Amazon SES vs Mailgun: which is better for email sending?

Amazon SES and Mailgun are both SMTP-and-API email sending services aimed at developers. Neither is an email marketing platform -- they are the pipes your application or marketing tool sends through. The choice between them comes down to cost at scale, the deliverability features you need, and how much operational complexity you are willing to handle.

What they have in common

Both services provide an SMTP relay and an HTTP API for sending email. Both support dedicated IPs, custom sending domains, DKIM signing, bounce and complaint handling via webhooks, and suppression lists. At a basic level, either one will let you send transactional or marketing email reliably.

Where they differ

Price

This is where the gap is most pronounced. Amazon SES charges $0.10 per 1,000 emails -- one of the lowest rates in the industry. Mailgun's pricing starts higher and scales less favorably. At 100,000 emails per month, SES costs about $10. Mailgun's equivalent tier runs $35 or more depending on the plan.

For high-volume senders, this difference compounds quickly. At 1 million emails per month, SES is roughly $100. Mailgun is several hundred dollars. For pure send volume at scale, SES wins on price without much contest.

Ease of setup

Mailgun wins on setup speed. You can have a sending domain verified and your first email sent in under 30 minutes. The dashboard is clear, the API documentation is well-organized, and the sandbox environment lets you test without production consequences.

SES takes more work. You start in a sandbox that only allows sending to verified addresses, and moving to production requires submitting a request to AWS explaining your sending use case and expected volume. AWS reviews and approves this manually, which typically takes one to two business days. For developers who need to move fast, this friction is real.

Deliverability tools

Mailgun includes inbox placement testing, email validation, and more detailed analytics out of the box. You can see open rates, click rates, bounces, and complaints without connecting a third-party analytics tool.

SES provides bounce and complaint notifications via SNS, and integration with Google Postmaster Tools for Gmail reputation monitoring. It does not include inbox placement testing or email validation natively -- those require separate tools or services.

Email validation

Mailgun has a built-in email validation API that checks whether an address is real before you send to it. SES does not. If list hygiene is a priority, you either need a separate validation service with SES or use Mailgun's validation as a standalone product even if you send through SES.

Dedicated IPs

Both offer dedicated IPs. Mailgun includes one in higher-tier plans. SES charges $24.95 per dedicated IP per month on top of sending costs. For senders who need dedicated IPs at volume, SES's dedicated IP cost needs to be factored into the total.

Support

Mailgun offers email support on all paid plans and faster response times on higher tiers. AWS support requires a separate support plan -- the free tier gets community forums only, and paid support plans start at $29/month for developer support. For teams that need responsive help when something goes wrong, Mailgun's support model is more accessible.

The full comparison

When to choose Amazon SES

• You are already on AWS and want native integration with your infrastructure
• You send at high volume and price per email is the primary concern
• You have engineering resources to handle the setup and operational complexity
• You can tolerate the sandbox approval process before going live
• You use a separate email marketing platform like AledaMail that connects to SES and handles the deliverability tooling layer

When to choose Mailgun

• You need to get sending live quickly without an approval process
• You want built-in validation and inbox testing without additional services
• You are sending moderate volume where the price difference is not significant
• You need responsive support without paying separately for it
• You are building a developer-facing application and want clean API documentation

The SES + email marketing platform pattern

Many senders get the best of both by connecting SES to an email marketing platform. SES handles the sending infrastructure at low cost; the platform handles campaign management, list segmentation, automation, analytics, and deliverability monitoring. This separates the economics of sending from the tooling of running a sending program.