Subscribe to the newsletter to receive the latest content.
For personal email, I use the following ESPs: Gmail is my favorite, but not far behind is Yahoo, Outlook, and Zoho.
Gmail is part of the Google Workspace Business Starter plan, which costs $4.20/user/month, billed annually and limited to 30 GB of storage per user. Use email alias to save on cost. Here's how to add an alias to an existing email account, so you can send emails using it. Aside from aliases, you can also use groups. It doesn't count as additional account, but allow others to send emails to members. Here's how to setup Gmail in a 3rd party email client. To migrate the messages between accounts, read this.
Since we are on a Google service, to give a 3rd party app access to a Google account, like using Drive for backups, disable the "Less secure app access" option here.
Outlook is part of Microsoft 365 which is billed at $3/user/month (annual). With 1 TB of aggregate storage. Checkout Proton. MXRoute provides unlimited domains and email accounts for just $45 /year, but limited to 10 GB data. They have bigger size at extra cost. If you use this ESP, select CrossBox as the webmail.
For business email, Zoho allows the use of custom domain email for free, good for up to five users with 5 GB of storage space. The paid plan starts at $1 per user. They also have a WorkPlace plan annually billed at $3/user/month.
SpaceMail provides the Starter Plan at $0.68/month, 1 custom domain, 1 mailbox + $0.68 per additional mailbox, 3 GB/mailbox + $1.00 per additional 10 GB.
PurelyMail as the name suggest focuses purely on email service, nothing more. And because of that, they can offer just $10/year with no hard limits. Not on users, custom domains, storage, or anything else. The caveat? If you use significantly more than $10 a year in resources, you may need to switch to advanced pricing, which is pay-as-you-go. Checkout how cheap it is here.
Meco is mailbox for newsletter, so you can de-clutter your primary inbox, it provides a free email address you can use to send and recieve email.
AtomicMail.IO is a free, secure and private email service with unlimited storage. Started operations in 2024, based in Talinn, Estonia. It has a password protected email that self-destruct(automatically become unreadable) after 28 days or based on the expiration date set. Forwarding, POP3, and IMAP support is in the pipeline.
HubSpot offers a free email signature generator. Sender have a mail to link generator, MailToLinkGenerator is another option.
Mozilla ThunderBird is an email client that consolidates all your email inboxes in one application for easy access. BetterBird is a better version of ThunderBird, haha. Aerion, BlueMail, and MailSpring are excellent options. FairEmail is exclusively on Android. Vivaldi browser has a built-in email client, on top of other features like calendar, ad blocking, feed reader, notes, tab management, screenshots, translation, workspaces, and so much more.
Cypht is an online e-mail client that allows browsing and managing IMAP folders and sending outbound messages with SMTP. Download the docker image here.
---
A practical option is using the web host's webmail (Horde, SquirrelMail) and connecting it to your Gmail. Here's how. Take note, that if you decide to change webhost, then you need to transfer the emails too.
If migrating from Gmail to cPanel's webmail, export email messages by selecting Gmail here. Using the Horde webmail application, import the .mbox file in a new folder. If SquirrelMail is the default, switch to Horde by logging in and replace the "/3rdparty/squirrelmail/src/webmail.php" portion of the URL with "/horde/index.php" so it would look like this: "https://domain.com:2096/cpsessxxxxxxxxx/horde/index.php". If the .mbox file is too large, split it using this. An easier process, is to use Google's Data Migration Service. To account for time zone discrepancy, set the start date to at least a day prior to the oldest message date.
Cypht is a modern webmail app. Cypht is capable of combining several email accounts into one inbox.
Another solution is to use a free email routing like the one offered by CloudFlare. Here's how to use CloudFlare Email Routing with Gmail. Or use an email forwarding service like Anonaddy. They provide unlimited aliases, 20 domains but only 2 recipients, and 10MB monthly bandwidth. ForwardEmail is more generous in giving away unlimited domains, email addresses, and aliases. The attachment limit is 50MB.
---
Email marketing is a very effective way to build loyalty, trust, and brand awareness. Plus, it is useful for advertising and/or selling. There are 2 types of email sending services: Marketing and Transactional.
Marketing email is used to send commercial or promotional content with the intent of generating income. It is strictly governed by local laws. The email is usually sent to a large number of people or subscribers. Used in newsletters.
Transactional email, on the other hand, is one to one communication that usually belongs to a transaction or process. Used in e-commerce for sending the order confirmation, or for sending a security email notification.
These services are pretty expensive, especially for startups. Luckily, there are enterprise-grade platforms that offer free plans.
Brevo is a marketing email service that offers 300/day email sends to unlimited contacts. Integrate into WordPress easily with their plugin. It has SMTP feature, that can be used to enable websites and apps to send transactional emails. MailerLite gives 12,000 free email sending monthly. SendPulse is also a multi-channel marketing platform offering email marketing, SMS, CRM, web push, live chat, landing pages and popups. The free account is stingy with a limit of 500 contacts, however the subscription plans are a little cheaper. Kit offer unlimited email sending for up to 10,000 contacts in their free account.
