Why Gmail Is Clipping Your Emails (& Our Fix to Avoid It)

The 10 Tip Strategy Inside

AuthorAuthor

Jimmy Kim & Chase Dimond
December 11, 2024

Good morning! Chase and Jimmy here. 👋

Ever sent an email that felt like it could win awards—only to find out a chunk of your subscribers didn’t even see the whole thing? In fact, we had fallen victim to this just last week… Gmail clipping strikes again.

So, when life gives you lemons… you make a newsletter out of it!

Here’s the thing: Gmail’s 102KB limit can hide your best work and mess up your analytics. But don’t worry—there’s a fix! This week, we’re breaking down everything you need to know about Gmail clipping:
✅ Why it happens
✅ How it affects your campaigns
✅ The 10 Step Checklist to ensuring your emails don’t clip!

Ready to send emails your subscribers actually see? Let’s dive in.

But first, some quick goods:

🎙️ New Episode Alert! How to 🎙️ Turn First-Time Buyers into Repeat Customers with Email and SMS - EP9

In this latest episode of SendIt! we’re diving into the power of personalized communication, loyalty programs, and segmenting your audience to deliver targeted offers that keep customers coming back. Plus, we explore the metrics that matter—like repeat purchase rates and customer lifetime value—and share tips for leveraging tools to optimize your efforts.

Watch the full episode here now!

And a major thank you to our friends at Omnisend and AppBrew for sponsoring the show! Now, without further adieu, let’s send it—Watch the episode on YouTube or listen in on Spotify or Apple.

In DTC, “exciting” is great for your sales—not your reports. That’s why Omnisend just dropped something delightfully dull this week: smarter, streamlined reporting.

After listening to customer feedback Omnisend delivered reporting upgrades that let you:

  • See sales reports at a glance (no detective work required)

  • Compare campaign & workflow performance easily (fewer tabs, more clarity)

  • Make fast, data-driven decisions (because time is money, right?)

Reporting that’s so intuitive, it’s almost boring. But hey—isn’t that exactly what you asked for? Try out beta for their all-new reporting here!

💡 Knowledge Drop of The Week

Have you thought about how you’re engaging with your customers after they hit that “buy” button?

Jimmy knowledge drop

Alright now the meat and potatoes you’ve been waiting for, let’s jump right in…

Why Gmail Is Clipping Your Emails (& Our Fix to Avoid It)

Subscribers not receiving your full email? That’s Gmail’s clipping feature at work.

When Gmail clips your email, it doesn't just hide your content—it breaks your tracking too. Your analytics gets skewed and you end up making decisions based on incomplete info.

What's worse? It happens every day. 😱

Good news though: fixing Gmail clipping isn't complicated once you know how.

In this post, we’ll break down exactly what Gmail clipping is, why it happens and stop it from chopping off your amazing campaigns.

What is Gmail clipping?

Do me a favor: Open your Gmail and go through a few messages in your inbox. You’ll probably see something like this at the bottom of one of those emails.

That's Gmail hiding parts of longer emails from view. Most of your subscribers never even notice these clipped sections, let alone click to expand them.

They're missing a large chunk of your email, and you're missing critical data.. because most open rate pixels (the invisible image that shows open rates) are generally hidden at the bottom of an email.

With clipping you get inaccurate analytics which leads to marketing decisions made in the dark.

Why does Gmail clipping happen?

Want to know what's behind email clipping? It all comes down to size.

Gmail has some pretty strict limits: once your email hits 102kb, it gets the chop. And let's face it—those aren't exactly generous limitations for modern email designs.

So, how exactly do you end up with such large emails?

The problem often lies in how most eCommerce email providers build their email designs. They use HTML5 code, which is widely used but isn’t responsive and doesn’t adapt to different email clients.

Things like links, images, bolding, colors, and different HTML properties cause expansion in email limits which will cause an email to be clipped. 

One way to help reduce the size of emails is to use modern language like MJML - Mailjet Markup Language, which is a framework that’s been widely adopted by many ESPs. 

