5 best email service platforms with free plans

Getting started with email shouldn’t be expensive. Whether you’re sending onboarding messages, product updates, or password resets, email APIs make it easy to build messaging into your app or service. And with the right platform, you can test delivery, performance, and analytics without paying upfront.

We’ve evaluated five of the most reliable email service platforms offering free tiers. Each provider has a different take on what “free” means, so we’ve broken it down for clarity.

• Free sending limits: 100 emails per day (approximately 3,000 per month), no expiration
• Included tools: RESTful Email API, SMTP relay, event tracking, webhook support, inbound email routing, one-day log retention, ticket-based support

Platform overview: Mailgun offers developer-first email infrastructure focused on speed, control, and deliverability. Setup is quick with domain authentication and API key generation. Email events like opens, clicks, and bounces are logged and viewable in real time. The platform also supports inbound routing for reply management.

Evaluate Mailgun for scalable, high-performance email delivery with access to predictive inbox placement tools, email validation APIs, and detailed reporting as you grow. Mailgun is part of Sinch and optimized for dev teams building product-critical messaging.

• Free sending limits: 300 emails per day (approximately 9,000 per month)
• Contact limits: Manage up to 100,000 contacts
• Included tools: Email template editor, customizable templates, API access, SMTP relay, webhooks, SMS and WhatsApp messaging

Platform overview: Brevo merges email marketing and transactional email in a single dashboard. The visual builder and subscriber management tools simplify content creation. Developers can send emails via API or SMTP, with access to event tracking and performance data. Marketing automation is included, though limited, and scaling unlocks deeper segmentation and analytics capabilities.

• Free sending limits: 3,000 emails per month for 12 months
• Post-trial pricing: $0.10 per 1,000 emails sent
• Included tools: SMTP support, API integration via AWS SDKs, Deliverability Manager, inbound processing

Platform overview: Amazon Simple Email Service is built for cost-conscious teams running inside AWS. The service focuses on reliability, throughput, and performance. It lacks a user-friendly UI or design tools but delivers strong API and CLI integration. SES includes monitoring via Deliverability Manager and scales well with production traffic.

• Free sending limits: 6,000 emails per month, capped at 200 per day
• Contact limits: Store up to 1,500 contacts
• Included tools: API and SMTP access, drag-and-drop email editor, subscription form builder, basic analytics, webhooks

Platform overview: Mailjet is designed for teams who need both a visual editor and programmatic email delivery. The free plan includes access to APIs, SMTP, and basic analytics. Setup is fast, requiring domain verification and API key generation. While the plan adds Mailjet branding to outgoing emails, essential features are unlocked without payment.

• Free sending limits: 500 emails per month, with a daily cap of 100
• Included tools: Email API access, analytics dashboard, suppression list tools, sender health metrics, webhook support

Platform overview: SparkPost provides visibility into deliverability and recipient engagement. Even on the free tier, users get real-time dashboards, spam trap detection, and sender reputation tools. It supports email templating and event-based webhooks. For developers focused on monitoring and optimization, SparkPost’s free tier delivers data access and testing capabilities.

Each platform in our list offers enough capability on its free tier to test, build, and iterate on real-world email use cases. Here’s a quick recap:

1. Mailgun Free Plan: https://www.mailgun.com/pricing/
2. Brevo Free Plan: https://www.brevo.com/pricing/
3. Amazon SES Pricing: https://aws.amazon.com/ses/pricing/
4. Mailjet Free Plan: https://www.mailjet.com/pricing/
5. SparkPost Free Plan: https://pages.sparkpost.com/tm-us.html

Author: Em Blitstein Em Blitstein is a Sr. Content Marketing Manager at Sinch Mailgun. She manages the Mailgun Blog, curates top-notch content, and falls down SEO rabbit holes. She writes about all things email and loves a good dev deep dive.