Import Subscribers

Quickly import your email subscribers from another platform.

This guide will show you how to import a CSV file of your subscribers so that they’ll be notified each time you publish a post on your site.

Add up to 100 subscribersMD

People with a free Jetpack plan may import up to 100 subscribers. This counts both towards a bulk .csv import or adding subscribers manually one at a time. The 100-subscriber limit on the free plan is a total cap on your account, not a per-import limit.

Add up to 10,000 subscribersMD

If you upgrade your plan to Growth, Social, Security, or Complete, or if you have our legacy Jetpack Creator plan, you can import up to 10,000 subscribers.

To help protect against spam, the free plan limits importing up to 100 subscribers. Paid plans have no limit, but imports of more than 10,000 subscribers will go through a manual review.

No matter what plan you have, there is no limit to the number of people who can choose to subscribe to your blog directly via your subscription form or the WordPress.com Reader.

Writing engaging content and promoting it via Jetpack Blaze or to your social media is a great way to have more followers.

Before you importMD

Get permissionMD

Please ensure that you have permission to email your subscribers. If we receive complaints from your subscribers about spam, or if your emails have a high bounce rate, we may take action against your account.

Clean up your listMD

Subscriber list hygiene is important for successful imports. If our tools suspect that too many of your email addresses are invalid, your import may fail.

Do your best to have a clean and updated list when importing your subscribers to Jetpack. When you have an old list or if you haven’t sent any emails to your subscribers in more than 1 year, it is very likely that over 10% of the email addresses no longer exist because people change jobs.

To prevent this from happening, we strongly suggest that you clean your subscribers’ lists using a third-party service, such as the ones listed below:

• Kickbox (free up to 100 addresses)
• Emailable (free up to 250 addresses)
• Proofy
• EmailListVerify
• NeverBounce
• Klemail (France)
• emailvalidation.io (free up to 100 addresses)

Import your subscriber listMD

Jetpack imports subscribers from the Subscribers page in WP Admin. You can type addresses in, upload a file, or hand off to the Substack importer. To import subscribers, follow these steps:

1. Go to Jetpack → Newsletter → Subscribers in WP Admin.
2. Click the “Add subscribers” button.
3. Pick the tab that matches your list:
   • Manual: Type or paste addresses. Put each one on its own line, or separate them with commas.
   • “Upload CSV”: Choose a .csv, .txt, or .tsv file. Jetpack picks out every email address in the file, so an export from Substack, Beehiiv, Mailchimp, Ghost, Patreon, Kit, or Medium works without editing.
   • Substack: See Import from Substack.
4. For a Manual or “Upload CSV” import, click the “Add subscribers” button. The button counts the addresses Jetpack found, for example “Add 25 subscribers.”

Jetpack notifies you when the import finishes, and you can close the window while it runs. Each site runs one import at a time, so the form stays unavailable until the current import is done.

Import from SubstackMD

The Substack importer runs as a guided wizard on WordPress.com. Besides free and paid subscribers, it can bring over your Substack posts and paid plans. To start it, select the Substack tab in the “Add subscribers” window, then click the “Open Substack importer” button.

Import subscribers with Newsletter categories MD

Jetpack can file imported subscribers under one or more newsletter categories, so they only get emails for posts in those categories. The option works for Manual and “Upload CSV” imports. The Substack importer doesn’t offer it.

The option appears only when newsletter categories are turned on and your site has at least one category. Set both up in Jetpack → Newsletter → Settings first. See Newsletter categories.

To choose categories during an import, follow these steps:

1. Go to Jetpack → Newsletter → Subscribers in WP Admin, then click the “Add subscribers” button.
2. On the Manual or “Upload CSV” tab, enter your addresses or choose your file.
3. Turn on “Add these subscribers to specific categories”. The Categories field opens below it.
4. Start typing a category name in the Categories field and pick it from the suggestions. Add as many categories as you need.
5. Click the “Add subscribers” button.

Jetpack gives every address in the import the same categories. To put two groups in different categories, import each group separately.

Manage your subscribersMD

Imported subscribers appear at Jetpack → Newsletter → Subscribers in WP Admin. There you can add more subscribers, remove them, and check whether Jetpack is emailing each one. For every action on that page, see Manage Newsletter subscribers in WP Admin.

Note: Manual and CSV imports add everyone as a free subscriber. To bring paying Substack subscribers over with their paid plans, use the Substack importer. To give a subscriber free access to one of your paid newsletter plans, use Comp a subscription on the Subscribers page. This works for subscribers who have a WordPress.com account. See Manage Newsletter subscribers in WP Admin.

Publish a PostMD

When you publish a post, an email is sent to all your email subscribers. When you click Publish on a new post, scroll down until you see the number of subscribers to which the post will be sent.

Jetpack will only send out notifications for new public posts. Publishing other content types (like pages or a custom post type) or updating an already published post will not send a notification email.

Migrate subscribers from a WordPress.com siteMD

If you want to migrate subscribers from a WordPress.com website to a self-hosted Jetpack-connected site, you can use our Subscription migration tool.

Troubleshoot issues with subscribers import MD

Errors during importMD

If you face any errors importing a CSV file of followers, here are a few things to verify first:

1. Go through your subscriber email list and make sure that all of the email addresses are valid. If we detect any invalid email addresses, the import will not work.
2. Make sure you have collected all your subscriber email addresses by yourself and that you have not purchased any subscriber lists. We take spam very seriously, and your email list will be blocked if we detect known spam addresses.
3. If you have lots of email addresses, try importing them in smaller batches of 500 each (this only applies if you have Growth, Social, Security, Complete, or the legacy Jetpack Creator plan).

Here is a list of common subscriber import errors, and what you can do about them:

Error Message	Explanation	Suggested Action
Can’t start subscriber import while another one is running.	Another import is already running.	Make sure you haven’t started imports in another tab. Otherwise, contact support.
No subscribers have been submitted.	An empty file was submitted.	Examine your CSV file and double-check whether it’s empty.
The CSV file does not contain information.	The CSV file is empty.	Examine your CSV file and double-check whether it’s empty.
You cannot add more subscribers on the free plan.	It is only possible to import up to 100 subscribers without a paid Jetpack Creator, Jetpack Social plan or bundled Jetpack plan.	There is a limit of 100 subscribers on the free plan. Please upgrade to one of those: Jetpack Social, Jetpack Growth, Jetpack Security, Jetpack Complete.
You are not allowed to manage subscribers for the specified site.	The user account does not have permission to manage users on the site (likely because the account has a different role).	Try performing the action from an administrator account.
Your recent import is taking longer than expected to complete.	–	Contact support.
Any other error	–	Contact support.

Subscribers not importedMD

If you receive an email saying that not all of your subscribers have been imported, here’s why:

• Some email domains are known spammers or abusers, so we block such domains from receiving email.
• The email address you tried to add is associated with a WordPress.com user account that has chosen not to receive email.
• The email address has too many pending invites for subscriptions.
• Mail to the address bounced. Jetpack can’t deliver email to a bounced address, so it skips that address on import. Confirm the address is spelled correctly, or get a working address from the subscriber. See what each email subscription status means.

Export subscribers to a different platformMD

You can export your subscribers list as a CSV file. You can follow the steps on this page to do that.