Your newsletter is doing well. Subscribers are signing up, your list keeps growing, and you're still sending roughly the same number of campaigns each month. So why does your Mailchimp bill keep going up?
It's a fair question, especially if all you need is a straightforward weekly newsletter.
Take a list of 10,000 subscribers. Using the prices in this comparison, Mailchimp's Standard plan comes to about $230 a month. Sending four newsletters to that same list through Amazon SES would cost around $6.40 in email delivery fees.
That sounds like an easy decision. It isn't quite that simple. Mailchimp gives you the tools to run email campaigns; Amazon SES gives you the infrastructure to send them. The interesting question is whether you need everything you're paying Mailchimp for.
Why Mailchimp gets more expensive as your list grows
Mailchimp's pricing is tied in part to the number of contacts in your audience. For the Standard plan, the example prices we're using are roughly $135 a month for 5,000 contacts, $230 for 10,000, and $385 for 25,000.
That means your bill can rise even if you don't send a single extra campaign. Unsubscribed contacts can also count toward your billable audience until you archive them.
Of course, you're not just paying for delivery. You're paying for a campaign editor, audience management, automations, reporting, and other marketing features. If you rely on those tools, the subscription may be worth it.
But if you mostly write a newsletter, pick a list, and hit Send, it's reasonable to wonder whether there's a cheaper way.
What would those emails cost with Amazon SES?
Amazon Simple Email Service (SES) is built around sending volume rather than audience size. For this comparison, we'll use an assumed Essentials rate of $0.16 per 1,000 emails. Depending on your setup, the pay-as-you-go rate of $0.10 per 1,000 emails may also be relevant.
Let's assume you email your entire list four times a month:
| Subscribers | Emails per month | Mailchimp Standard | Amazon SES delivery |
|---|---|---|---|
| 5,000 | 20,000 | ~$135 | $3.20 |
| 10,000 | 40,000 | ~$230 | $6.40 |
| 25,000 | 100,000 | ~$385 | $16.00 |
These are illustrative prices, not quotes. The SES column covers email delivery at the assumed rate, not the full cost of running a newsletter. Other AWS charges may apply.
Still, the difference is hard to ignore. The catch is that SES isn't a drop-in replacement for Mailchimp.
The part Amazon SES leaves to you
If you've worked with AWS before, you may already know SES as the service behind password resets, account confirmations, and receipts.
It can send marketing emails too. What it doesn't give you out of the box is the kind of newsletter workflow you get with Mailchimp. There's no comparable all-in-one campaign editor, ready-made signup form experience, convenient marketing segmentation, or campaign reporting dashboard.
You'll also need to handle some setup and ongoing responsibilities:
- Verify your sending domain and configure email authentication.
- Request production access to move your SES account out of the AWS sandbox. Approval is up to AWS.
- Keep track of unsubscribes, bounces, and spam complaints so you don't keep emailing people you shouldn't.
- Maintain a healthy list and sending practices. Low delivery costs don't guarantee good inbox placement.
None of this is necessarily difficult if you're comfortable with AWS or already have software to manage campaigns. But building a newsletter workflow around SES alone can quickly become a project of its own.
For a closer look at the technical side, see our Amazon SES deliverability guide.
A middle ground: use SES for delivery and another tool for campaigns
You don't have to choose between Mailchimp's full platform and managing everything yourself in AWS.
Another option is to send through your own SES account while using a separate email marketing tool to handle the day-to-day work.
That's how Mailomia works. You connect your AWS account, then use Mailomia to build newsletters, manage contacts and segments, create signup forms, and review campaign results.
It also helps with domain setup and the SES production-access request, handles bounces and complaints, and provides warm-up plans for gradually increasing sending volume. AWS still decides whether to approve production access, and your sending practices still matter for deliverability.
Mailomia is free for up to 5,000 emails a month. That gives smaller newsletters a way to get started without paying for the campaign tool, although AWS still charges for delivery. If you send more than 5,000 emails a month, Mailomia is $19 per month plus AWS sending costs. All three examples below exceed the free allowance:
| Subscribers | Mailchimp Standard | Mailomia + SES delivery | Estimated annual savings |
|---|---|---|---|
| 5,000 | ~$135 | $22.20 | ~$1,350 |
| 10,000 | ~$230 | $25.40 | ~$2,450 |
| 25,000 | ~$385 | $35.00 | ~$4,200 |
These estimates assume you email every subscriber four times a month, use the prices above, and incur no additional charges. They also don't account for differences in features between the products.
Should you actually leave Mailchimp?
Maybe. If you mainly send regular newsletters and your audience is growing faster than your need for new marketing features, it's worth running the numbers. Even after paying for a campaign tool on top of SES, the savings could be substantial.
But price isn't the only thing to consider. If your business depends on Mailchimp's advanced automations, integrations, or other marketing features, make sure your replacement can do what you need. Saving on a subscription isn't much of a win if you end up rebuilding half your workflow.
And don't treat migration as a simple CSV import. Bring over your suppression data as well as your active subscribers, so you don't accidentally email people who unsubscribed or previously bounced. Keep your consent records, and start by sending to your most engaged subscribers before ramping up.
The bottom line is fairly simple: Mailchimp can be good value when you use the broader platform. If what you really need is a reliable way to send campaigns to a growing list, Amazon SES paired with the right interface can cost a lot less.
