Somebody opens your email in Gmail. Your tracking pixel fires. But here's the twist: the request didn't come from their laptop or phone. It came from Google.
That's a Gmail proxy open. And whether it should count as a real open is one of the most quietly botched questions in email tracking.
What is a Gmail proxy open?
Gmail serves every image in every email through its own image proxy. Your tracking pixel is an image, so it goes through the proxy too. The glossary entry on the Gmail image proxy covers the mechanics.
The result: when a Gmail user opens your email, the request your tracker sees comes from Google, not from the recipient's device. The device and location details you'd get from other email apps aren't there.
So the open happened. Probably. Through a middleman. The question is what to do with that.
Why does Gmail do this?
Privacy and safety, mostly. Routing images through a proxy means senders can't see the recipient's device details directly. It also lets Google scan images before they ever reach the user.
Apple went further with Mail Privacy Protection, which loads images whether the email gets opened or not. Gmail's proxy is different: it usually fetches when someone opens the message, and it hides the route.
That difference is exactly why the two need different treatment.
What "proxy opened" looks like on one email
Here's an example: one email sent from a Gmail account to someone who reads it in Gmail. To a tracker that only counts image loads, every row below is the same thing: an image load from Google. Here they are in order, with the label Outsolvi shows for each.
| What happened | Label | Counted as a read? |
| Gmail gets the email ready on arrival | Gmail preloaded this (not an open) | No |
| You check it landed in your Sent folder | could be your own Sent folder (you use Gmail) | No |
| The recipient opens it | opened in Gmail | Yes |
| The same view loads the image again | same Gmail view, repeat fetch | Grouped with the read above |
| They open it again the next morning | opened in Gmail | Yes |
Example timeline, not a real customer's data.
Counted that way, the table is five opens. One person read it, twice. The other three rows were Gmail getting the email ready, you checking your own Sent folder, and a repeat fetch from a single view.
When Gmail loads it before anyone opens it
Google's own help page says it "scans images for signs of suspicious content before you receive them."[1] In practice, that means Gmail sometimes loads an email's images when the email arrives, whether or not anyone ever opens it.
That load comes through the same proxy as a real read, so a tracker that counts every proxy fetch will log it as an open. It isn't one. Since October, Outsolvi labels it "Gmail preloaded this" and leaves it out of the count.
So should a proxy open count?
Yes, once, when it's the recipient.
A proxy fetch is how Gmail readers show up at all. Gmail started serving every image through "Google's own secure proxy servers" in December 2013.[2] Throw proxy fetches away and you throw away everyone who reads you in Gmail, and you stop following up with people who are actually reading.
Count every fetch and you overshoot the other way: the preload on arrival, your own Sent folder, and the repeat fetches from one view all land as extra opens. That's how one read becomes five on a dashboard.
The fix sits between the two. Count a read in Gmail as a person, count it once per view, and keep the preload and your own looks visible but out of the total.
How Gmail differs from Apple Mail
Apple's Mail Privacy Protection works the other way round. Apple says it "downloads remote content in the background by default", whether or not the person engages with the email.[3] So when Apple Mail loads your image, it tells you the email reached an Apple Mail inbox and nothing about whether anyone read it.
Gmail's proxy is mostly the opposite: a fetch usually follows a real open. That's why the two need different treatment, and why a tracker that handles them the same way gets one of them wrong. The Apple Mail post goes through Apple's side in detail.
How do I know it's not just guessing?
Click the open and look. That's what the Diagnose view is for.
Every open in Outsolvi shows why it counted or why it was filtered. If a Gmail proxy open got counted as most likely human, you can see the reasoning. No mystery numbers, no trust-us dashboard.
That transparency is worth testing for when you compare tracking tools. Ask any vendor one question: "This open right here, why did you count it?" If the product can't answer, the number on the dashboard is a guess with confident formatting.
What to do with your Gmail opens
- Treat "opened in Gmail" as a person reading, once per view.
- If you send from Gmail, be sceptical of a read that shows up while you're still looking at the email yourself.
- Ignore anything labelled as a preload. The email arrived; nobody has read it yet.
- Act on replies first. Then clicks on a specific link. Reads come third.
- When a number surprises you, open the event and read the reason before you follow up.
For the mechanics behind the proxy, see the glossary entry on the Gmail image proxy and how the proxy behaves in 2026. How Outsolvi grades every open is on the methodology page. To set tracking up in Gmail, start with how to track emails in Gmail.
What does this mean for your open rate?
Your Gmail opens are neither fake nor gospel. Most are people. Some are Gmail getting the email ready, and some are you.
If you'd rather see which is which than guess, Outsolvi labels every Gmail event with what it was, in Outlook and Gmail. It's $7 a month billed yearly, with a 14-day free trial and no credit card.