Email remains a foundational channel for transactional messages, newsletters, user notifications, and automated workflows. Choosing the right email-delivery service means balancing deliverability, pricing, API/SMTP flexibility, analytics, and compliance. Below we compare five leading platforms.
Amazon SES (Simple Email Service)
Key Features: High-volume email sending, both SMTP and API endpoints; integrates deeply with the Amazon Web Services ecosystem; global infrastructure; flexible developer tooling.
Cost: Extremely competitive: e.g., when sending from EC2 or AWS Lambda the first 62,000 emails/month are free, then ~$0.10 per 1,000 emails; attachments and data transfer may add.
Security: Built on AWS infrastructure; supports DKIM, SPF, dedicated IPs, feedback loops, encryption in transit and at rest; compliance with AWS standard certifications.
Postmark
Key Features: Focused on transactional email (as opposed to just bulk newsletters); fast delivery, high deliverability, good analytics and webhooks for opens, clicks, bounces.
Cost: Pricing tiers based on volume; e.g., starting plans around ~10,000 emails/month for ~$10-$20, then incremental cost as volume rises.
Security: Dedicated IP options, DKIM/SPF support, strong reputation management; suitable for mission-critical transactional workflows.
SendGrid
Key Features: API + SMTP support, large ecosystem, supports transactional + marketing email, advanced analytics, templating, and large partner ecosystem.
Cost: Free tier often available (e.g., send up to 100 emails/day), then paid plans starting ~$15-$20/month for higher volumes; additional cost for dedicated IPs, extra features.
Security: Supports DKIM, SPF, dedicated IPs, sub-users, role-based access controls, SOC2/ISO certifications (depends on plan), and advanced deliverability tools.
SMTP.com
Key Features: Established SMTP relay service, good for both transactional and marketing email, supports dedicated IPs, deliverability consulting, reputation monitoring.
Cost: Pricing typically starts with a base plan (e.g., ~50,000-100,000 emails/month) and scales with volume; dedicated IPs extra.
Security: Offers dedicated sending infrastructure, monitoring, authentication features, reputation management support.
Mailgun
Key Features: Developer-centric email API, SMTP relay, high deliverability, inbound routing (webhooks for incoming email), analytics, and event webhooks for opens, clicks.
Cost: Pay-as-you-go model: e.g., first 5,000 emails free/month (in some tiers), then ~$0.80-$1 per 1,000 emails; dedicated IPs and premium features extra.
Security: Supports DKIM, SPF, dedicated IPs, two-factor authentication, API keys, strong event logging; used by tech teams requiring deep integration.
Which Platform Fits Your Use-Case?
Budget-conscious / AWS-native infrastructure:
Choose Amazon SES - lowest cost per email if you’re comfortable managing infrastructure and deliverability.
Transactional-only, high reliability:
Postmark is ideal if you send notifications, password resets, receipt emails, and want very high deliverability without marketing-bulk overhead.
All-in-one (transactional + marketing) with ecosystem:
SendGrid offers breadth of features and is good if you’ll scale into marketing workflows beyond pure transactional email.
Established SMTP relay + deliverability consulting:
SMTP.com fits organizations that want a trusted relay, dedicated IPs, and expert deliverability support.
Developer-centric, API-first, inbound + outbound email flows:
Mailgun is strong when you need programmatic control, inbound routing, analytics, and integration with microservice architectures.
Conclusion
Selecting the right email delivery platform depends on your volume, type of email (transactional vs marketing), budget, infrastructure, and deliverability goals. Each of the platforms above has distinct strengths: aligning them with your use-case ensures you get reliability, cost-efficiency, and future scalability.
