Mailgun vs SendGrid for Solo Developers

Quick Comparison

Mailgun Overview

Mailgun has been in the email API space for years, primarily serving developers who need reliable transactional email delivery. The platform focuses on deliverability, offering email validation, inbound email processing, and detailed analytics.

Mailgun's API supports both REST and SMTP. You can send emails through HTTP requests or configure your application to use Mailgun as an SMTP relay. The logging system is thorough, showing every event from send to delivery to open. When an email bounces or gets marked as spam, Mailgun tells you exactly why.

The email validation API is a unique feature. You can verify email addresses before sending to them, reducing bounces and protecting your sender reputation. For applications that collect email addresses from users, this validation can prevent a lot of deliverability headaches down the line.

SendGrid Overview

SendGrid (now owned by Twilio) is one of the largest email platforms in the world. It handles both transactional email (password resets, order confirmations) and marketing email (newsletters, campaigns) in a single platform. The scale is massive: SendGrid sends over 100 billion emails per year.

The platform offers a visual email builder for marketing campaigns, dynamic templates for transactional email, and an API that supports both v3 REST and SMTP. The Event Webhook notifies your application of deliveries, opens, clicks, bounces, and spam reports in real time.

I used SendGrid on an early project because it had a free tier and was well-known. The API works fine, and email deliverability was acceptable. But the dashboard feels dated, the documentation is sprawling, and the overall experience is less polished than newer competitors.

Key Differences

Free tier. SendGrid offers 100 emails per day (3,000 per month) for free. Mailgun removed their free tier and now offers only a trial with limited sends. For a solo developer starting out, SendGrid's persistent free tier is a meaningful advantage. You can run a small project on SendGrid without ever paying.

Marketing email. SendGrid includes a full marketing email platform with visual email builders, contact management, and campaign analytics. Mailgun is focused on transactional email only. If you need both transactional and marketing email from one provider, SendGrid covers both. With Mailgun, you need a separate marketing email service.

Pricing structure. Mailgun's Foundation plan starts at $35/month for 50,000 emails. SendGrid's Essentials plan starts at $19.95/month for 50,000 emails. SendGrid is nearly half the price at comparable volumes. For budget-conscious solo developers, SendGrid's pricing is more accessible.

Email validation. Mailgun includes an email validation API that checks addresses for deliverability before you send. This is genuinely useful for reducing bounce rates. SendGrid offers validation through a separate product. If you're collecting email addresses and want to verify them, Mailgun's built-in validation is convenient.

Inbound email. Mailgun supports receiving emails (inbound routing) as a core feature. You can parse incoming emails and route them to your application via webhooks. SendGrid also supports inbound parsing but it's less prominent in their feature set. If your application needs to process incoming emails, Mailgun handles it well.

Dashboard and UI. Neither platform wins design awards. SendGrid's dashboard is functional but cluttered with navigation for marketing features you might not use. Mailgun's dashboard is simpler but feels dated. Both could learn a lot from Resend's clean interface. This is an area where newer email services have a clear advantage.

Deliverability. Both platforms have decent deliverability, but community reports suggest mixed results. SendGrid's shared IP deliverability can vary. Mailgun's deliverability has received complaints after their acquisition. Neither is considered best-in-class for deliverability anymore, with services like Postmark and Amazon SES typically rated higher.

When to Choose Mailgun

• You need email validation to check addresses before sending
• Inbound email processing is a requirement for your application
• You want a transactional-only email service without marketing features
• The email validation API is worth the higher base price for your use case
• You prefer Mailgun's simpler, transactional-focused feature set

When to Choose SendGrid

• You want a free tier that persists (100 emails/day, no trial expiration)
• You need both transactional and marketing email in one platform
• Lower pricing at comparable volumes matters for your budget
• You want a visual email builder for marketing campaigns
• The larger ecosystem and Twilio backing provide confidence

The Verdict

Here's the honest truth: both Mailgun and SendGrid feel like legacy options in 2026. They work, they're reliable enough, and they have the features you need. But the developer experience, pricing, and interfaces of both platforms have been surpassed by newer services like Resend and Postmark.

If you must choose between these two, SendGrid is the better option for solo developers. The persistent free tier, lower pricing, and combined transactional/marketing capabilities give you more for less. Mailgun's email validation is nice, but it doesn't justify the higher price for most use cases.

My honest recommendation: consider Resend for transactional email or Postmark for deliverability-critical applications instead. Both offer better developer experiences, cleaner APIs, and pricing that makes more sense for solo developers. Mailgun and SendGrid are fine choices, but the email API space has moved forward and newer options are genuinely better.