If you are an EC2 user, Amazon SES allows sending up to 62,000/month for free, after which the standard rate of of $0.10 per 1,000 emails sent and received apply. Otherwise, send up to 3,000 free emails per month for 1 year, then standard rates apply. Here are guides for quick set-up and creating SMTP credentials. Spare yourself the hassle and use WP Offload SES Lite plugin which integrates it easily with WordPress. After the setup, replace it with Post SMTP which has logging and fallback feature in case of sending failure. For fallback use Brevo. IceGram Express plugin has post notification in the free version, option for no branding but no captcha.
Oracle Cloud's Email Delivery in the free tier allows sending of 3,000 per month, with a throttle limit of 100 per day and 10 per minute. After which the standard rate of $0.085 per 1,000 emails apply. Read how to create SMTP credentials. Take note, when setting it up with POST SMTP plugin, select the "Authentication" type to "Plain".
BigMailer is a pay-as-you-go email marketing service connected to an existing SES account. Send 2,000 emails per month to 1,000 contacts for free. It charges $1 per additional 1,000 contacts per month, this is on top of Amazon SES fees. Has multiple brand support.
MailBluster provides free plan with a limit of 3,000 email sends per month for unlimited subscribers. The paid plan just charges $0.20 per 1,000 email send, not including SES fees. SendDune is another option.
An alternative to SES is Elastic Email, which charges $0.09/1,000 emails, IP is quite expensive though at $1 per day.
MailRelay offer 80,000 email sends per month in their free account. Comes with automation, RSS to Email, SMTP server, and so much more.
Take note that in contact based billing model, you pay for all the contacts/subscribers, even those that are not active. The email based, especially if its pay as you go, and you efficiently use segmentation, can be a more practical choice. If you decide to lessen the frequency of emailing, you save big on monthly cost.
Moe savings can be had if free, open-source and self-hosted options are selected.
Courier and Mailu provides a complete mail server ecosystem, including SMTP, IMAP, POP3, webmail, mailing list management, and authentication.
Keila and ListMonk are newsletter and mailing list manager.
SendPortal is an open-source self-hosted email marketing. Works with Amazon SES, MailGun, SendGrid, PostMark, MailJet, etc.
More options available here:
PostalServer, Maddy and ZoneMTA(Zone Mail Transfer Agent) are free and open-source self-hosted SMTP servers. More alternatives can be found here. They are cost effective, just pay for the hosting, email sending is free, but requires technical knowledge to install, set-up and maintain.
---
CRM service bundled with email marketing is a sensible offering. Mautic is an open-source marketing automation project. CRM, email marketing, and other channels included in the package. Free to download and self-host. Here's the hardware requirements and the installation instruction in Ubuntu server. Don't forget to set up the cron jobs. If using cPanel, it is already part of Softaculous auto-installer. Mautic Email RSS Import Bundle and Mautic RSS to Email Bundle are some useful plugins.
GroundHogg is a free CRM(Customer Relations Management) and email marketing WordPress plugin, it has "funnels" automation but no post notification.
AgileCRM is cheap, while ActiveCampaign, Kajabi, Kartra, and Keap are pricey. Kajabi is suitable for websites that sell products and memberships. Kartra has a membership and and agency feature. BuilderAll is another all-in-one platform.
SuiteDash is a CRM with a project management feature.
Systeme allows creation of blogs, sales funnels, communities/memberships, online courses and digital stores. It has newsletters and workflows. The free account comes with one custom domain. The Startup plan is $17 per month.
Podia is another option, the Mover plan cost $33/month on a yearly billing.
HighLevel is an all-in-one platform. You can create full websites, funnels and landing pages. It has drag and drop surveys and forms, online appointment scheduling, email marketing, campaign management and automation, memberships, customer payments, analytics and reports, and much more. Start at $97/month.
Simple Membership is a free WordPress membership plugin with basic features. WP-Members has few features but comes with more than 120 action and filter hooks for customization and a library of API functions for extensibility. s2Member Framework version is 100% free but with limitations. The Pro version cost $89/site one-time payment with lifetime support.
AR Member plugin with Lite plan is free, but feature rich and comes with unlimited sites and membership plans, 19+ in-built addons, and 2 payment gateways. The Standard plan cost $69/year for 1 site.
---
Using free WordPress plugin like Newsletter, Noptin, or Email Subscribers & Newsletters is a cost-effective way of sending email campaigns when combined with an affordable ESP. Read how to send email using JavaScript, you can also use EmailJS.
Did you know you can create a contact form using Google Forms? Use the Email Notification for Google Forms app to receive email every time you get a message. OpenWidget is a free contact form pop-up. In WordPress, create forms with Ninja Forms and Contact Form 7. If you need to send Contact Form 7 data to an API endpoint, try Contact Form to Any API, and WPGetAPI plugins. Ultra Addons for Contact Form 7 offer plenty of free addons.
These are forms that can be added to static websites. FoxyForm is the very first contact form I've used. FormSubmit.CO is free a endpoint for HTML forms, just connect the form to the endpoint and it will email the submissions. No PHP, Javascript or any backend code required. Tally.so is an intuitive form builder offering unlimited forms and submissions in the free account as long as within the fair usage guidelines. LetterBird is free embeddable contact form.
FabForm.IO has a one-time payment of $99, for unlimited forms and submissions. FormSpark's free account provides 250 monthly submission, a $25 upgrade comes with 50,000 submissions. FormOwl.DEV costs $3 monthly with unlimited submissions.
To protect email forms from spambots, use hCaptcha, free up to 1 million requests per month. Lemin is free for up to 5,000 puzzle images. What's better than a captcha? No captcha, haha. Friendly Captcha has a free plan for 1 domain and up to 1,000 requests per month. MTCaptcha is free for 1 domain and 10,000 evaluations per month. CloudFlare's Turnstile is free but limited to 10 widgets and can be set to invincible. Integrate in WordPress using Simple CloudFlare Turnstile and Easy Cloudflare Turnstile plugins. Here's a tutorial on how to implement CloudFlare Turnstile by coding.
SVG Captcha is a free open-source and self-hosted captcha built in Node.JS. ALTCHA also offers a free open-source and self-hosted captcha with a PHP library. It has a WordPress plugin.
For Infusionsoft forms, SpamKill is a paid service but quite effective.
If you use the default WP mailer, the message will most likely end in spam. To prevent this, try sending via SendGrid. It is an API based Email Service Provider(ESP). Another option is Zoho Mail plugin, it requires an account. If you have an STMP provider like Gmail or ReachMail, use WP Mail SMTP or Bit SMTP.
In case you need, BeeFree provides a free drag & drop HTML email editor with tons of templates. It's responsive and no signup required. Another option is Topol.
Check for the "spammyness" of the email using Mail-Tester and GlockApp's Inbox Insights.
If your website is sending periodic newsletters and all of a sudden your subscribers aren't receiving them, then your site's domain or IP may be on the blacklist and the email went to spam. To make sure, use SpamHaus, the mother of all DNS-based Blocklist(DNSBL) services. Just look up your IP or domain and see if it's listed. If it returns positive, don't panic. The result provides a link that guides you on how to remove the unlucky website. Also check the domain's IP at DNSBL. If i its blacklisted, request removal here. MultiRBL is a free multiple DNSBL(DNS BlackList or RBL) lookup and FCrDNS(Forward Confirmed Reverse DNS or IPRev) check tool.
Use email validation to reduce bounces. For single email address, use Hunter.IO, VerifyEmailAddress, and MailInput. Check-Mail provides a generous 1,000 validation requests per month for free. Requires RapidAPI account and credit card details. For 50,000 validations, here are some cheap pay as you go providers: GamaLogic charges $60, MailMule $72, TheChecker for $79, and Bouncer $100. However, if you go higher MailMule is the most practical choice as it will only cost $135 for 250,000 requests!
When doing email marketing, its handy to include an email whitelist instruction link. Here's a sample of what it looks like.
---
I am in a situation where I need to use a disposable email address. It is an effective protection against spam. As a Web Developer, I use it for testing registration forms, etc. There are lots of free services out there, but I've found out that most have serious bugs. One site doesn't render the full message and in another service, the links in the message don't work.
Temp-Mail creates temporary disposable email. A further search led me to an ad-free service, FakeMailGenerator. It is very straightforward, upon visiting, it immediately generates an email address. You can specify your own, coupled with a variety of domain selections to choose from.
MailDrop suggests easy-to-read and editable addresses. But, the email address is limited to their domain. Yet, it offers a much-needed security feature. It generates an alias email together with the suggested one. The alias inbox is hidden from the public, and only you can access it using the original email. Great right?
EmailOnDeck is another site to try out since it renders the messages properly. The downside is the extra step. Also, there's an exit pop-up ad. Other than these, it’s an exceptional service.
Firefox Relay is a free service that hide the real email address by generating unique, anonymous email masks, which forward messages to the primary inbox, helping to protect from spam and tracking. DuckDuckGo's Email Protection.
---
An important step is to secure the domain emails, so its use is exclusive to the domain owner only and prevents "spoofing". This can be achieved by implementing SPF, DKIM, and DMARC. EasyDMARC provides lots of tools to analyze and create SPF, DKIM, and DMARC. Another option is DMARCIAN.
To generate a DKIM, use EasyDMARC and SparkPost tools.
PostMark a purely transactional email service, provides free DMARC reporting tool. It emails a weekly digest that's very easy to understand and troubleshoot. ValiMail is also offering free DMARC reporting for Microsft Office 365.
To check if the email address passes the various sender authentication mechanisms like the SPF, "iprev" and DKIM, send an email to [email protected]. It will reply with results.
Google PostMaster shows Gmail delivery errors, spam reports, feedback loop, and more.
Affiliate Disclosure: Post may contain links to affiliate websites, and we may receive a commission for any purchases or actions made by you on the websites using such links. Thank You.