SendGrid alternatives
At 100k emails/mo, SendGrid costs $34.95 a month. 1 email API costs less, from $10 (Amazon SES). Ranked by price at the size you pick, with free plans, price hikes and how to switch.
Alternatives to SendGrid at 100k emails/mo, cheapest first
- Amazon SES: $10/mo new accounts start on $0.16/1k Essentials (À la carte, $0.10 per 1k (any account can switch to it)). Free plan: none. Last price hike: Jul 2026.
- Resend: $35/mo (Pro (Scale above 100k)). Free plan: 3,000 emails/mo (100/day).
- MailerSend: $68/mo (Hobby + overage, then Starter). Free plan: 500 emails/mo. Last price hike: Dec 2025.
- Mailgun: $75/mo (Basic, Foundation, then Scale). Free plan: 100 emails/day. Last price hike: Dec 2025.
- Brevo: $82/mo (Starter (Standard 500k, Professional 1M)). Free plan: 300 emails/day.
- Plunk: $100/mo (Pay as you go). Free plan: 1,000 emails/mo.
- Postmark: $115/mo (Basic plan). Free plan: 100 emails/mo (Free plan). Last price hike: Jan 2023.
- Loops: $199/mo (Growth (4 emails per contact)). Free plan: 1,000 contacts, 4,000 sends a month.
Prices at every size
- SendGrid: 10k emails/mo $19.95/mo, 50k emails/mo $19.95/mo, 100k emails/mo $34.95/mo, 500k emails/mo $499/mo, 1M emails/mo $799/mo
- Amazon SES: 10k emails/mo $1/mo, 50k emails/mo $5/mo, 100k emails/mo $10/mo, 500k emails/mo $50/mo, 1M emails/mo $100/mo (new accounts start on $0.16/1k Essentials)
- Resend: 10k emails/mo $20/mo, 50k emails/mo $20/mo, 100k emails/mo $35/mo, 500k emails/mo $350/mo, 1M emails/mo $650/mo
- MailerSend: 10k emails/mo $14.50/mo, 50k emails/mo $35/mo, 100k emails/mo $68/mo, 500k emails/mo $325/mo, 1M emails/mo $600/mo
- Mailgun: 10k emails/mo $15/mo, 50k emails/mo $35/mo, 100k emails/mo $75/mo, 500k emails/mo $400/mo, 1M emails/mo $700/mo
- Brevo: 10k emails/mo $17/mo, 50k emails/mo $56/mo, 100k emails/mo $82/mo, 500k emails/mo $429/mo, 1M emails/mo $999/mo
- Plunk: 10k emails/mo $10/mo, 50k emails/mo $50/mo, 100k emails/mo $100/mo, 500k emails/mo $500/mo, 1M emails/mo $1,000/mo
- Postmark: 10k emails/mo $15/mo, 50k emails/mo $55/mo, 100k emails/mo $115/mo, 500k emails/mo $455/mo, 1M emails/mo $775/mo
- Loops: 10k emails/mo $49/mo, 50k emails/mo $149/mo, 100k emails/mo $199/mo, 500k emails/mo $599/mo, 1M emails/mo $1,199/mo
Cheapest paid plan (plus overage when that's cheaper) covering the monthly volume, billed monthly. Contact-based pricing assumes 4 emails per contact.
How to move from SendGrid to Amazon SES
- 1. Verify your sending domain on Amazon SES. Add Amazon SES's SPF, DKIM and DMARC records at your DNS host. Keep SendGrid's records until you've fully switched.
- 2. Export your suppression list from SendGrid. In SendGrid, export the Suppressions lists (bounces, blocks, spam reports, unsubscribes) as CSV. Bounces, complaints and unsubscribes must carry over, or you'll email people who opted out.
- 3. Set up Amazon SES. Request production access (new SES accounts start in a sandbox), verify your domain with DKIM, then point your SMTP credentials or SDK at SES. Recreate your templates and import the suppression list.
- 4. Swap the API key behind a flag. Send a slice of traffic (say 10%) through Amazon SES first and watch bounces and spam complaints for a day.
- 5. Re-point webhooks. Bounce, complaint, open and click webhooks need new endpoints and payload parsing for Amazon SES.
- 6. Ramp up, then cancel SendGrid. If you send a lot, ramp volume over one to two weeks so mailbox providers get used to the new infrastructure. Cancel SendGrid once all traffic has moved.
Built a cheaper email API?
List it on PriceHiked for free as an alternative to SendGrid: Add your product. It's ranked by price at the same size; sponsored listings are labeled and never change the order.
Everything about SendGrid's own prices and price hikes: SendGrid.