.org is a generic top-level domain used by non-profits, associations, public bodies. Across 56,401 .org addresses verified by BounceZero between April and October 2026, 24.6% were invalid, 12.4% catch-all, 25.0% unknown and 36.2% confirmed valid. Catch-all and unknown together mean a large share cannot be confirmed.
The .org row is all 56,401 addresses verified in the six months to October 2026; the other rows are the benchmarks from the same corpus. Risky and role results fill each row to 100%.
| Segment | Addresses | Invalid | Catch-all | Unknown | Confirmed valid |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| .org | 56,401 | 24.6% | 12.4% | 25.0% | 36.2% |
| All non-freemail domains (business and ISP) | 6,514,884 | 14.5% | 2.3% | 27.0% | 32.6% |
| Business domains only (consumer ISP and freemail excluded) | 1,269,919 | 22.9% | 9.4% | 22.5% | 40.3% |
| All freemail | 1,415,154 | 17.6% | 1.1% | 2.1% | 74.0% |
Non-freemail includes consumer ISP mailboxes; a business-only cut is on the benchmarks page. Method and every other cut: Lead List Quality Benchmarks 2026. Risky and role on the .org row: 1.8%.
The highest catch-all share of any segment: one in eight .org domains accepts any address, so finder guesses look valid and bounce later. Confirmed invalid is also above average because small organisations change staff and domains often.
Non-profits, associations and public bodies run small mail systems, and one in eight of their domains accepts any address, the highest catch-all share of any segment. Staff turnover is high in the sector and domains change with mergers and rebrands, which drives the invalid rate above the business average. Role addresses such as info@ are common and rarely reach a decision-maker; named contacts from annual reports and board listings verify better.
On confirmed-invalid rate, .org ranks 6 of 23 country domains in the corpus, just behind .gov at 24.7%, ahead of .nl at 21.9%.
On unknown rate, .org ranks 6 of 23 country domains in the corpus, just behind .net at 28.8%, ahead of .in at 22.7%.
On confirmed-valid share, .org ranks 17 of 23 country domains in the corpus, just behind .au at 37.3%, ahead of .gov at 34.7%.
How to read these rates: they are BounceZero's probe outcomes on customer lists over April to October 2026, not a census of .org mailboxes. Unknown and catch-all measure what verification could not confirm, which depends on the provider's gateway policy during the window as much as on the addresses. The lists are the ones customers chose to upload, so segments dominated by a few large uploads carry their age and source. Method and limitations: benchmarks page.
.org leaves 25.0% of addresses unconfirmed. Hold them out of cold volume, re-check in a week, and move anything still unknown to a second channel.
24.6% of .org addresses are confirmed invalid, above the 14.5% seen across non-freemail lists. Delete them; there is nothing to re-check.
Catch-all is the defining trait here: 12.4% of .org addresses accept anything, so finder guesses look valid and bounce later. Hold them out of cold sequences entirely.
Just over 36% confirmed valid: reachable today, re-verified before every send, since only 19.2% of addresses were still valid 90 days after a check in BounceZero's decay study.
Never send to .org catch-alls from the main domain. Verify, hold the catch-all share, and prefer named contacts over role addresses.
Role addresses such as info@ and sales@ make up 13.2% of .org addresses in the corpus. Role addresses rarely reach a person; prefer named contacts.
24.6% of 56,401 .org addresses verified by BounceZero between April and October 2026 were confirmed invalid, against 14.5% across non-freemail domains and 17.6% across freemail.
25.0%. Unknown means the mailbox could not be confirmed either way, usually because the gateway deferred the probe. BounceZero refunds unknown results; re-check after a week or use a second channel.
Partly: 12.4% of .org addresses sat behind a catch-all accept, so the server took any address and the mailbox could not be confirmed.
36.2% confirmed valid at verification time. Keep bounces under 2% and complaints under 0.3% on the send, and re-verify the segment before every send.
Upload the file and see valid, invalid, catch-all and unknown per row, with the .org segment against this benchmark. 100 free checks a month, unknowns refunded.
Ayoub built BounceZero's 5-stage validation pipeline, its dedicated BGP-announced IP infrastructure, and the Patroni HA PostgreSQL cluster behind every verification. Previously built high-volume email delivery infrastructure. Trained at 1337 Benguerir (École 42 network, 2019). Open-source: bgp_analyzer.
Invalid, catch-all and unknown rates per email provider and country domain, 2026
36,773 .nz addresses verified April to October 2026
38,181 Optimum addresses verified April to October 2026
25,971 PeoplePC addresses verified April to October 2026
232,302 SBCGlobal addresses verified April to October 2026
10,158 .se addresses verified April to October 2026
25,403 SFR addresses verified April to October 2026
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