Over 90% of people in the U.S. are email users. Like most people in 2026, your supporters likely receive an overwhelming number of emails each day. In fact, an average of 121 business emails are sent and received daily!
So, how can your nonprofit organization stand out from the crowd of emails filling your supporters’ inboxes? In combination with other factors, the time of day you send your fundraising emails can have a major impact. When you send a fundraising email can be the difference between improved engagement metrics (open rate, click-through rate, donation amount, etc.) and disappointing ones.
That begs the question: What’s the best time to send a fundraising email?
You want to make sure that every element of your fundraising email is aligned in a way that will catch a supporter’s attention and get opened. Let’s focus on the send time piece—read on for helpful fundraising email send time data and best practices!
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The Best Time for Nonprofit Emails
When we dug into the data for The Nonprofit Email Report: Data-Backed Insights for Better Engagement—analyzing 37,472 email campaigns and a whopping 157,048,634 individual emails, broken down by list size—we paid close attention to key email engagement metrics, including email performance by time of day.
Here’s what we found:
The average email send time for nonprofits was 11:44 a.m. CDT, and the average open rate for this time was 29.18%.
For small nonprofits, the average email send time was 12:01 p.m. CDT, and the average open rate for this time was 45.37%.
For large nonprofits, the average email send time was 11:32 a.m. CDT, and the average open rate for this time was 26.10%.
Even with some adjustments for different time zones, this data shows us that nonprofits across the board typically send their emails in the late morning and early afternoon. It also reveals that small nonprofits tend to have more engaged contacts. Regardless of your organization’s size, experimenting with the time of day you send fundraising emails can result in better engagement outcomes.
Before moving on, we do want to note that these averages may not lead you to the perfect fundraising email send time formula for your organization (more on how to find that in the next section), but they can give you points of comparison and a solid place to start. Alright, let’s get a move on!
How to Find the Ideal Send Time for Your Fundraising Emails
Fundraising emails are a crucial piece of nonprofit communications, but they’re less effective when they aren’t sent at an ideal time. The benchmarks above are a great launching pad for experimentation, and they likely won’t be the end of your quest to find the best time to send nonprofit emails. Here’s how you can find the most effective send time for your organization’s emails:
1. Test, Test, Test
Try sending emails at a different time of day than you usually do. Compare engagement metrics and test until you see improvements. What difference does a different time of day make for open rates? Donations completed? Click-through rates?
Use A/B testing (also known as “split testing”) to test various send times. In email marketing, A/B testing means sending different versions of an email to test how a single adjustment changes engagement metrics. For example, if you normally send fundraising emails at 9:00 am but you want to test the average small nonprofit email send time of around 12:00 pm, you would send two versions of the same email (Version 1 sent at 9:00 am and Version 2 sent at 12:00 pm) to see which performs better.
This doesn’t mean you send the same email to everyone on your list twice. Most email marketing platforms allow you to A/B test within the same campaign, sending half of your email contacts Version 1 and the rest Version 2.
When testing, it’s important to only experiment with one element of your fundraising email at a time. If you want to see whether one send time is better than another, don’t also use a wildly different subject line or make major changes to your email’s layout or content. By only testing one element at a time, you’re able to confirm that that piece is driving the changes and not something else.
2. Follow the Money
Increased open rates aren’t the only metric you’ll want to pay attention to when trying to find the best time to send your fundraising emails. The donation amount that a supporter gives after receiving a fundraising email can also be impacted by the time it was sent.
Are your supporters more likely to click through and make a donation early in the morning? Do they donate more when fundraising emails are sent in the afternoon or evening? If a donor clicks a link in your fundraising email, at what time are they completing their donation? At what time of day do they most often click through to the “Donate” page but don’t follow through with a donation?
Experimenting with different fundraising email send times can reveal all of this information. After A/B testing, check the timestamps for donations that came through a fundraising email. Do you notice a pattern?
3. Consider Other Factors
If you’ve reviewed nonprofit email benchmarks and tried testing various times of day to send your fundraising emails with little to no success, it’s time to consider other factors.
Low engagement with fundraising emails could be due to issues unrelated to the time the email is sent. The issue may be with your subject lines or even your copy. If you’re not seeing the better results you hoped for when changing the email send time, test changes to other parts of your email.
I’ll also note that if you’re looking for a comprehensive CRM that includes email communication tools you should check out Neon One’s Neon CRM. Having a tool like Neon CRM allows you to see all the details about your supporters—like email opens, clicks, donations, event registrations, volunteer sign-ups, and beyond—all in one spot.
For help getting started with a higher-performing subject line, check out 10 Nonprofit Email Subject Line Ideas That Work.
Data in Action: The Via International Story
Finding your ideal send time is much easier when your outreach and donor data are in one place. Via International provides a perfect example of how moving to a centralized system allows an organization to master its email strategy.
After outgrowing their previous platform, Bloomerang, Via International switched to a more robust system to better manage their communications. By integrating their email tools with their donor database, they were able to:+1
- Improve Deliverability: They moved away from fragmented systems to ensure their emails actually reached their supporters’ inboxes.
- Track Real-Time Engagement: The team gained the ability to monitor opens and clicks immediately, allowing them to test which send times resulted in the most activity.
- Personalize the Journey: With all supporter data in one spot, they could tailor their email content based on donor history, ensuring their messages stood out in a crowded inbox.
By moving from a system that increased chaos to one that instilled confidence, Via International proved that the right technology is the key to turning email benchmarks into actual donations.
Outgrowing Bloomerang: How Via International Found a Partner for Long-Term Growth
Get Data-Backed Insights for Better Email Engagement
There’s more nonprofit-specific data where the average send time data in this article came from. The Nonprofit Email Report: Data-Backed Insights for Better Engagement is full of email benchmarks for nonprofits of all sizes that can help you create emails your supporters want to open. Download your copy today for best practices, great nonprofit email examples, and more tips that will equip you to build more compelling emails.
And if you want to dive into more ideas on how to build relationships through communications, automation, and sharing your impact, check out the Relationship-First Nonprofit Growth Playbook.
Your action guide to build relationships that drive growth.
In this playbook, we’ll dive into insights that can help and simple steps you can take to start putting relationships first in your day-to-day work.
FAQs About Email Send Times
According to Neon One’s 2026 data, the best time to send a fundraising email is generally in the late morning to early afternoon. Specifically, the average nonprofit sends emails at 11:44 a.m. CDT, achieving a 29.18% open rate. Small nonprofits see peak engagement—averaging a 45.37% open rate—when sending at 12:01 p.m. CDT.
Small nonprofits achieve the highest engagement by sending emails around 12:00 p.m. CDT. Research analyzing over 157 million emails shows that small organizations (250–999 contacts) average a 45.37% open rate at this time, significantly higher than the industry average for larger organizations.
To find the ideal send time, nonprofits should use A/B testing (split testing) by sending two versions of the same email at different times to separate halves of their list. Organizations should also “follow the money” by analyzing donation timestamps to see when supporters are most likely to complete a gift.
Beyond timing, engagement is heavily influenced by subject line sentiment and copy clarity. Neon One research indicates that emotionally positive subject lines—expressing gratitude or optimism—outperform those based on fear or urgency. Other critical factors include mobile-friendly design and personalized salutations.
Yes, nonprofit size significantly impacts engagement. Small nonprofits generally have more engaged contact lists, with an average open rate of 45.37% compared to 26.10% for large nonprofits. Large nonprofits also tend to send emails slightly earlier, averaging an 11:32 a.m. CDT send time.
