Mailgun alternatives
Providers that compete with Mailgun on at least one of: Transactional
Developer-leaning email infra, owned by Sinch.
Switching as growth and lifecycle teams
Growth work lives or dies on targeting and measurement. What matters is whether behavioral triggers can be built without engineering time, whether the event stream supports attribution past the open, and whether deliverability holds when broadcast volume shares a reputation with product email.
Mailgun does not cover operating track record and best published rate per 1,000, and none of the alternatives below close that gap either. If it is a hard requirement, the shortlist has to widen beyond this category.
ranked for growth and lifecycle teams
- 01
MailerSend
TransactionalModern transactional API with a clean UI.
Matches Mailgun on every priority weighed here, so the decision is price and preference.
500/mo permanent · $7/mo for 5,000 emails - 02
Loops
Marketing TransactionalModern lifecycle and broadcast email for SaaS.
Gives up multi-tenant support against Mailgun and adds nothing on these priorities.
1,000 contacts and 4,000 sends/mo on the Free plan · $49/mo for 5,000 contacts - 03
Resend
TransactionalEmail API tightly coupled to React Email.
Gives up multi-tenant support against Mailgun and adds nothing on these priorities.
3,000/mo permanent, capped at 100/day, one domain · $20/mo for 50,000 emails - 04
Brevo
Transactional MarketingAll-in-one with a generous daily free tier.
Gives up multi-tenant support against Mailgun and adds nothing on these priorities.
300/day permanent · $9/mo for 5,000 emails - 05
Postmark
TransactionalTransactional-only, fast and well-delivered.
Gives up scheduling against Mailgun and adds nothing on these priorities.
100/mo developer plan · $15/mo for 10,000 emails - 06
Mailtrap
Transactional TestingOriginally a staging inbox, now a sender too.
Gives up scheduling against Mailgun and adds nothing on these priorities.
4,000/mo (sending), free testing tier · $15/mo for 10,000 sending - 07
Cloudflare Email Service
Inbound TransactionalFree routing, programmable inbound via Workers, sending in beta.
Gives up scheduling against Mailgun and adds nothing on these priorities.
Email Routing free; Email Workers on Workers Free plan · Sending: $0.35 per 1,000 messages (Workers Paid required, $5/mo) - 08
SMTP2GO
TransactionalReliable SMTP relay with strong deliverability.
Gives up scheduling against Mailgun and adds nothing on these priorities.
1,000/mo permanent · $10/mo for 10,000 emails
Mailgun and its alternatives, side by side
Columns are the priorities growth and lifecycle teams weigh, in order. Mailgun is the first row so the trade in each direction is readable at a glance.
| Provider | Scheduling | Event stream | Operating since | Suppressions API | Best published rate per 1,000 | Multi-tenant |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Mailgun | Yes | Yes | 2010 | Yes | $0.70 | Yes |
| MailerSend | Yes | Yes | 2020 | Yes | Tiers not published in comparable form | Yes |
| Loops | Yes | Yes | 2022 | Yes | Tiers not published in comparable form | No |
| Resend | Yes | Yes | 2023 | Yes | $0.35 | No |
| Brevo | Yes | Yes | 2012 | Yes | Tiers not published in comparable form | No |
| Postmark | No | Yes | 2010 | Yes | $1.50 | Yes |
| Mailtrap | No | Yes | 2014 | Yes | Tiers not published in comparable form | Yes |
| Cloudflare Email Service | No | Yes | Not published | Yes | Tiers not published in comparable form | Yes |
| SMTP2GO | No | Yes | 2006 | Yes | Tiers not published in comparable form | Yes |
Nothing on this list is a clean upgrade: every alternative trades something away against Mailgun on these priorities, so the choice depends on which of them the build actually needs.
before you switch
Mailgun pricing, tier by tier
All 3 paid tiers with effective cost per 1,000 emails. Worth checking whether the cost curve, rather than the feature set, is what is prompting the switch.