A recent question in r/Emailmarketing asked the anxiety-inducing version of a question many senders have: does anyone actually read messages in Gmail’s Promotions tab—or do discounts and launches simply disappear there?

The thread had no substantive top-comment consensus at the time of writing, but the premise itself is useful. It reflects a common mistake: treating placement in Promotions as proof an email has failed.

Promotions is not spam—and it is not Primary

Gmail explicitly describes the Promotions category as the place for “deals, offers, and other promotional emails.” That is categorization, not a spam verdict. In fact, Gmail’s default inbox is designed to separate message types so users can choose when to deal with them. A reader may ignore a sale announcement at 10 a.m., then browse Promotions on a Friday night when they are ready to buy.

That means promotional email competes less with a recipient’s work messages and more with every other retailer, creator, and software company asking for attention. The real challenge is not escaping the tab. It is becoming the message worth opening once the reader gets there.

Google is leaning into that behavior rather than moving away from it. In a 2025 Gmail update, the company said it was introducing a more relevant Promotions experience that can prioritize brands and senders people engage with, while highlighting timely deals. The implication for marketers is clear: engagement and relevance matter more than trying to disguise a campaign as a personal note.

The inbox has become a permission environment

The Promotions tab is best understood as a shelf customers visit with a purpose. People open messages there when at least one of three conditions is true:

  1. They recognize and trust the sender. A familiar brand or creator gets a split-second advantage.
  2. The offer is relevant now. A discount on something a subscriber recently viewed, uses, or has signaled interest in is different from a generic “20% off everything.”
  3. The email promises a clear payoff. Useful information, a genuinely limited opportunity, early access, or a product story that matches the reader’s goals can overcome inbox fatigue.

This is why “more volume” is usually the wrong answer to weak engagement. If every send looks interchangeable, subscribers learn to postpone opening—and eventually to unsubscribe. Gmail has also rolled out a Manage Subscriptions view that makes it easier for people to review high-volume senders and unsubscribe. Readers now have better tools to prune inboxes, so brands need a stronger reason to remain invited.

Deliverability is table stakes, not a growth strategy

For businesses sending at scale, Gmail’s requirements are also a reminder that legitimate marketing has operational obligations. Since February 2024, senders delivering more than 5,000 messages per day to Gmail accounts must authenticate mail, keep unwanted mail low, and provide easy unsubscribe options. Google’s Postmaster Tools can surface data on reputation, authentication, delivery errors, and user-reported spam.

These measures will not make a dull campaign compelling. But they protect the ability to show up at all. A technically sound sender with poor relevance may land in Promotions and be ignored; a sender with poor list practices risks much worse outcomes.

In the United States, compliance also matters beyond Gmail. The FTC says commercial senders must provide a way to opt out, and opt-out requests generally must be honored within 10 business days. Treating unsubscribes as a healthy preference signal—not a defeat—helps preserve trust with the people who remain.

Stop using opens as the final verdict

The Reddit question asks whether campaigns are still getting good open rates. That metric can still be directional, but it is no longer a clean measure of human attention. Apple’s Mail Privacy Protection prevents senders from seeing whether a recipient opened a message, which makes open-based comparisons noisier for lists with Apple Mail users.

Creators and small businesses should therefore judge promotional email with a broader scorecard: clicks, conversions, replies, repeat purchases, site behavior after the send, unsubscribes, spam complaints, and revenue per recipient. For a newsletter business, another useful signal is whether readers return for the next issue—not merely whether a tracking pixel loaded.

The practical takeaway

Do people read Promotions emails? Yes—selectively. The category is full of messages that recipients have already tacitly agreed are commercial. That is not a disadvantage if the email respects the context.

Send fewer campaigns that have a specific audience, a concrete reason to exist, and a recognizable editorial or brand voice. Segment based on what subscribers asked for or did, not just on what you want to sell. Make the subject line a truthful preview, make the first screen useful, and make leaving easy.

The goal is not to force every marketing email into Gmail’s Primary tab. The goal is to become the sender a subscriber looks for when they finally decide it is time to shop, learn, or act.