So What’s The Best Way To Avoid Email Clipping?

Sure, you could just say “screw it” and send plain text emails—that will solve the clipping problem.

But eCommerce brands need visuals in their emails. How else will you show off your awesome products and grab your customers’ attention?

1. Keep the Email Size Under 102KB

  • Gmail clips emails larger than 102KB. Use tools like Litmus, Email on Acid, or Chrome DevTools to check the size of your email before sending.

  • Avoid embedding large images or using heavy inline styles.

2. Optimize Images

  • Use optimized, compressed images to reduce file size without compromising quality.

  • Avoid embedding large base64 images in your HTML; instead, host them externally and link to them.

  • Pro Tip: Design your images in 600px width for best quality with lowest sizing.

3. Minimize HTML Code

  • Clean up your HTML code by removing unnecessary tags, comments, and inline styles.

  • Minimize the use of redundant nested tables, divs, or excessive spacing or spacers.

  • Pro Tip: Minimize the use of links, bold, changes to natural color of links, and any other changes to the text.

4. Avoid Excessive Tracking Code

  • Tracking codes for opens, clicks, and analytics can bloat your email size. Consolidate tracking pixels or use lightweight tracking solutions. Most people are fine with their ESP tracking, this tends to apply to those who are adding more or doing any 3rd party advertising.

5. Limit the Use of Custom Fonts

  • While custom fonts can enhance design, embedding them or using multiple font families increases file size. Stick to web-safe fonts when possible, which lower the sizing of the email.

  • Remember: most custom fonts do not appear on most devices unless the user has the font in their computer or mobile device, otherwise, you end up using the fall back.

  • Pro Tip: Use a font that looks similar to the style you want.

6. Use Custom Inline CSS Sparingly

  • While inline CSS is essential for email rendering, keep it efficient and avoid excessive repetition. In plain english: Don’t use too many blocks and frames.

7. Simplify Content

  • Reduce the overall content in the email. Too much text, large file attachments, or complex designs or image only can increase the email size..and also not great for deliverability.

8. Avoid Excessive Personalization

  • While personalization is important, overly detailed dynamic content (e.g., multiple personalized blocks or complex variables) can increase the file size and can sneak up without being seen in the measurement of the size of the email.

9. Test Email Before Sending

  • Use email testing tools to preview how Gmail will handle your email. Look for clipping issues and fix them before sending to your audience.

  • Pro Tip: Often times, test emails are not live tests, and if you’re concerned, create a list or segment of your seeds and send a real test to confirm both mobile and desktop.

10. Split Content and/or Include a "View in Browser" Link

  • If your email still exceeds the size limit, consider breaking it into smaller, separate emails instead of trying to fit everything in one.

  • Even with these precautions, clipping can still occur. Including a "View in Browser" link at the top of the email ensures recipients can view the full email if it gets clipped.

And on that note, we will leave you with one recent lesson I’ve learned on Gmail clipping: links.

Adding too many links causes large, bloated sizes. Changing those links to a different blue, highlights, bolds, italics…will bloat it even further.

I’ve seen 2-3 links cause 100kbs of space used, because we changed it to the the PROPER blue, the italics, bolded and underlined it..

We learned that the hard way with different newsletters we’ve done.

We hope our linking misfortune brings you optimized email luck in the future!

🔥 DTC Wins of The Week

The Black Friday wins keep rolling in! Kate over at Moodi just shared that they sold more in one hour than they did in an entire year of business. One. Hour. 🎉 We see you, Kate—keep crushing it!

And a big shoutout to GrĂźns for snagging shelf space in all 460 Sprouts locations. Big moves!

🗞️ Quick Clips

🔍 The Hiring Vault

New This Week:

That’s a wrap for this week’s edition! 

Thanks for spending some time with Chase and me! If you enjoyed this newsletter or found it helpful, spread the love—share ecomemailmarketer.com with your favorite DTC marketer. Let’s get them subscribed so they’re in the loop for next week’s updates! 🚀

Remember: Do shit you love.

🤘 Jimmy Kim

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