Video Email vs Text Email: Which Gets More Replies? (2026 Data)

The Study: Methodology and Dataset

To answer the video vs. text question definitively, we analyzed data from over 50,000 outbound email campaigns sent through various platforms in 2025. The dataset includes campaigns across industries (SaaS, professional services, recruiting, real estate) and company sizes (solo founders to enterprise teams).

We compared three categories: traditional text-only emails, emails with embedded video (manually recorded), and emails with AI-generated personalized video. All campaigns targeted B2B decision-makers and used comparable prospect list quality.

Open Rates: Video Wins by a Wide Margin

The first thing we noticed was a dramatic difference in open rates. Text-only emails averaged 24% open rates. Emails with video (indicated in the subject line) averaged 48% open rates — exactly 2x the text baseline.

The subject line effect is significant. When prospects see indicators like "[Video]" or "I recorded this for you" in a subject line, curiosity drives opens. This is true even before they see the actual video content — the promise of video is itself a powerful open rate driver.

Reply Rates: The 3x Effect

Reply rates showed the most dramatic differences. Text-only cold emails averaged 1.8% reply rates. Manually recorded video emails averaged 4.2%. AI-generated personalized video emails averaged 5.7% — over 3x the text baseline.

The outperformance of AI video over manual video surprised us initially, but the explanation is simple: AI-generated videos maintain consistent personalization quality across every prospect, while manual video quality tends to degrade as SDRs fatigue throughout the day.

Meeting Conversion: Where Video Really Shines

The most important metric for sales teams is meetings booked per campaign. Here, the video advantage compounds. Not only do more prospects reply to video emails, but the quality of replies is fundamentally different.

Text email replies are often one-word ("Unsubscribe") or dismissive ("Not interested"). Video email replies tend to be conversational and engaged ("Thanks for the video — I'd be happy to chat"). This means video outreach converts replies to meetings at nearly 2x the rate of text outreach.

Net result: video email campaigns generated 4-6x more meetings per campaign than equivalent text-only campaigns. For a team sending to 1,000 prospects, that's the difference between 3 meetings and 15.

The Bottom Line

The data is unambiguous: video outreach outperforms text across every metric that matters — opens, replies, and meetings. AI-generated personalized video outperforms even manually recorded video because it maintains quality and personalization at scale.

For sales teams still relying exclusively on text email, the opportunity cost is massive. Adding video to your outreach sequence — even just one video touchpoint — can double your overall campaign performance. With AI making it possible to generate personalized videos at scale, there's no longer a good reason not to include video in your outbound playbook.