Email File Size Restriction in Gmail
Posted by John Reynolds on January 23rd, 2012
Reaching your Gmail subscriber’s inbox is critical. Even more important is that your message renders the way you want it to. All of it! If your HTML is more than 102 kilobytes, your email may be cut off by Gmail in mid-sentence. As an email marketer you may focus on the top half of your message, but at the bottom of your message are the tracking image used to record Opens/Renders and the unsubscribe link you need to be CAN-SPAM compliant.
Gmail will automatically clip a message if the total size exceeds 102 kilobytes. Users will see a [Message Clipped] View Entire Message link in order to download the rest of your message (see screenshot below). In Gmail’s smart phone and tablet apps, the same rules generally apply.
To fix this situation, keep your HTML code short by removing extra returns, comments and unnecessary attributes and styles. Applications like Outlook and Apple Mail will show you the size of your message if you’re looking for ways to test. You can also check your file size from an original HTML text file.
Aside from the HTML code, it is also recommended that you save your images in an optimized format. Recipients should not have to wait for the images to render on their desktop or smart phone.
Continue to test how your messages render. It is critical that your message renders properly in Gmail to avoid losing the unsubscribe link, tracking image for Opens/Renders , and any content that is displayed after 102 kilobytes.
It’s all about trials and errors so at the end you can have a fully functional email that wouldn’t get clipped.
I hadn’t even considered this, but I am so new to email marketing I may have bitten off more than I can chew. I guess testing is truly key, but thanks for giving me more to think about, as far as, all of the things I need to test for are, in fact, tested.
I think in a good email, it should be easily possible to get in all the content below 102kilobytes, as the user won’t read a lot more.
I definitely agree that testing the way your emails look is important. Different platforms (i.e. Mac, PC) can display them differently.