9 Best Transactional Email Software Compared (Pros & Cons)
Transactional emails are your trump card in your email marketing success today!
Have you ever refreshed your email app waiting for a code, password reminder, or an order confirmation email to come in?
Sometimes they come in an instant, but some other times, oh God those other times, that you have to wait hours to receive them are aggravating.
That’s why we are going to share with you the best transactional email software that can be relied upon in this article, so you know which one is the best to choose for your business.
Read on to find out more.
What is a Transactional Email?
Transactional emails are the emails that are sent to the customers in response to specific actions taken, usually after a purchase or account creation.
If you ever bought something online or made an account on a website, chances are that you have already received a transactional email.
According to an email marketing metrics benchmark study:
transactional emails generated an average 44.9 percent open rate which is way higher than any other kind of marketing emails.
The importance of these emails lies in their ability to carry the information the recipient has requested explicitly.
What are the Best Transactional Email Software?
Below are the 8 best transactional email software we have listed for you with a detailed comparison table:
| Software | Starting Price | Free Plan | Rating |
|---|---|---|---|
| Amazon SES | $0,10 per 1000 emails | Yes ✅ | 4.7 ⭐ |
| Mailjet | $15 per month | Yes ✅ | 4.3 ⭐ |
| Mailtrap | $10 per 10 000 emails | Yes ✅ | 4.5 ⭐ |
| Mailchimp Mandrill | $20 per block | Yes ✅ | 4.5 ⭐ |
| SendGrid | $19.95 per month | Yes ✅ | 4.2 ⭐ |
| Mailgun | $35 per month | Yes ✅ | 4.3 ⭐ |
| Brevo | $25 per month | Yes ✅ | 4.5 ⭐ |
| Postmark | $10 per month | Yes ✅ | 4.9 ⭐ |
| Sendloop | $9 per month | Yes ✅ | 4.5 ⭐ |
1. Amazon SES
Amazon Simple Email Service (Amazon SES) is a flexible and cost-effective emailing software that relies on Amazon’s infrastructure. With Amazon SES, you can easily send notifications and transactional emails to your users and keep in touch with them.
Amazon SES is reliable email sending software for businesses of all sizes to personalize their content in order to engage more clients.
You can use different methods like the Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP) interface, AWS, or Amazon SES console to integrate and directly send emails from this service.
Amazon SES allows you to create rules for the emails using the configuration sets feature, and it offers a free version for the first 62000 emails every month followed by some premium plans to fits any requirement.
For more information you can check out Amazon SES Capterra reviews.
Pros:
- The setup is straightforward
- It allows you to send 62000 free emails monthly
- It offers effective monitoring for email limits
- It has dedicated IP addresses
- Mailbox Simulator
- Spam check
- Click through tracking
Cons:
- The only con is since it only provides valid cases, it gets tricky once you need a sandbox environment to set up
Price:
- $0.10 per 1000 emails sent
- $0.12 per GB attachment sent
Capterra Rating: ⭐ 4.7 / 5
2. Mailjet
Mailjet is a simple and feature-rich email software for transactional emails that you can choose for your business.
You can create, manage and optimize your emails with Mailjet and create personalized templates and content for your customers.
Mailjet’s Email automation service lets you create on-time and engaging email messages and its powerful templating language allows you to quickly craft highly customized transactional emails.
You can also segment the contact list by preference, demographic or past behaviors to send the right customized content to your customers.
Take a look at Mailjet's Capterra reviews for detailed information.
Pros:
- Comprehensive Email tracking system
- In-app commenting feature
- Dedicated IP and A/B test
- Email segmentation and statistics
- Real-time monitoring and statistic
- Email builder and customizer
- Free 6000 Emails per month plan (No credit card required)
Cons:
- Limited automation options
- No planned pricing system
Price:
- Free Plan: $0 with 6,000 emails/month
- Basic plan $15 per month for 30000 emails
- Premium plan $25 per month for 30000 emails
- Enterprised customized solution request a quote
Capterra Rating: ⭐ 4.3 / 5
3. Mailtrap
Mailtrap is an email delivery platform for businesses and individuals to test, send, and control their email infrastructure in one place.
Mailtrap Email Testing provides a seamless solution to inspect and debug emails in staging, development, and QA environments, all without sending spam to recipients.
With support for HTML and CSS templates across the most popular mailbox providers, you can analyze email Spam Scores and check if your IP is on any blacklist reports.
The Email Testing API also enables automated testing flows.
Additionally, Mailtrap's Email API and SMTP service offer a secure and hassle-free setup, with an average email delivery time of ~1 second.
Plus, the actionable in-depth analytics provide unique monitoring capabilities to troubleshoot email infrastructure issues quickly and easily.
For detailed information, take a look at the Capterra reviews of Mailtrap.
Pros:
- All-in-one solution: Manage, deliver, test, and track emails with Mailtrap's comprehensive features.
