How open tracking consent works

Open tracking consent lets contacts choose whether you can see when they open your emails. It's separate from email marketing opt-in. A contact can be subscribed to your marketing emails and still say no to open tracking.

You turn it on per country. For contacts in those countries, Ometria only tracks opens when the contact has consented. Ometria still sends every email, and clicks are still tracked.

Why open tracking consent matters

Ometria tracks opens with a tiny invisible image (a tracking pixel) in each email. When a mailbox loads the image, Ometria records an open.

What the CNIL asks for

The CNIL is France's data protection regulator. In March 2026 it adopted a recommendation on email tracking pixels and published it in April 2026.

The recommendation treats the open-tracking pixel as tracking that needs its own consent. Agreeing to receive marketing emails isn't enough. In practice:

• Contacts must be asked separately about open tracking, apart from email marketing opt-in.
• Consent must be freely given and explicit. A pre-ticked checkbox doesn't count.
• Contacts must be able to withdraw consent at any time.
• Almost every use of open data needs this consent, including campaign reporting, send-time optimisation, engagement segments, automation triggers and personalisation.

It applies to any brand that emails contacts in France, wherever the brand is based.

Key dates

• 14 April 2026: email addresses collected from this date need open tracking consent before you track opens.
• 14 July 2026: for contacts collected before 14 April 2026, you could keep tracking opens only if you told them about it and they didn't object by this date.

Other countries are expected to follow, starting with Italy. Ometria adds countries to its list as new rules come in.

See: CNIL

How Ometria decides whether to track opens

Enabled countries

Ometria keeps a list of countries with open tracking consent rules. You choose which of these countries to add to your account and switch each one to Enabled in Settings > Channel settings. Changes apply as soon as you save.

See: Setting up open tracking consent

Effective date

Each country has an effective date, set by Ometria. For France, it's 14 April 2026. The date starts at midnight UTC. You can't edit it.

The effective date decides what happens to contacts who haven't given an answer yet. You choose one of two options per country:

• Contacts acquired before effective date stay opted in and contacts acquired after are opted out (default). Contacts acquired before the effective date are treated as consented. Contacts acquired on or after it are treated as not consented.
• Contacts acquired before and after the effective date are opted out unless they change their opt-in status. Every contact without an explicit yes is treated as not consented.

Explicit answers

For contacts in an enabled country, an explicit yes or no always wins over the effective date. Ometria holds the answer per email address.

Contacts outside enabled countries

Ometria tracks opens as normal for contacts:

• In a country that isn't on Ometria's list
• In a country you've added but set to Disabled
• With no known country

If one of these contacts gives an answer, Ometria keeps it but doesn't apply it. If you enable their country later, the recorded answer applies.

How Ometria knows a contact's country

Ometria uses the country stored on the contact. It looks at these sources in order:

1. Country data you send through the API, a CSV upload or a sign-up form
2. The billing address on the contact's orders
3. The contact's location, based on their IP address

This is a best-effort match. Keep country data up to date to get the most accurate result.

Summary

What happens when you send an email

For contacts who haven't consented, Ometria sends the email without the open-tracking pixel. The email still goes out as normal. Nothing else in the email changes.

This applies to every email type: broadcast, automation and transactional emails.

What still works: clicks

Click tracking doesn't change. For every contact, including those without open tracking consent:

• Links in your emails are still tracked and clicks are counted
• Automation conditions based on clicks, such as "has clicked", work as normal
• Segments that filter on clicks work as normal
• A/B tests that pick a winner by click rate work as normal

What changes: opens

For contacts without open tracking consent, Ometria doesn't record opens.

Ometria also no longer counts a click as an open. This change applies to all contacts since 21 September 2026, not only to contacts without consent.

As a result, contacts without consent never show as openers. This affects:

• Open rate: your reported open rate is lower, because these contacts' opens aren't counted.
• A/B tests by open rate: Ometria picks the winner only from the opens it can record. Consider picking winners by click rate for audiences with many untracked contacts.
• Send-time optimisation: it can't learn from these contacts' opens.
• Automation conditions based on opens: contacts without consent never meet a "has opened" condition. Check any automation that waits for an open.
• Segments based on opens: contacts without consent don't match open-based filters, such as contacts who opened in the last 30 days.

See also: Human opens vs. pre-opened emails

Where contacts give consent

Contacts can say yes or no to open tracking in several places:

• A checkbox on your website overlays
• A checkbox in your preference centre
• One-click yes and no links in your emails
• A checkbox on Ometria sign-up forms

You can also send answers to Ometria by CSV upload or the API, or record one by hand on the single customer view.

See: Collecting open tracking consent

Where you see consent

Segments

Use the Customer is opted in to non-native channel and Customer is opted out from non-native channel filters with the channel Email open tracking. These filters match the consent Ometria applies, including the effective-date default. They only include contacts in enabled countries.

To use them, non-native channels need to be switched on for your account. Contact your Customer Success Representative (CSR) to switch this on.

See also: Customer filter

Single customer view

The contact's marketing preferences show an Email open tracking row. It shows the answer the contact gave, not the effective-date default. The row appears for contacts in enabled countries and for contacts who already have an answer.

The Consent tab lists each change with the purpose Open tracking.

See also: Contact details: Consent

Exports

Profile exports include an email_open_tracking_consent column with two values:

• consented: whether Ometria tracks opens for the contact's primary email address
• consent_required: whether open tracking consent applies to the contact. false means the contact is outside every enabled country, so opens are tracked.

The marketing_channel_consents column lists the contact's non-native channel consents, including Email open tracking. Exports show the current state only.

API

Contact profiles returned by the API include channels.email_open_tracking with the same consented and consent_required values.

See: Collecting open tracking consent