I’m not going to dance around this at all: I’m a professional writer — and I love everything about “best regards.”

In the small subset of common email sign-offs, it’s my favorite for a huge variety of professional emails. I’ll get into the reasons why in this article.

But… I’ll also talk about the situations where you shouldn’t use “best regards.” Mostly cold emails, but also probably if you’re emailing your buddies or your mom.

I’ve also put together a few examples of emails that properly use best regards, and compared best regards to other common email sign-offs.

Let’s roll.

Best Regards: Table of Contents

• 4 Reasons Why “Best Regards” Is Such a Strong Email Sign-Off
• 3 Examples of Effectively Using Best Regards as an Email Sign-Off
• Why I Prefer “Best Regards” to 10 Alternative Email Sign-Offs
• Should I End Cold Emails with “Best Regards”?
• 3 Other Professional Scenarios Where Best Regards Doesn’t Work As a Sign-Off
• Best Regards FAQ
• So… What’s the Best Email Tool to Use to Send Your Regards?

4 Reasons Why “Best Regards” Is Such a Strong Email Sign-Off

Here are the four reasons why I advocate for using “best regards” to end your professional emails rather than the alternatives (like “sincerely” or “thanks”).

1. Best regards is versatile

Best regards does not ascribe a level of formality, familiarity, urgency, or expectation to a message — instead, it adapts to whatever tonal baseline you’ve established throughout the message.

If you’re sending in a formal cover letter to apply for a job, “best regards” makes sense as your sign-off.

Then, if you’re casually corresponding back and forth with a hiring manager for that job a few weeks later, “best regards” also makes sense as your sign-off.

Few other sign-offs, if any, can boast that versatility.

Like…

• “Sincerely” brings a certain amount of stilted formality to the proceedings.
• “Thanks in advance” is presumptuous and has much narrower applications.
• “Warmest regards” has no place in a professional email to a new contact.

The chameleon nature of “best regards” makes it an easy go-to — so you don’t have to agonize over what sign-off you’re going to use.

2. It’s benign, in a good way

As much as we devote our brainpower to picking the perfect sign-off, unfortunately, there’s one fundamental truth behind all of them:

There’s no professional email sign-off that’s going to seal the deal and make someone enthusiastically write you back.

I’d even go as far as to say a bad sign-off choice can only hurt your chances of getting someone to write you back. Like in my examples in the prior section, I might wince at the awkwardness of “sincerely” and be less inclined to respond.

But — even though sign-offs are all downside, you generally can’t shun them entirely. Professional standards dictate that you really do need some kind of sign-off.

That’s where the benign-ness of “best regards” is an asset.

Best regards is inoffensive and, again, not too formal nor too casual. In other words, it’s a sign-off that does its job: Checking the box of having a sign-off without potentially altering someone’s perception of you.

3. You can use it with virtually every type of contact

Whether you’re emailing a colleague or a client, you can use best regards.

If you’re a student reaching out to a professor, you can use best regards.

If you’re reaching out to a new contact or someone you’ve been doing business with for decades, you can use best regards.

In all five cases I’ve just detailed, the recipient wouldn’t flinch at “best regards.”

4. It’s not phony

I know we’re talking about email sign-offs here, but let’s switch for a moment to email openers (for me to make a point).

In particular, I’m going to talk about one of my least favorite openers: “I hope this email finds you well.”

Not only is that a waste of an opening line — it’s a vacuous, empty platitude.

The person sending that email doesn’t actually care if it “finds [me] well.” They’re just looking for some kind of small talk filler greeting before they get into asking me for something.

Now back to best regards. Best regards isn’t a way of pretending you care.

It’s a simple, unassuming way to say, “I’ve said my piece, I respect you, but I’m not going to pretend I’m trying to connect any deeper than that.”

3 Examples of Effectively Using Best Regards as an Email Sign-Off

Here are three types of emails that end in best regards.

I tried to really vary up these emails to show the wide swath of scenarios where “best regards” fits naturally at the end of an email.

Ultra-formal: Following up with a hiring manager

Dear Michael,

I wanted to follow up on my application for the Senior Analyst position, which I submitted on your website on September 19th. I remain very excited about the opportunity to contribute to your team and wanted to check if there are any updates regarding the status of my application.

Please let me know if any additional information is needed from my end. I look forward to hearing from you soon.

Thank you for your time and consideration!

Best regards,

Jessica Pollent

Semi-formal: Confirming meeting details

Hi Michael,

I just wanted to confirm our meeting for Monday, November 4th at 11:00 A.M. I’m looking forward to connecting with you and learning more about what MegaCorp might be able to do for our company.

Please let me know if anything changes on your end or if you need anything from me beforehand.

Best regards,

Jessica

Casual: Talking with a long-time vendor

Hi Michael,

It’s been a little while since we last connected — hope everything is still going great for you and the team up in Seattle.

As we gear up for the next few months, I wanted to see if you have any upcoming promotions or discounts on shipping costs.

We’ve always valued working with you, and any heads-up would be great as we make our Q1 2025 plans.

Best regards,

Jessica

Why I Prefer “Best Regards” to 10 Alternative Email Sign-Offs

Here are 10 other popular email sign-offs — and why I prefer “best regards” to all of them.

Kind regards / warm regards

Tone: Warmer and friendlier than best regards.

Why they’re inferior to best regards: You can’t use these in as many scenarios. They’re both more informal — and almost nurturing. I wouldn’t want to use something this pillowy soft in formal communications, or any messages with stakes.

Sincerely

Tone: Formal and serious.

Why it’s inferior to best regards: It’s stilted and feels antiquated, not right for a lot of modern, day-to-day professional correspondence.

Thanks / thanks again

Tone: Friendly and polite.

