Where should I host images for emails?
Image hosting affects load speed, reliability, and deliverability. Choose infrastructure designed for high availability and email-specific needs.
Options:
ESP's image hosting: Most ESPs provide image storage. Optimized for email delivery, often includes CDN distribution. Simplest option.
CDN services: Cloudflare, AWS CloudFront, Fastly provide fast global delivery. Good for high-volume senders wanting control.
Your web server: Possible but may lack CDN performance and could be overwhelmed by email-triggered traffic spikes.
Requirements:
HTTPS: Required for modern email clients. HTTP images may be blocked or trigger warnings.
Reliability: Images must load quickly and consistently. Broken images hurt engagement and look unprofessional.
Persistence: Don't delete images that are referenced in sent emails. Recipients open emails days or weeks later.
Optimization: Compress images appropriately. Large images slow loading and may hit size limits.
Caching considerations:
- Gmail caches images through its proxy after first load
- Apple MPP prefetches all images at delivery
Plan for images being cached; don't rely on real-time image serving for personalization
Your image server is the warehouse. It needs to be accessible whenever someone opens the crate.
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