Email verification
Email verification keeps your lists clean by identifying invalid and risky addresses before you send to them. On every paid plan, contacts are verified automatically as they're imported — there's no separate verification service to buy or configure, and your plan includes a monthly verification allowance.
Automatic verification on import
When you import contacts on a paid plan, verification starts automatically in the background as soon as the rows land. Contacts are checked in batches, and the import status page shows a live breakdown — how many came back verified, risky, or invalid, and how many are still waiting. You can keep working while it runs.
Auto-verification is on by default for every list and can be switched off per list — the Verify contacts on import toggle lives in the list's settings. Before you confirm an import, the wizard also shows an estimate: how many contacts will be verified and how much of your monthly allowance remains.
Verification statuses
Every checked contact gets one of these statuses, shown as a chip on subscriber rows and available as a filter in the subscriber list and in segments:
- Verified (deliverable) — the address exists and can receive mail.
- Risky — the address may accept mail but shows warning signs (catch-all domains, full mailboxes, and similar).
- Invalid (undeliverable) — the address cannot receive mail.
- Unknown — the check couldn't produce a definitive answer.
- Unverified — not checked yet (for example, contacts added on the Free plan or after an allowance ran out).
How checks work
- Format and DNS/MX checks — addresses are validated for correct syntax and for a domain that can actually receive mail.
- Mailbox-level risk assessment — invalid, undeliverable, and high-risk addresses are flagged.
- Result caching — a verified result is reused for roughly 30 days, so the same address isn't re-checked needlessly — and cached results don't count against your allowance.
- Resilient processing — verification runs in the background across redundant infrastructure, so large imports keep moving reliably.
Monthly allowance
Each paid plan includes a monthly contact-verification allowance:
| Plan | Included verifications / month |
|---|---|
| Free | — (auto-verification not included) |
| Starter | 5,000 |
| Standard | 10,000 |
| Professional | 50,000 |
| Enterprise | 100,000 |
If an import is bigger than what's left of your allowance, verification stops cleanly: the checked contacts keep their statuses, the remainder stays Unverified, and you get a notification. A one-click Verify the rest action on the import status page picks up exactly where it left off — after your allowance resets or you upgrade. See plans & quotas for the full limits table.
Send-time protection
Verification statuses actively protect every campaign send:
- Invalid addresses are always excluded. A contact verified as undeliverable is never sent to — this rule cannot be switched off.
- Risky addresses are excluded by default. The campaign confirm step has an Audience protection section showing exactly how many invalid and risky contacts are being held back — and a per-campaign toggle to include risky contacts if you accept the bounce risk.
- Unverified contacts are sendable. Contacts that simply haven't been checked (Free plan, allowance exhausted, toggle off) are not blocked from sends.
Why it matters
Sending to invalid addresses drives up bounces, which mailbox providers read as a signal of a careless sender — hurting placement for everyone on your list. By catching bad addresses at import and stripping them from every send, verification protects your sender reputation, improves deliverability, and stops you wasting your monthly email volume on addresses that were never going to receive your mail. Combined with domain authentication and our managed delivery infrastructure, it's a core part of keeping you in the inbox.
Frequently asked questions
Do I pay extra for verification? No. Every paid plan includes its monthly verification allowance at no additional charge — there's nothing to buy or configure. The allowance resets each billing cycle.
Is verification available on the Free plan? Automatic verification on import is a paid-plan feature; on Free the per-list toggle is locked off and contacts stay Unverified. Unverified contacts can still be emailed — and addresses are always validated for correct format at import on every plan.
Will it slow down my imports or sends? No. Verification runs in the background after your import completes, and results are cached for about 30 days, so addresses you've already checked don't need re-verifying — cached checks are free.
What happens to invalid addresses? They stay on your list with an Invalid chip so you can review or remove them, but they're permanently excluded from every send — they never count against your sending reputation.
Can I send to risky contacts? Yes, per campaign. Risky contacts are held back by default, but the confirm step shows the count and lets you include them for that specific campaign.