LinkedIn Outreach Benchmarks for Mechanical & Industrial Engineering (2026)

Key Takeaways

In mechanical and industrial engineering, the average LinkedIn connection acceptance rate is 29.5%. Replies to the connection note average 2.3%, and replies to a message after the connection is accepted average 10.9%. Those numbers come from 86,407 connection requests sent by 87 mechanical and industrial engineering accounts between May 2025 and April 2026. Against the cross-industry averages of 28.5%, 3.0% and 10.4%, mechanical and industrial engineering is above on acceptance and message replies and below on note replies.

Mechanical / Industrial Engineering vs. the platform average

Metric	Mechanical / Industrial Engineering	All industries	Difference	Rank
Connection acceptance	29.5%	28.5%	+1.0 pts	11th of 38
Connection-note reply	2.3%	3.0%	-0.7 pts	31st of 38
Message reply after acceptance	10.9%	10.4%	+0.5 pts	17th of 38

Across the 38 industries with at least 50 sending accounts, acceptance runs from 21.8% (telecommunications) to 36.5% (staffing & recruiting). Note replies run from 1.8% to 6.6%, and message replies from 7.2% to 18.9%.

What the numbers say about engineering outreach

Mechanical and industrial engineering finishes above the platform while trailing it on the connection note. Note replies of 2.3% rank 31st of 38, 0.7 points under the 3.0% cross-industry average, yet end to end the sector converts about 3.2 in every 100 recipients into a reply, 13th of 38 and ahead of the cross-industry 3.0. The note is the weakest step here, and it is not the step deciding the result.

Acceptance and message replies carry it. Acceptance of 29.5% ranks 11th of 38, level with accounting, and message replies of 10.9% rank 17th, half a point above the platform. Neither margin is large on its own. Because end-to-end conversion multiplies the two, a point above platform on acceptance and half a point on messages are enough to put the sector ahead of most of the 38.

Its closest matches are marketing and advertising, IT and services, and accounting, all of which accept at or close to the platform rate and reply to notes below it. The sharper comparison is with machinery, which shares the 2.3% note reply rate but accepts at 26.8% and converts about 2.4 per 100. Both samples are small, 87 accounts here and 56 in machinery, so the gap is indicative rather than settled, but it is wide for two categories that sound this close.

If your numbers sit below these

The dataset says where an account sits, not why. From what we see in campaigns, three gaps come up most often in this sector, and they point at different problems.

Message replies under 10.9%. Half a point above the platform and 17th of 38, and it does slightly more than acceptance to lift the sector above 3.0 per 100. From what we see in campaigns, engineering senders do best when the first message asks a specific question about a specific project or process instead of restating capabilities.

Acceptance under 29.5%. The sector accepts a point above the platform, 11th of 38. A number below the line usually follows a list built on keywords, anyone with engineer in the headline, rather than on the people who commission or buy engineering work.

Note replies under 2.3%. The sector is already 31st of 38 on notes and still finishes above the platform. Below this line, sending requests without a note is a more informative test than another rewrite, because the note is the step contributing least to the result.

Further reading:

• Improving your LinkedIn Sales Navigator targeting
• How many LinkedIn invites can you send a week?
• Personalising a LinkedIn message request without tripping limits
• The LinkedIn message follow-up formula
• Tips for building a LinkedIn content strategy for B2B sales
• The best AI lead generation software to add to your stack

Frequently asked questions

What is a good LinkedIn acceptance rate in mechanical and industrial engineering?

29.5% is the sector average, one point above the 28.5% cross-industry figure and 11th of 38 reported industries, level with accounting. Above 31% is doing better than the sector, and under 28.5% is below the platform as well.

Do mechanical engineering and machinery companies get the same LinkedIn results?

Not on this data. Mechanical and industrial engineering accepts at 29.5% and converts about 3.2 in 100 recipients end to end, 13th of 38. Machinery accepts at 26.8% and converts about 2.4. Both reply to notes at 2.3%. The samples are 87 accounts here and 56 in machinery.

How does mechanical and industrial engineering compare with other industries?

Acceptance ranks 11th of 38, message replies 17th and note replies 31st. End to end about 3.2 in 100 recipients reply to a follow-up, 13th of 38 and ahead of the roughly 3.0 across all industries, despite a note reply rate below the platform.

How this data was collected

Mechanical / Industrial Engineering is reported from 87 accounts and 86,407 connection requests sent between May 2025 and April 2026, drawn from the LinkedIn Outreach Benchmarks 2026 dataset of 13.2 million requests across 13,302 accounts. That report carries the full methodology, along with the breakdowns by sender seniority, company size and month that are not repeated here.

Two things to hold in mind while reading any of these figures. The industry is the sender’s, taken from their company profile, not the recipient’s. And only industries with at least 50 sending accounts are reported at all: below that, a single unusual account moves the average by several points, which is why some of the most extreme numbers in the full appendix are not published here.

Related industry benchmarks

• Marketing & Advertising, 29.4% acceptance and 10.6% message replies
• Information Technology & Services, 28.4% acceptance and 10.5% message replies
• Accounting, 29.5% acceptance and 12.0% message replies
• All industry benchmarks

Grade your own outreach against these numbers

Enter your own acceptance and reply rates and grade your outreach against the mechanical and industrial engineering benchmark, plus see where you sit among all 38 reported industries. No signup.

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Data updated 19 August 2026. Refreshed quarterly against the source report.