Why they’re inferior to best regards: There’s a suggestion of gratitude here that’s not a good fit for every scenario.

Thanks in advance

Tone: More than a little passive-aggressive.

Why it’s inferior to best regards: It’s too presumptuous and can be off-putting, especially compared to the more neutral tone of best regards.

All the best

Tone: Friendly and somewhat optimistic.

Why it’s inferior to best regards: This sign-off is less common than “best regards,” so it might stop someone and make them think about it — rather than your message. It’s also not quite as professional.

Cheers

Tone: Informal, friendly, and maybe British.

Why it’s inferior to best regards: Too informal and too colloquial for a lot of cases, especially with new contacts. Plus I do a really bad British accent, so if I sent this, a contact mistook me for British and liked that about me, I would have a tough time faking that persona indefinitely.

Take care

Tone: Warm and fairly informal

Why it’s inferior to best regards: This treads into feeling too personal, especially in more formal situations.

Looking forward to it

Tone: Very casual

Why it’s inferior to best regards: Comes off surprisingly demanding, which isn’t always the tone you want as your closing beat in an email.

Should I End Cold Emails with “Best Regards”?

No.

Unfortunately, this is where my love fest with “best regards” crashes right into the side of the mountain.

While “best regards” is great for most professional emails, cold outreach isn’t one of them.

The reason: Cold emails don’t need a sign-off.

Sign-offs run counter to three of the absolute core principles of effective cold emailing:

1. Ending with a CTA.
2. Keeping the message as short as possible.
3. Making every single damn word in the message focused on driving one prospect action.

You want your cold email to end with an irresistible (or, at least, intriguing) call-to-action. You don’t want to unleash your CTA and then follow it up with a sign-off.

Even sign-off royalty like “best regards.”

3 Other Professional Scenarios Where Best Regards Doesn’t Work As a Sign-Off

While I’m already speaking ill of best regards, might as well keep it going and share some other situations where I wouldn’t use it as an email sign-off.

Internal communications

Don’t end an email to your teammates, your boss, or your boss’s boss with “best regards.”

In those situations it feels too unfamiliar. Instead, I’d recommend a “Thanks!” or “Talk soon” type of ending to the message.

Delivering bad news

If you’re expressing condolences, turning down job candidates or vendors, or delivering other bad news, I’d avoid ending with “best regards.”

This is actually a case where “Sincerely” works better, as it adds that layer of formal distance.

Informal thank-yous or other emails that you want to have a spontaneous vibe

You may pore over a “quick” thank you note after an interview — but you want it to look like you just typed it from the heart and sent it off.

In that case, and in the case of other informal messages, a sign-off like “best regards” feels somewhat overproduced.

You’re better off here with something leaning more familiar and casual, like “Thanks again” or “Take care.”

Best Regards FAQ

Here are the most common questions people ask about “best regards” and my shot at giving helpful, definitive answers to those questions.

Is it correct to say “best regards”?

Yes, it is correct to say “best regards” as your sign-off for an email (or other document).

Best regards is a widely accepted and recognized sign-off that works in both formal and less formal situations. It’s both polished and natural, which means it’s appropriate for clients, customers, partners, and other professional contacts.

Is best regards outdated?

No, best regards is not outdated — in fact, it’s one of the most widely used and accepted modern email sign-offs.

There’s a certain timeless quality to it because of its neutrality and the fact that it’s professional without being awkwardly formal.

What can we write instead of “best regards”?

Other popular sign-offs include kind regards, sincerely, best, thanks, and take care.

Be careful, though, as different sign-offs work (or don’t work) in different contexts. One reason I like best regards is its versatility. Sincerely, for instance, sends a more formal message — which may or may not be your desired tone.

Does best regards need to be capitalized?

You should capitalize the the “b” — making the exact way you write the sign-off “Best regards” followed by a comma. (Then a line break or two, then your name.)

I would NOT recommend capitalizing the R to start “regards” as well. This is a situation where you should use sentence case, not title case.

Is “best regards” formal or informal?

Best regards toes the line between formal and informal.

It’s not the most formal sign-off, but it’s also formal enough for most business communication.

It’s also not the most informal sign-off — far from it — but it’s casual enough to flow naturally in your more conversational communication.

Is best regards impolite?

No, best regards is not impolite. It’s the perfect level of politeness, actually; it’s respectful and polite, but in a neutral and not overbearing way.

Can you put best regards in email?

Yes, you should absolutely put best regards in email as your sign-off.

In fact, when in doubt for what your sign-off should be, best regards is a great pick.

What’s the difference between “best regards” and “kind regards”?

The biggest difference between “best regards” and “kind regards” is the tone.

“Kind regards” sends a warmer and softer message, so you shouldn’t use it in as many professional scenarios as you use the more neutral “best regards.”

So… What’s the Best Email Tool to Use to Send Your Regards?

Now that I’ve effectively celebrated “best regards” for 1,500 words, it’s time to actually send some emails.

And I’d love for you to give GMass a look.

If you’re not familiar, GMass is a tool that actually turns Gmail into an email sending platform.

You can send any email campaigns through Gmail — newsletters, cold outreach, mail merge, mass emails, internal comms, and everything else — using GMass.

We offer unlimited everything, from messages to contacts to campaigns. We also give you unlimited email tracking and address verification included in every plan.

Plus we have the best set of tools in the industry to help keep you out of spam and in the inbox.

Come find out why 300,000+ people, from sales pros to nonprofits, are using GMass to replace their other email tools — and why they’ve given us an average rating of 4.8 out of 5 stars across 10,000+ reviews.

And, of course, it’s super easy to get started. Just download the Chrome extension and you’ll start a free trial — no credit card required.

You can check out our quickstart guide and you’ll be up and running in a matter of minutes.

Best regards,

Sam