Channel & craft
Plain-text alternative
Also known as: text version · multipart alternative
The plain-text version of an HTML email that sits alongside the HTML in the message's MIME structure — fallback for clients that don't render HTML, accessibility signal for mailbox providers, and a deliverability micro-signal.
Every well-formed email should include a plain-text alternative in its multipart/alternative MIME structure. Most modern inboxes render HTML, but plain-text serves three purposes: fallback for clients that strip HTML (rare but still exists — terminal clients, some legacy corporate gateways), accessibility for screen readers and low-bandwidth contexts, and a small deliverability signal — mailbox providers weight messages with both parts slightly more favourably than HTML-only because matching HTML-only structure with spam is more common. A good plain-text version isn't just the HTML with tags stripped; it's a readable rewrite with sensible line breaks, URLs written out rather than hidden in anchors, and a logical flow. Most ESPs auto-generate the plain-text version from HTML but the auto-generated output is usually poor quality.
Read next
Plain-text email versions: why they still matter in 2026
Every HTML email should ship with a plain-text twin — the same email rendered as bare text, no styling. Most ESPs auto-generate one, and most of those auto-generated versions are garbage. Here's why the plain-text version still matters in 2026 and how to make the version you ship actually work.
Email accessibility: the seven rules that make your emails readable by everyone
Roughly fifteen percent of your audience opens your email with a screen reader, on a cracked phone in direct sunlight, or with images blocked at the corporate gateway. Most programs accidentally design around them. Seven rules — most of them cheap, all of them learnable in an afternoon — close the gap.