- Dedicated customer support: Get exceptional guidance and support from Mailtrap's responsive team.
- Secure and easy setup: Mailtrap conducts security checks for hassle-free domain setup.
- Compatible with Sendgrid, Mailgun, and Mandrill: Use Mailtrap's standard SMTP and APIs for an effortless switch.
Cons:
- No 24/7 support and no live chat: you can contact Mailtrap support only via email
- Mailtrap doesn't include any drag-and-drop editors.
Price: There is separate pricing for Email Sending and Email Testing, but both have a free plan. Mailtrap Email API offers a straightforward plans grid, depending on sending volume. Free: 1,000 emails/mo
- Individual 10K: $10 per month (10,000 emails/mo)
- Business 100k: $85 per month (100,000 emails/mo)
- Enterprise 1,5M: $750 per month (1,500,000 emails/mo)
- Custom: By Request (over 5M emails/mo)
Capterra Rating: ⭐ 4.5 / 5
4. Mailchimp Transactional Email (Mandrill)
Mandrill is a transactional email service for Mailchimp users with a secure and reliable delivery API from websites and applications.
You can use Mandrill for both data-driven emails for eCommerce and personal one-to-one communications.
Mandrill provides you with a fully detailed statistical overview and searchable activity log on your dashboard.
You can have an A/B split test and comparative reports of your activities using this software.
Review the detailed Mandrill reviews on Capterra to learn more about this tool.
Pros:
- Comparative reports
- Split testing
- Searchable activity log
- Customizable tracking options
Cons:
- It is more expensive for small businesses with fewer customers
- Premium Consulting / Integration Services
Price:
Mandrill’s prices are based on the number of blocks (Each block 25000 Emails)
- 1 to 20 blocks $20 per block
- 21 to 40 blocks $18 per block
- 41 to 80 blocks $16 per block
- 81 to 120 blocks $14 per block
- 121 to 160 blocks $16 per block
- 161 blocks and more $10 per block
Capterra Rating: ⭐ 4.5 / 5
5. SendGrid
SendGrid is a cloud-based SMTP email delivery service that allows you to send emails without having to maintain email servers.
This email sending software manages all of the technical details and enables your entire team to send emails, and provides support through its online community and visual and textual content.
In addition, SendGrid provides client libraries in many languages along with transactional and responsive templates.
You can take a look at the in-depth and honest SendGrid reviews on Capterra to learn more about this useful software.
Pros:
- Client libraries in multiple languages
- Proactive ISP monitoring
- Global and module styles
- Flexible workflows
- Free plan for 100 Emails per day
- Provides security through two-factor authentication, IP access management, and more
Cons:
- No access to email validation on essential plan
- No Sub-user management on essential plan
Prices:
- Essential : $19.95 per month
- Pro: $89.95 per month
- Premier: Custom Pricing
Capterra Rating: ⭐ 4.2 / 5
6. Mailgun
Mailgun is an email validation service that lets you easily send emails from your own domain. It also lets you track your sent emails performance by robust open, click, bounce, and delivery tracking features.
It offers a complete cloud-based email service to send, receive and track the emails that are through your website.
Using this software's intelligent inbound routing and storage, you can track your emails and see where they ended up.
One of the good things about MailGun is that each domain is an isolated sub-account with its own queue and reputation that makes it easier to send transactional emails. Capterra reviews on Mailgun can help you with additional information.
Pros:
- Custom meta-data
- Individual IP address
- Batch sending
- Advanced Email analytics
- Preventing Email spamming
Cons:
- The price goes up as the number of emails and validation increase
- Old data is not comprehensive
- No backend mail building
Price:
MailGun’s pricing depends on the number of validations you require, along with the number of emails sent per month that you can pay as you grow. But it has other plans as well, which are listed below:
- Foundation: $35 per month 50,000 Emails included
- Growth: $80 per month 100,000 Emails included
- Scale: $90 per month 100,000 Emails included
Capterra Rating: ⭐ 4.3 / 5
7. Brevo
Brevo is an innovative solution for small and medium-sized businesses managing and tracking marketing and transactional emails.
Reviewing Brevo on Capterra we found out that this transactional software offers more automation and management features than Mailchimp, and its pricing is much more affordable. In addition, it provides a friendly email design tool, excellent reports, and advanced features such as A/B testing.
Pros:
- Contact management
- Automation workflow designer
- Message archiving and logs
- Nicely-featured free plan up to 300 Emails per day
- Various professional template designs
- Offers statistics for engagement and deliverability
Cons:
- There are no cons to it, except the part that it’s not recommended if you need multiple logins and different user access levels.
Price: Brevo offers three other pricing plans in addition to itsfree plan.
- Starter: $25 per month for 20,000 Email volume
- Premium: $65 per month for 20,000 Email volume with additional features
- BrevoPlus: Custom pricing
Capterra Rating: ⭐ 4.5 / 5
8. Postmark
Postmark is one of the best email sending software for sending time-sensitive transactional emails. It has a quick and easy setup and content-ready responsive email templates.
