In short: the weighted average first-message reply rate across our 389,890 prospects was 31.9 percent and the average meeting rate 4.6 percent, but the spread by segment runs from 17 percent to over 50 percent. Compare yourself to your segment, not the average.
How to read your result
Reply rate is a leading indicator. Meeting rate is the decision. We ran fifteen controlled tests and several of them lifted replies while producing no extra meetings at all, which is why this calculator shows both and why you should never optimise a campaign on replies alone.
If your reply rate beats the benchmark and your meeting rate does not, the problem is almost never the copy. It is seniority, response speed, or a missing booking link. If both are below, the problem is the list.
The benchmarks behind the calculator
Every figure comes from campaigns run for 17 clients across 41 programmes between 2018 and 2026, measured to the point a meeting was accepted in the client's calendar. Prospects were split at random inside each account, so industry, geography, seniority and company size are held constant on both sides of every test.
| Segment | Prospects | Reply rate | Meeting rate |
|---|
| Founders and CEOs | 19,600 | 41.2% | 6.3% |
| Solution Architects | 15,490 | 38.1% | 5.9% |
| Heads of Engineering | 31,200 | 36.4% | 5.6% |
| IT Directors | 58,400 | 34.2% | 4.8% |
| Product Leaders | 38,700 | 33.8% | 4.9% |
| All fourteen personas, by company size and by region. |
Full method, sample sizes and all fifteen tests are on the 2026 outbound benchmarks page.
Frequently asked questions
What is a good LinkedIn reply rate?
Across 389,890 prospects in our dataset the weighted average first-message reply rate was 31.9 percent, but the useful number is your segment's, not the average. Founders at companies under 50 people in the UK and Ireland replied at well over 40 percent. Procurement managers at 2,000-plus employee firms in the US replied at under 20 percent. Anything above your segment benchmark is good.
What is a good meeting rate from LinkedIn outreach?
The dataset delivered 15,018 meetings from 389,890 prospects contacted, a raw rate of 3.9 percent, with the segment-weighted average at 4.6 percent. Under 2 percent means the targeting is wrong. Above 6 percent is top decile and normally means a verified subject-matter fit rather than job-title targeting.
Why is my reply rate high but my meeting rate low?
Usually seniority. Directors and above replied at 32.0 percent against 26.0 percent for managers and below, but booked meetings at 2.2 percent against 4.4 percent. Senior people reply out of politeness and delegate the meeting. The other common cause is response speed: replies answered inside 24 hours converted at 21.4 percent against 3.6 percent after 48 hours.
How is the benchmark calculated?
It is an index. We take the measured reply rate for your persona and adjust it by how far your company-size band and region sit from their own weighted means. Because the persona figure already partly reflects size and region, those adjustments are dampened rather than applied in full, and the result is capped at the highest rates we actually observed: 51.9 percent replies and 6.5 percent meetings. Treat it as a well-grounded estimate rather than an exact figure.
Is the calculator free?
Yes. No sign-up, no email, nothing stored. Everything runs in your browser.
