Check your email’s spam score before you press send
This email spam score checker reads your subject line and body the way a content filter does and gives you a score from 0 (clean) to 10 (almost certainly spam). It looks for the signals that rule-based filters such as SpamAssassin have penalised for twenty years: trigger phrases about urgency, money, free offers and shady marketing, phishing wording, CAPITALS, exclamation marks, link shorteners, image-only bodies, missing unsubscribe links and postal addresses, fake “Re:” prefixes, unfilled merge tags and risky attachment names.
Every finding comes with points, an explanation and a concrete fix, and the tool rewrites your subject line without the capitals, punctuation and bait phrases. Nothing is sent anywhere: the whole check runs in your browser, so you can paste confidential drafts and customer data safely.
How to use the Email Spam Score Checker
- Paste your subject line into “Subject line” and the full email text, including the footer and links, into “Email body”.
- Choose the email type. Marketing and newsletter mail is checked for an unsubscribe link and a postal address; one-to-one mail is not.
- Read the score and verdict. Under 3 is clean, 3–5 has some red flags, 5–7 is likely to be filtered, and 7 or more is very likely spam.
- Work through “Findings and fixes”, starting with the highest points. The badge colour shows the weight of each rule.
- Copy the suggested subject line, edit it to taste, and re-check. Press “Copy report” to share the findings with a colleague.
Email Spam Score Checker features
Over 150 trigger phrases in five groups
Urgency, money and prizes, “free” bait, shady marketing and phishing wording, each capped so a single long email cannot explode the score. Phrases in the subject count 1.5 times.
Formatting checks
Ratio of CAPITALISED words, exclamation marks in subject and body, repeated punctuation, spaced-out letters (F R E E) and alternating case.
Link analysis
Counts links, flags shorteners such as bit.ly and raw IP addresses, checks the words-per-link ratio and mismatched link text.
Bulk-mail compliance
Marketing emails are checked for unsubscribe wording and a physical address, as required by CAN-SPAM and expected by Gmail and Yahoo bulk-sender rules.
Subject line clean-up
Removes fake “Re:”, shouting, stacked punctuation, extra emoji and trigger phrases, then trims the subject to a phone-friendly length.
Attachment and personalisation checks
Spots .exe, .zip, .docm and similar file names, vague “see attached invoice” lines, generic greetings and unfilled {{first_name}} tags.
How the spam score is calculated
Each rule adds a fixed number of points, loosely modelled on the weights SpamAssassin assigns to its content tests, where a message scoring 5 or more is normally classified as spam. Points are added up and capped at 10. The table shows the main rules:
| Signal | Points | Why filters care |
|---|---|---|
| Phishing wording (“verify your account”, “unusual activity”) | 1.0 each, max 3 | The most common wording in credential-theft mail |
| Shady marketing phrase (“click here”, “this is not spam”) | 0.6 each, max 3 | Classic bulk-mail vocabulary |
| Money or prize phrase (“you have won”, “guaranteed”) | 0.5 each, max 2.5 | Advance-fee and get-rich scams |
| Urgency or “free” phrase | 0.4 each, max 2 | Pressure tactics and bait |
| Over 30% of body words in CAPITALS | 1.5 | Shouting is a strong historical signal |
| Link shortener or raw IP link | 1.0–1.5 | Hides the destination |
| Missing unsubscribe link (bulk mail) | 1.5 | Legal requirement, and Gmail/Yahoo demand it |
| Missing postal address (bulk mail) | 1.0 | CAN-SPAM requirement |
| Risky attachment name (.exe, .zip, .docm…) | 1.0–1.5 | Malware delivery |
| Fake “Re:” or “Fwd:” prefix | 1.0 | Pretends to be part of a conversation |
What a text check cannot see
Modern inbox providers weigh sender reputation far more heavily than words. Gmail, Outlook and Yahoo look at whether your domain passes SPF, DKIM and DMARC, how many recipients mark you as spam, how many addresses bounce, how often people open and reply, and whether you send from a warmed-up IP at a steady volume. A perfectly worded email from a domain with a 0.5% complaint rate will still land in spam, and a slightly clumsy one from a trusted sender will reach the inbox.
Use this checker to remove avoidable content problems, then verify your DNS records with the SPF Checker and DMARC Checker, keep your list clean with the Email Validator, and watch complaint rates in Google Postmaster Tools. Treat the score as a checklist, not a promise.
Quick wins for a lower score
- Write the subject in sentence case, under 60 characters, with no exclamation mark, and make it describe the content.
- Replace “free”, “guaranteed” and “act now” with specifics: price, date, what happens next.
- Link to full URLs on your own domain, and keep at least 20 words of real text per link.
- Put the message in text, not in one big image, and avoid attachments unless the reader expects them.
- For bulk mail, include a visible unsubscribe link and your postal address in the footer, and set List-Unsubscribe headers in your sending platform.
- Greet the reader by name, and double-check that merge tags are filled before the send.
Email Spam Score Checker FAQ
Is this email spam score checker the same as SpamAssassin?
No. It borrows the idea of additive rule scores and many of the same signals, but SpamAssassin also checks headers, DNS blocklists, URL reputation and Bayesian word statistics. This tool only sees the text you paste, which makes it a content pre-check, not a replacement.
What spam score should I aim for?
Under 3 is comfortable. Between 3 and 5 fix the biggest findings; 5 and above means several filters would probably flag the message on content alone.
Do spam trigger words still matter in 2026?
Less than they used to, because reputation and engagement dominate, but they still matter in two ways: filters at smaller companies and older corporate gateways still use word rules, and readers themselves distrust “FREE!!!” and “click here”, which lowers replies and raises complaints.
Why does my transactional email need an unsubscribe link?
It does not. Choose “Personal or transactional” and the unsubscribe and postal-address rules are skipped. Order confirmations, password resets and replies are exempt from those requirements.
Why is my score still high after removing the trigger words?
Look at the formatting and link findings: a subject in capitals, several exclamation marks, a shortened link or a .zip attachment each add a point or more on their own.
Is my email stored or sent anywhere?
No. The subject and body stay in your browser; there is no server, upload or logging, so drafts containing customer data are safe to test.