By routing transactional and promotional messages through parallel but separate infrastructure, According to Capterra, Postmark offers one of the most reliable email delivery services available today.
Pros:
- Status API and Templates
- Delivery and insights
- In-time test variable updates
- Best time-sensitive delivery services
- It comes with a free trial
Cons:
- It doesn't offer adequate premium consulting or integration services
Price:
- $10 per month for 10,000 Emails + $1.25 per 1,000 for additional emails
- $50 per month for 50,000 Emails + $1.00 per 1,000 for additional emails
- $100 per month for 125,000 Emails + $0.85 per 1,000 for additional emails
- $200 per month for 300,000 Emails + $0.60 per 1,000 for additional emails
Capterra Rating: ⭐ 4.9 / 5
9. Sendloop
Sendloop is one of the easiest and most user-friendly software for small businesses to use for their transactional email services.
It offers good customer service support, and you can easily target your audience with its autoresponders and bulk email features.
There are over 80 free email templates on Sendloop, along with a drag-and-drop email builder, and many other unique features.
Reviewing Sendloop on Capterra gives you a comprehensive view of the software.
Pros:
- A great tool to Customize automated Emails
- Various Email templates
- Good customer support
- Easy to use
Cons:
- Not enough variety in the pricing plans
- The report requires development with integration possibilities
- It automatically logs you out after a few minutes of inactivity
Price:
Sendloop offers unique pricing plans for frequent and occasional users.
- Regular Sendloop users can take advantage of the plan at a starting price of $9 per month
- For occasional users, Sendloop charges at a rate of $10 per 1,000 emails
Capterra Rating: ⭐ 4.5 / 5
What are Transactional Email Examples?
Transactional emails, also known as "triggered emails" or "automated emails", contain personalized information based on the action taken by the recipient.
Here is an example of a transnational email you may receive from Popupsmart, a no code popup builder, which is sent automatically after a user signs up.
Here is a list of different types of transactional emails you may receive:
- Order & shipping confirmations
- Tracking number notifications
- Password resets
- Welcome emails
- User activation emails
- Trial expiry emails
- Payment emails
What are Transactional Email Software Top Features?
Transactional Email Software are services businesses use to send relevant emails to customers in response to their actions.
Transactional email software facilitates the process of sending pre-established emails to your clients for agreed-upon transactions, like one-time passwords (OTPs), or creating accounts, and other vital instant information.
Transactional email software can act as additional security options or multi-step verification for your business and provide you with different services and features such as:
- Email Preview
- Email list management
- Contact management
- High-volume send
- Fast template Creation
- Automated email campaigns
- Tracking and Reporting
They monitor any real-time changes that take place on your customers' accounts and instantly generate emails accordingly.
Most businesses use transactional email software to send automated and personalized emails after any transaction to their customers.
Why You Should Use Transactional Emails?
Today's diverse business trends and challenges make every interaction with customers and prospects crucial for your business's survival.
Therefore, you must keep on top of your customers' feedback and satisfaction levels regarding your services if you want to remain competitive and profitable.
Transactional email software is one of the best tools to drive up your customer value and retention with frequent communications.
In fact, not all the email marketing and optimization processes are about newsletters and cart abandon campaigns.
Sometimes, transactional emails, such as an order confirmation, a welcoming email or a password reminder, are the most effective.
To Sum It Up
Transactional Email plays a key role in today's technological business world, and selecting the best service is vital for your business growth.
As we discussed above, each of these services has its own pros and cons, which will help you decide which suits your business objectives the best.
Hopefully, you have a clear picture of the best transactional email software now.
Listed below are the repeated questions and related terms and articles to this blog, check them out and please let us know if you have any further questions!
Frequently Asked Questions
What is the Difference Between a Transactional and Marketing Email?
Marketing emails are any kind of email with a marketing intent. Marketing emails are usually sent to a large list of customers or prospects in the form of newsletters, promotional and sales emails, event invites, or product updates. On the other hand, Transactional emails are one-to-one emails that contain personal information for the recipient which they requested for. A transactional email is sent to a single recipient rather than an extensive contact list.
What is the Best Transactional Email Service?
Here is a list of the best transactional email services:
- Amazon SES
- Mailjet
- Mandril
- SendGrid
- Mailgun
- Sendinblue
- Postmark
- Sendloop
Which is Better Mandrill or MailChimp?
Mandrill is a transactional email platform that was created by MailChimp. You can use Mandrill to create personalized one-to-one emails, whereas MailChimp is typically used for bulk email campaigns. Mandrill is a better option for transactional email services.
What's Better Than SendGrid?
Depending on your objectives and size, there are other alternatives you can consider, such as Amazon SES, Mailjet, Mandril or Mailgun.
Related Terms:
Related Articles:
