ensure the email renders correctly on different devices and in various email clients, even with images blocked. Also use bulletproof buttons using HTML and VML.
11 Sep 2022 - HubSpot Blog
5 expert opinions
The Gmail message 'Images in this email are hidden' suggests Gmail suspects the email is potentially spam but lacks the confidence to directly filter it. This is influenced by factors like sender reputation and new ESP pairings. It particularly affects emails with low reputation, causing image blocking. A more aggressive stance against cold outreach platforms contributes to this. Gmail employs image proxies, impacting open tracking accuracy as pixels are triggered by Google's servers, not the recipient. Image blocking serves as a privacy feature, preventing automatic image downloads and mitigating tracking and malicious content loading, reducing marketer tracking capabilities.
Expert view
Expert from Word to the Wise explains that image blocking in Gmail (and other email clients) is a privacy feature that prevents the automatic downloading of external images. This protects users from being tracked via tracking pixels and prevents the loading of potentially malicious content. Users must explicitly click to display images, giving them control over what content is loaded. This reduces a marketers ability to track opens.
7 Jul 2023 - Word to the Wise
Expert view
Expert from Email Geeks shares that the message about hidden images has been appearing for about a month and seems to affect emails with low reputation, causing images not to display.
14 Nov 2021 - Email Geeks
4 technical articles
Gmail's 'Images in this email are hidden' message relates to user-controlled image display settings, where Gmail may block images by default for suspicious emails or if users choose to enhance privacy. Gmail uses an image proxy that caches images, impacting open tracking accuracy by pre-fetching images and potentially inflating open rates. Implementing SPF, DKIM, and DMARC improves sender reputation, increasing the likelihood of Gmail displaying images. Providing descriptive alt text is essential for accessibility when images are blocked, ensuring users still understand the email's purpose.
Technical article
Documentation from RFC explains that SPF, DKIM, and DMARC are email authentication standards that help verify the sender's identity and prevent email spoofing. Implementing these standards can improve sender reputation and ensure that Gmail is more likely to display images, as it trusts authenticated senders more than unauthenticated ones.
20 Jan 2022 - RFC Editor
Technical article
Documentation from Litmus explains that Gmail uses an image proxy to cache images, which can affect open tracking. The proxy pre-fetches images, potentially inflating open rates because an email can be counted as opened even if the recipient doesn't view it. Marketers need to be aware of this discrepancy when analyzing email campaign performance and use metrics beyond open rates to gauge engagement.
11 Sep 2023 - Litmus
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