Braze named strong performer in The Forrester Wave™ for Email Marketing Service Providers, Q1 2026

What changed

Braze reports that Forrester recognized them as a "Strong Performer" in the Q1 2026 Email Marketing Service Providers report, evaluating them against 11 other significant vendors. According to Braze, the report gave them the highest possible scores in critical categories including deliverability, queries and segmentation, and in-email innovation. The evaluation specifically highlighted their "Current Offering" as one of the strongest in the field, citing development speed and personalization as key strengths. While Braze earned high marks for its platform, the report identified Adobe, Cordial, and Zeta Global as the market "Leaders" for this period.

Why it matters for email marketers

The "Strong Performer" label for Braze signals a major shift: the death of the "email-only" specialist. Braze’s perfect scores in deliverability and segmentation suggest that modern, API-first platforms have finally caught up to legacy clouds in core email mechanics. For practitioners, this means you can stop managing email in a silo. If you can achieve top-tier deliverability within a platform that also handles SMS and push, the overhead of maintaining a separate, legacy ESP becomes harder to justify. Marketers should look closely at the "in-email innovation" scores. As AI begins to dynamically adjust platform interfaces based on user roles, the speed at which your team can build complex, personalized journeys becomes a competitive moat. If your current provider is lagging in AI-driven message composition, you are likely overpaying for manual labor that your competitors are already automating.

What to do about it

1. 1Audit your current segmentation speed; if it takes hours to pull a list that modern platforms handle in seconds, request a platform demo.
2. 2Review your deliverability metrics against the "native deliverability center" features mentioned in the report to see what automated insights you are missing.
3. 3Map out your cross-channel data flow to identify if a cross-channel suite could consolidate your tech stack and reduce vendor overhead.
4. 4Evaluate your team's use of generative AI in email composition to see if you are leveraging the "responsible AI" frameworks Forrester highlighted.