We analysed 336,782 B2B emails.
75% use just two formats.
Nearly half of all business email addresses are first.last@. Another quarter are flast@. And the bigger the company, the more predictable it gets.
What is the most common B2B email format?
The most common B2B email format is [email protected], used by 47.7% of business email addresses. The second most common is [email protected] (first initial plus last name) at 26.8%. Together, those two formats account for roughly 75% of all B2B email addresses. Larger companies standardise far more: 74.2% of emails at companies with 10,000+ employees use first.last@, compared with 38.0% at companies with 1–10 employees, where the informal first@ format is about four times more common. Based on a random sample of 336,782 B2B profiles with a work email and full name from the Sendburg database, analysed in July 2026.
How B2B companies format work emails
Share of 336,782 business email addresses by format.
“other” = addresses that matched none of the known name-based patterns (aliases, shared inboxes, custom conventions).
Bigger companies are more predictable
Share of emails using first.last@, by company headcount.
At enterprises with 10,000+ staff, 74.2% of emails follow first.last@ — nearly double the rate at companies with 1–10 people (38.0%). Small teams are where the informal first@format still thrives (16.8% at 1–10 employees, versus almost none at enterprise scale). The takeaway: the larger the target company, the more confidently you can predict an address from a name.
The full data
| Format | Example | Share |
|---|---|---|
| first.last@ | [email protected] | 47.71% |
| flast@ | [email protected] | 26.81% |
| other | unmatched / custom | 8.57% |
| first@ | [email protected] | 8.13% |
| firstlast@ | [email protected] | 2.29% |
| first_last@ | [email protected] | 2.29% |
| f.last@ | [email protected] | 2.14% |
| last@ | [email protected] | 1.2% |
| last.first@ | [email protected] | 0.65% |
| first.l@ | [email protected] | 0.13% |
| first-last@ | [email protected] | 0.1% |
Methodology
We drew a random sample from the Sendburg B2B contact database and kept every profile that had both a work email address and a full name — 336,782 profiles. For each address we took the part before the @and matched it against the person’s first and last name to classify its format. Addresses matching none of the known name-based patterns are grouped as “other”.
The company-size breakdown uses a separate random sample joined to company records, with between 2,269 and 12,684 profiles per size band. Analysed 16 July 2026. Percentages are rounded to one or two decimals and may not total exactly 100%.
Frequently asked questions
What is the most common email format for businesses?
[email protected] is the most common B2B email format at 47.7% of addresses, followed by [email protected] at 26.8%. Together they cover about 75% of all business email addresses.
Do big companies and startups use different email formats?
Yes. 74.2% of emails at companies with 10,000+ employees use first.last@, versus 38.0% at companies with 1–10 employees. Small companies are far more likely to use the informal first@ format (16.8% at 1–10 employees, versus almost none at enterprises).
How was this study conducted?
We took a random sample of the Sendburg B2B database and kept every profile that had both a work email and a full name — 336,782 profiles. We derived each address's format by matching the part before the @ against the person's first and last name. The company-size breakdown uses a separate random sample joined to company records.
Why do email formats matter?
If you know a company's email format and a person's name, you can predict their work email. That is how email finders work — and why guessing the wrong format is the main cause of bounced cold email.
Stop guessing the format.
Sendburg finds and verifies the real work email — no pattern-guessing required. Free to start, 10,000 verified contacts every month.