An email newsletter template that saves you time every week is less about design and more about a fixed text structure: a welcome email that tells new subscribers what's coming and which rules you follow, a skeleton every issue is built on, a handful of subject line patterns, and a footer with your sender details, postal address and unsubscribe link that stays the same under every email. All of it is below to copy, free and without signing up, plus a prompt that has Claude adapt the templates to your business. Newsletter tools and design apps like Canva offer visual templates with colors and columns; this page is about the words that go inside them.
My own newsletter serves as the example. The German edition, "Aus dem Maschinenraum", goes out every Tuesday, and the English edition, "From the Engine Room", once a week. The first German issue went out on October 27, 2026, and you can read it word for word on the website (in German). After confirming their signup, every subscriber first gets a welcome email, then the weekly issues. One distinction up front: a newsletter goes to everyone who opted in. An email to one contact about an open deal is a different job, covered in Follow-Up Email Templates, No Pressure and Business Email Templates That Work. How to set up a newsletter from scratch, from the promise to the tool, is in How to Start a Newsletter: My Own Setup.
Welcome email template
The welcome email is the one email your reader is actually waiting for: they just signed up and clicked the confirmation link. So it should say what the newsletter does for them, when it arrives and what you stick to. Placeholders are in angle brackets.
Subject: You're in: <newsletter name>
Preview text: What's coming every <weekday>, and one question for you
Hi <first name, if you ask for it>,
thanks for confirming. From now on you'll get <newsletter name>
every <weekday>.
Every issue has:
- <part 1, e.g. a real case from my work>
- <part 2, e.g. the rule I take from it>
- <part 3, e.g. a template you can reuse>
You'll also find notes on my offers, always at the end and clearly
marked as such.
Three rules I stick to:
1. <rule>
2. <rule>
3. <rule>
<If there's a signup bonus: Your <bonus> arrives in a separate email.>
One last question: <something answerable in one sentence, e.g. What
are you stuck on right now?> Just hit reply.
<sign-off>
<first name>
<footer, see the section on legal requirements>
What the welcome email examples above have in common:
- The three parts repeat the promise from your signup page, in the same words. New subscribers should recognize what they signed up for.
- The promotion is announced, not hidden. My signup forms say up front that the newsletter includes notes on my trainings and offers. The welcome email says it again.
- The rules pay off later. Mine are the three rules that apply to all fifteen of my AI employees, and later issues point back to them. My first issue says: "That's rule 2 from my welcome email: whoever builds something doesn't check it themselves."
- The bonus gets its own email. With a bonus, it arrives with a download link right after confirmation, and the welcome email follows the next morning. How to turn the welcome email into a sequence is in Email Automation: Tools and a Welcome Series.
- The closing question is for you. The replies tell you what to write about next. Only ask if you read them.
Email newsletter template for every issue
A fixed skeleton saves you from deciding how to start every week. This one follows my first issue, with the subheadings it uses in the text.
Subject: <a pattern from the subject line section>
Preview text: <one sentence that adds to the subject, not repeats it>
Hi,
<Who is this for, and what doesn't work today? Two sentences.>
<What am I showing you today? One sentence.>
The principle
<The principle in one paragraph, with one concrete example.>
How it's built
- <step or part>
- <step or part>
- <step or part>
Where I stand
<What's done and what isn't. Numbers only with a source.>
To take away
<One thing the reader can do today without buying anything.>
On my own behalf
<One offer, with its price or conditions. One link.>
Until next <weekday>
<first name>
<footer>
Two parts carry the whole thing. "To take away" is the reason anyone opens the next issue: in my first one it's a find-and-replace that swaps names and account numbers for placeholders like CLIENT_1 before a client text goes into Claude. It works without any product. And "On my own behalf" sits at the end, clearly separated, so the issue stands on its own without the offer. Mine named the offer and its condition, a seven-day free trial. The web copy notes that offers in it reflect the day it was sent; borrow that line if you publish past issues.
No topic list yet? One way to split the first three issues: issue 1 covers the topic most people signed up for, issue 2 answers the question you get asked most often, and issue 3 shows something you changed in your own workflow, with the reason and whatever result you can back up.
Subject line patterns
The subject decides before anyone opens. These patterns fit the skeleton above; the examples are made up for illustration:
What never belongs in a newsletter subject: "Re:", "Fwd:", "Your order" or a sender name that hides who's actually writing. The FTC's guide to the US CAN-SPAM Act puts it plainly: "The subject line must accurately reflect the content of the message." German law has a related rule for promotional email: under section 6(2) of the German Digital Services Act (Digitale-Dienste-Gesetz, DDG), neither the sender nor the commercial nature may be disguised in the header or subject line. A sender name made of your first name and the newsletter name is common; your sender address and the footer show who is behind it.
What every newsletter footer needs
This isn't legal advice, just the operator's perspective with the wording of the rules, as of November 2026. Which rules apply depends on where your readers are. How to set up the template in your email tool is something we'll look at together.
US readers (CAN-SPAM Act, per the FTC's compliance guide):
- "Your message must include your valid physical postal address." A registered PO box counts.
- A "clear and conspicuous explanation of how the recipient can opt out", including the option to stop all marketing email from you.
