SparkPost Event Types

SparkPost events are tracked with specific event type IDs in SendPost, allowing you to distinguish between native SendPost events and SparkPost events.

Event Type	ID	SparkPost Event	Description
SP Sent	37	`injection`	Email accepted by SparkPost for delivery
SP Delivered	38	`delivery`	Email successfully delivered to recipient
SP Deferred	39	`delay`	Temporary delivery delay (SparkPost will retry)
SP Dropped	40	`policy_rejection`	Email dropped by SparkPost policy
SP Hard Bounced	41	`bounce`, `out_of_band`	Permanent delivery failure
SP Soft Bounced	42	(reserved)	Temporary delivery failure
SP Opened	43	`open`, `initial_open`	Recipient opened the email
SP Clicked	44	`click`	Recipient clicked a link
SP Spam Report	45	`spam_complaint`	Recipient marked email as spam
SP Unsubscribe	46	`list_unsubscribe`, `link_unsubscribe`	Recipient unsubscribed

Bounce Type Details

SparkPost categorizes bounces into different types:

Hard Bounce (ID: 41)

Permanent failure (invalid email, domain doesn’t exist). Includes both synchronous bounce events and asynchronous out_of_band bounces. These addresses should be removed from your list.

Soft Bounce (ID: 42)

Temporary failure. SparkPost may retry these automatically. Consider these as temporary issues.

SparkPost Bounce Classes

SparkPost provides detailed bounce classification via bounce_class:

Bounce Class	Category	Description
1	Undetermined	Unable to classify
10	Invalid Recipient	Hard bounce - invalid address
20	Soft Bounce	Temporary failure
21	DNS Failure	Temporary DNS lookup failure
22	Mailbox Full	Recipient’s mailbox is full
23	Too Large	Message size too large
24	Timeout	Connection timeout
25	Admin Failure	Administrative failure
30	Generic Bounce	No RCPT permission
40	Generic Bounce	Network error
50	Mail Block	Blocked by recipient
51	Spam Related	Blocked as spam
52	Spam Content	Content flagged as spam
53	Prohibited Attachment	Attachment type blocked
60	Auto-Reply	Auto-reply message
70	Transient Failure	Temporary system failure
80	Subscribe	Subscribe request
90	Unsubscribe	Unsubscribe request
100	Challenge-Response	Challenge-response system

Event Data

Each SparkPost event includes:

Message ID (for correlation)
Recipient email
Timestamp
SMTP response code (for bounces)
User agent (for opens)
Clicked URL (for clicks)
SparkPost-specific IDs (message_id, transmission_id)
Bounce class (for bounce events)
Geographic information (country, region, city)

Event Type Quick Reference

Event	ID	SparkPost Event Name
Sent	37	`injection`
Delivered	38	`delivery`
Deferred	39	`delay`
Dropped	40	`policy_rejection`
Hard Bounce	41	`bounce`, `out_of_band`
Soft Bounce	42	(reserved)
Open	43	`open`, `initial_open`
Click	44	`click`
Spam	45	`spam_complaint`
Unsubscribe	46	`list_unsubscribe`, `link_unsubscribe`

Next Steps

View analytics to see event statistics
Troubleshoot issues with event processing

Documentation

Guides

SDK Quickstarts

Common Use Cases

SparkPost Event Types