The Complete Email Template Design Guide

Understanding Email Design Constraints

Email design operates under unique constraints that web designers often find surprising. Unlike modern web browsers, email clients vary dramatically in their rendering capabilities. Outlook still uses Microsoft Word's rendering engine. Gmail strips certain CSS. Mobile clients have limited viewport widths. Understanding these constraints is fundamental to effective email design.

The good news is that working within constraints often produces better designs. Email's limitations encourage focus, clarity, and mobile-first thinking. Rather than fighting these constraints, successful email designers embrace them.

Layout Fundamentals

Single Column vs. Multi-Column

Single-column layouts are the safest and most mobile-friendly choice. They read naturally on any device and avoid the complexity of multi-column rendering. For most emails, especially text-heavy content, single-column is the clear winner.

Multi-column layouts work for certain content types: product grids, feature comparisons, or digest-style emails with multiple items. If you use multiple columns, ensure they stack gracefully on mobile devices.

Width Considerations

Keep email width between 600-700 pixels. This ensures comfortable reading in preview panes and email clients. Wider emails require horizontal scrolling, which destroys user experience.

Content within the email should have adequate padding, typically 20-40 pixels on each side. This prevents text from butting against email client borders and improves readability.

Visual Hierarchy

Visual hierarchy guides readers through your email in the intended order. Without clear hierarchy, readers either miss important information or abandon the email entirely.

The Inverted Pyramid

The inverted pyramid model organizes content from most to least important. The most critical message appears first and largest, supporting information follows, and the call to action anchors the bottom. This structure works because readers naturally scan from top to bottom.

Size and Weight

Larger elements attract attention first. Use size strategically: headlines should be notably larger than body text, and your primary CTA should be visually substantial. Font weight (bold vs. regular) creates secondary hierarchy within similar-sized text.

Color and Contrast

Color draws the eye. Use your accent color strategically to highlight the most important elements, typically your CTA. Maintain strong contrast between text and background for readability. Dark text on light backgrounds remains the most readable combination for body content.

Typography in Email

Typography choices significantly impact both aesthetics and deliverability. Email supports web fonts inconsistently, so always specify fallback system fonts.

Font Selection

Sans-serif fonts (Arial, Helvetica, system-ui) work best for body text in email. They render cleanly at various sizes and across different clients. Serif fonts can work for headlines or decorative text but test carefully.

Keep your font stack simple: primary font, generic fallback. For example: font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, sans-serif.

Size Guidelines

• Body text: 14-16px for comfortable reading
• Headlines: 22-32px depending on hierarchy level
• Small text (preheaders, disclaimers): 11-12px minimum
• Line height: 1.4-1.6 for body text

Image Best Practices

Images enhance emails but require careful handling. Many email clients block images by default, so emails must make sense without them.

Alt Text

Every image needs descriptive alt text. When images are blocked, alt text conveys what would be shown. For decorative images, use empty alt attributes (alt="") to avoid cluttering screen readers.

Image Sizing

Always specify width and height attributes to prevent layout shifts when images load. Use responsive images where possible, but always test on actual devices.

File Formats

• JPEG for photographs
• PNG for graphics with transparency
• GIF for simple animations (use sparingly)
• Avoid SVG (poor email client support)

Call-to-Action Design

Your CTA is likely the most important element in your email. It deserves careful design attention.

• Size: Large enough to tap on mobile (minimum 44x44 pixels touch target)
• Color: Contrasting with background, typically your brand accent color
• Text: Action-oriented, specific to what happens next
• Placement: Above the fold for primary action, repeated at bottom for long emails
• Padding: Generous padding inside the button for visual weight

AI-Assisted Design

Modern tools like Sequenzy can accelerate email design by generating templates that follow these principles automatically. The AI understands email design constraints and produces templates that work across clients.

Rather than building from scratch, describe your email's purpose and Sequenzy generates a professionally designed template. This is particularly valuable when you need many templates quickly or lack dedicated design resources.

Testing Your Designs

Never send an email without testing. Use tools like Litmus or Email on Acid to preview across clients, or send test emails to accounts you control on different platforms. Check both desktop and mobile rendering.

Pay special attention to Outlook (often the most problematic), Gmail (both web and mobile), and Apple Mail (tends to render well). These cover the majority of your recipients.