Daily sending limits and capacity
How each mailbox's daily cap works across all your outreach, why emails move to later days, how many new people a mailbox can take a day, and how to send more.
Every mailbox sends at most a set number of emails a day: its daily cap. When an outreach needs more than that on a day, the rest moves to later days. This guide explains how the cap is counted, what Mailpitcher shows you, and how many new people a mailbox can take.
How the cap works
- 100 a day is the default and what we recommend.
- A newly connected mailbox sends at most 50 a day for its first 3 days.
- You can raise it up to 2,000 in the mailbox’s settings: click the cog next to the mailbox in the sidebar, then change Outreach emails per day. This is at your own risk: Gmail allows 500 a day and Google Workspace 2,000, counting everything you send.
The cap is counted over a rolling 24 hours. It covers every outreach that uses the mailbox, plus emails you write by hand from it. A hand-written email to three people counts as three.
On a full day, Mailpitcher fills the mailbox in this order:
- Follow-ups that are due get their slots first.
- First emails get what is left.
- Whatever doesn’t fit moves to the next allowed day: inside the batch’s window, and on a weekday if Weekdays only is ticked.
First emails in a batch with sending dates only go on those dates. If they no longer fit, the Queue lists them under Not scheduled with Add a date.
A follow-up joins the Queue only once the email before it goes out. Its day’s slot is counted from the start, though, so a day that looks empty in the Queue may already be taken by follow-ups to come.
What you see
Step 1: A warning before you add people
When you add people and choose when they get the first email, Mailpitcher checks the caps first. This happens in Send now or Schedule on the Recipients tab, in Send sequence, in Add from project, in a project’s Add to an existing outreach…, and in Schedule in Review & send. If the caps would push some of them later, a warning says so before you confirm, for example:
georgy@acaelo.com is at its daily limit on Thu 22 Oct (100/100, follow-ups first). Only 10 of these 90 go out on Thu 22 Oct; all of them go by Tue 27 Oct.
A line under it shows the first emails per day, for example “First emails: Thu 22 Oct 10 · Fri 23 Oct 10 · Tue 27 Oct 70”. It counts the follow-ups already due on those days and the follow-ups the new people will need.
It is a warning, not a block. Add them anyway, pick later dates, or add a mailbox first.
- 11: Which mailbox is full, and when all of them go
- 22: How many first emails go on each day
- 33: Confirm anyway, or pick later dates first
Step 2: A banner while it runs
On a running outreach whose mailbox is full, a banner sits at the top, for example “Your mailbox georgy@acaelo.com is sending at full capacity (100 a day). 80 emails moved to later days, the last on Tue 27 Oct.”
- Add a mailbox adds another connected mailbox to this outreach, also while it runs. New first emails go from whichever mailbox has room. Each follow-up stays with the mailbox that sent the first email, so it lands in the same thread. With no other mailbox, it offers Connect a mailbox.
- See queue opens the Queue.
- × hides the banner until tomorrow.
A shorter banner sits at the top of the Outreach list, and a gold dot appears next to Outreach in the sidebar. The demo mailbox never shows these.
- 11: Add a mailbox to this outreach
- 22: See queue
- 33: Dismiss until tomorrow
Step 3: Moved emails in the Queue
In the outreach’s Queue tab, an email pushed by the cap says moved from (the day) (daily limit), for example “moved from Thu 22 Oct (daily limit)”.
A worked example
One mailbox at 100 a day, Weekdays only, one follow-up 3 days after the first email. You add 90 new people each day with Send now.
| Day | What is due | New first emails that go |
|---|---|---|
| Mon 19 Oct | Nothing else | All 90 |
| Tue 20 Oct | Nothing else | All 90 |
| Wed 21 Oct | Nothing else | All 90 |
| Thu 22 Oct | Monday’s 90 follow-ups | 10 of Thursday’s 90 (90 + 10 = 100) |
| Fri 23 Oct | Tuesday’s 90 follow-ups | 10 more |
| Mon 26 Oct | Wednesday’s 90 follow-ups (moved from Saturday), plus the follow-ups of Thursday’s and Friday’s new people | None: the day is full |
| Tue 27 Oct | The 10 follow-ups that didn’t fit on Monday | The last 70 |
So 80 of Thursday’s 90 move to later days. If you keep adding 90 a day, the backlog grows the following week.
How many new people a day?
Each new person costs one email for every step of the sequence. With a first email and 2 follow-ups, that’s 3 emails per person. So one mailbox at 100 a day keeps up with about 30 to 33 new people a day. With 1 follow-up, about 50.
To send more, add mailboxes to the outreach. Each has its own cap. That is safer than raising one mailbox’s cap. See Mailbox pools, daily caps and pacing.
Replies stop follow-ups, so real days are often a little lighter than this. The warning and the banner assume nobody replies.
Good to know
- Settings, Usage shows what each mailbox has sent today against its cap.
- Review & send keeps to the cap too. If the mailbox is full, it offers to schedule the email for the next sending day. See Review and send.
- Want to change when one batch goes? Use Change schedule on the batch. See Pause, resume and reschedule.
Questions
Why did some of my emails move to another day?
The mailbox reached its daily cap that day. Follow-ups due that day go first, and whatever doesn't fit moves to the next allowed day. The Queue marks those emails with moved from (the day) (daily limit).
How many new people can one mailbox take a day?
Each new person costs one email per step. With a first email and 2 follow-ups, one mailbox at 100 a day keeps up with about 30 to 33 new people a day. With 1 follow-up, about 50. To send more, add mailboxes to the outreach.
Can I still add people when the warning shows?
Yes. The warning only says that some of them will go later than you picked. Nothing is blocked.