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What counts as an embed open?
How IssuePulse counts opens for Embed-format topics, and why the number is a relative signal.
Updated
Embed-format topics include a tiny invisible image. Each time an email client loads it, IssuePulse may count an open.
The rules
- One open per reader, per topic, within 5 minutes. Email clients often load images more than once; repeat loads from the same reader inside that window count once. Separate reads later still count.
- Scanners and prefetchers are filtered out. Security tools and some email services load images before a person opens the email. Known ones are dropped.
Why it’s not an exact headcount
Some readers block images, so their opens are never seen. Some email services load images through their own servers. That’s true of every open-tracking tool. Treat opens as a good relative signal: compare one issue with the next rather than reading the number as a precise count.
Why other formats show a dash
Linked, Markdown and Plain blocks are bare links. There’s nothing for an email client to load, so there’s nothing to count. A topic set to one of those formats shows votes and a dash for opens.
It’s the block you paste that counts, not the topic’s setting. If you copy the Embed block from a topic set to Linked, Markdown or Plain, its opens are counted and the topic starts showing them. Click-through stays an Embed-topic figure, because most of that topic’s votes come from links that can’t count opens.