- "You must honor a recipient's opt-out request within 10 business days."
- You must disclose "clearly and conspicuously that your message is an advertisement", unless the recipient gave prior affirmative consent, which a confirmed newsletter signup usually is (15 U.S.C. 7704(a)(5)(B)). The From and Reply-To fields must identify who sent it.
Readers in Germany: promotional email needs the recipient's "prior express consent" (§ 7(2) no. 2 UWG, the German Unfair Competition Act), which is why a confirmation email with a link (double opt-in) is the usual way to prove it. How that flow is built is in Double Opt-In: Email Setup and Legal Basics. Every promotional email needs a valid address for unsubscribing (§ 7(2) no. 3 c UWG), and business providers of digital services must keep their provider details "easily recognizable" and "directly accessible" (§ 5 DDG), including name, address, legal form and representatives for companies, an email address, register number and VAT ID if there is one. The law doesn't say outright whether each single email is such a service; putting the details, or a direct link to them, in the footer is common practice, and the template below does that. In my newsletter the unsubscribe link sits at the end of every issue and of the welcome email, and replying to any email works too.
The footer to copy:
You're getting this because you signed up for <newsletter name> at
<website> and confirmed your subscription.
Unsubscribe: <unsubscribe link from your tool>
Privacy: <link to your privacy policy>
<Company and legal form> · <postal address> · represented by <name>
<email> · <register and number> · <VAT ID, if any>
Legal notice: <link>
You insert the unsubscribe link as your tool's placeholder, in Listmonk for example {{ UnsubscribeURL }}. Running Listmonk yourself is covered in Self-Hosted Email Marketing with Listmonk. Send every new template to yourself once and click the link before it goes to your list. Which tool fits you is in Newsletter Platforms Compared: Free Plans.
A prompt that adapts the template to your business
The prompt follows the structure of my Prompt Templates: 12 Copy-and-Paste Briefs for Small Businesses: goal, context, material, limits, format and "done when". It's written for Claude and mostly works the same in ChatGPT.
Goal: A welcome email and the filled-in structure for my first three
newsletter issues, based on the templates in the material.
Context: I'm a <job, business> writing for <audience>. My newsletter is
called <name> and comes out <cadence, weekday>. On my signup page I
promise: <sentence from the signup page>. This is how I sound (three
paragraphs I wrote myself): <paste>.
Material:
- Welcome email template: <paste>
- Issue template: <paste>
- My topics or notes for three issues: <paste>
- My offer for "On my own behalf", with price and conditions: <paste>
Limits:
- You deliver drafts and send nothing. If anything is unclear, ask
instead of guessing.
- No experiences, clients or numbers that aren't in the material. If
something is missing, write [ADD: what's missing].
- The promise from the signup page stays word for word.
- The footer with unsubscribe link and postal address stays unchanged.
- No subject lines with "Re:", "Fwd:" or fake orders.
Format: Welcome email with subject and preview text. Then, per issue,
three subject line options, one preview text and the filled-in
structure. At the end, a list "Places I need to fill in".
Done when: Every sentence traces back to my material, and every email
ends with the unchanged footer.
The three paragraphs of how you sound matter most. Why examples beat adjectives like "casual but professional" is in Can AI Write Emails in My Voice?. For single issues after launch, template 8 in the prompt templates, "A text in your voice from bullet points", is enough. How to write an issue with AI, from material to approval, is in AI Newsletter Generator vs. Claude.
When an AI employee writes the first draft
In my business, content belongs to Conny, my AI employee for content; her page lists newsletter drafts as one thing she can do beyond reels. Two of her rules are built into the prompt above: she invents no facts, and when in doubt the spot stays blank; and she drafts, I approve. A newsletter goes out in your name, so sending stays your call.
Frequently asked questions
Where can I find a free email newsletter template?
Visual templates with colors and columns come with newsletter tools and design apps like Canva. For the text, this page has three templates to copy: the welcome email, the structure for every issue and the footer with the legal details, plus five subject line patterns and a prompt to adapt them.
What should a welcome email include?
What the newsletter contains, in the words of your signup page, when it arrives, that it includes notes on your offers, a few rules you stick to, and a question to reply to. A signup bonus works better in its own email. The footer with the unsubscribe link and your postal address goes at the bottom, as in every issue.
Does a newsletter need a physical address?
For marketing email to US recipients, yes: the FTC's CAN-SPAM guide says "Your message must include your valid physical postal address." For readers in Germany, provider details under § 5 DDG usually go in the footer or behind a direct link.
How long should a newsletter issue be?
As long as the structure carries it. My first issue runs just under 350 words in its web version (in German), from the greeting to the sign-off, with five subheadings. If an issue gets much longer, it usually holds two topics, and one of them is next week's issue.
Where to go from here
Copy the welcome email, fill in the three parts in the exact words of your signup page and complete the footer once. Send it to yourself, click the unsubscribe link and read it on your phone. Then fill in the structure for issue 1, with the prompt or by hand.
To see this structure as a running newsletter, pick a free template on my free templates page: it comes with "From the Engine Room", once a week, with a real case, the rule behind it and a template to reuse.
