Amazon SES vs Substack: Pricing Comparison 2026
Side-by-side pricing comparison of Amazon SES and Substack. See all plans, features, and costs at a glance.
Bottom line: Amazon SES starts at $0.000032/mo, making it $5/mo cheaper than Substack ($5/mo). Substack offers a free plan.
Last updated: August 10, 2026
Amazon SES vs Substack: Quick Pricing Facts
| Feature | Amazon SES | Substack |
|---|---|---|
| Starting Price | $0.000032/mo | $5/mo |
| Number of Plans | 49 | 7 |
| Free Tier | No | Yes |
| Pricing Model | usage-based | usage-based |
| Annual Discount | N/A | N/A |
Amazon SES is the more affordable option, starting at $0.000032/mo compared to Substack's $5/mo. Both are Email Marketing tools with 56 combined pricing plans and 22 features compared.
Substack stands out with a free plan for getting started.
Review the detailed tier-by-tier comparison above to see exactly which features are included at each price point and find the best fit for your Email Marketing needs.
| Pricing Plans |  Amazon SES Try free |  Substack Try free |
|---|---|---|
| Tier 1 | 0 – 10M emails1 / month $0/month | Free $0/monthCheapest Includes
|
| Tier 2 | 10 – 100M emails / month $0/monthCheapest | Basic $5/month $5 / year Includes
|
| Tier 3 | > 100M emails / month $0/monthCheapest | Standard $7/month $7 / year Includes
|
| Tier 4 | Per account per region per month Custom pricing | Advanced $10/monthCheapest $10 / year Includes
|
| Tier 5 | Feature Custom pricing | Pro $15/monthCheapest $15 / year Includes
|
| Tier 6 | Outbound sending Custom pricing | Premium $30/monthCheapest $30 / year Includes
|
| Tier 7 | Outbound Email 1 Custom pricing | Enterprise $75/monthCheapest $75 / year Includes
|
| Tier 8 | Virtual Deliverability Manager - SES deliverability Custom pricing | - |
| Tier 9 | Virtual Deliverability Manager - Global deliverability 2 Custom pricing | - |
| Tier 10 | Dedicated IPs - Managed 3 Custom pricing | - |
| Tier 11 | Email Validation 4 Custom pricing | - |
| Tier 12 | Global Endpoints 5 Custom pricing | - |
| Tier 13 | Tenants 6 Custom pricing | - |
| Tier 14 | Dedicated IPs - Standard/BYOIP Custom pricing | - |
| Tier 15 | Inbound processing and routing (Mail Manager) Custom pricing | - |
| Tier 16 | Email Processing 8 Custom pricing | - |
| Tier 17 | Authenticated Ingress Endpoint Custom pricing | - |
| Tier 18 | Open Ingress Endpoint 9 Custom pricing | - |
| Tier 19 | Email Add-Ons 10 Custom pricing | - |
| Tier 20 | Outbound sending & Inbound processing and Email routing (Mail Manager) Custom pricing | - |
| Tier 21 | Archiving Custom pricing | - |
| Tier 22 | Outbound email $0/monthCheapest | - |
| Tier 23 | Global Endpoints $0/monthCheapest | - |
| Tier 24 | Email Validation $0/monthCheapest | - |
| Tier 25 | Tenants $0/monthCheapest | - |
| Tier 26 | Dedicated IPs – Standard $25/monthCheapest | - |
| Tier 27 | Dedicated IPs – Managed $15/monthCheapest | - |
| Tier 28 | Bring Your Own IP (BYOIP) $25/monthCheapest | - |
| Tier 29 | Virtual Deliverability Manager – SES deliverability Custom pricing | - |
| Tier 30 | Virtual Deliverability Manager – Global deliverability $1250/monthCheapest | - |
| Tier 31 | Mail Manager – Open / mTLS Ingress Endpoints 2 $50/monthCheapest | - |
| Tier 32 | Mail Manager – Email Processing 3 $0/monthCheapest | - |
| Tier 33 | Mail Manager – Archiving $2/monthCheapest | - |
| Tier 34 | Mail Manager – Email Add-Ons $0/monthCheapest | - |
| Tier 35 | Inbound email $0/monthCheapest | - |
| Tier 36 | Outgoing messages (Essentials) $250000/monthCheapest | - |
| Tier 37 | Outgoing mail data $0/monthCheapest | - |
| Tier 38 | Total monthly cost Custom pricing | - |
| Tier 39 | Outgoing messages (Pro) $2/monthCheapest | - |
| Tier 40 | Fixed monthly charge (Pro) $105/monthCheapest | - |
| Tier 41 | Outgoing messages (Enterprise) $10/monthCheapest | - |
| Tier 42 | Email processing (Mail Manager) $300/monthCheapest | - |
| Tier 43 | Incoming mail chunks $50/monthCheapest | - |
| Tier 44 | Fixed monthly charge (Enterprise) $500/monthCheapest | - |
| Tier 45 | VDM – SES Deliverability $2/monthCheapest | - |
| Tier 46 | VDM – Global Deliverability Custom pricing | - |
| Tier 47 | Mail Manager – Email Processing $500000/monthCheapest | - |
| Tier 48 | Mail Manager – Mail chunks $32/monthCheapest | - |
| Tier 49 | Mail Manager – Open Ingress Endpoint $1/monthCheapest | - |
← Swipe to compare plans →
Ready to get started? Try either tool free — no credit card required.
Which Should You Choose?
Choose Amazon SES if:
- •You need transactional email infrastructure for your application - not newsletter publishing
- •Engineering team control over sending is a requirement
- •Low-cost bulk sending via AWS is the use case
Choose Substack if:
- •You're a writer building a newsletter business with paid subscribers
- •Substack handles publishing, payments, and distribution without any infrastructure setup
- •You want to monetize your writing directly without technical overhead
Amazon SES and Substack don't compete. SES is infrastructure; Substack is a publishing platform for writers. Any writer comparing these two should choose Substack - it handles all the email, payment, and publishing complexity automatically. SES would require building an entire newsletter platform from scratch. The comparison is only relevant for a developer who wants to understand the cost of running Substack-like infrastructure themselves.
Frequently Asked Questions: Amazon SES vs Substack
Which is cheaper, Amazon SES or Substack?
How many pricing plans does Amazon SES have vs Substack?
Does Amazon SES or Substack offer a free plan?
Can I save money by paying annually for Amazon SES or Substack?
Does Amazon SES or Substack offer custom enterprise pricing?
How do Amazon SES and Substack compare for Email Marketing?
Sources
- Amazon SES Official Pricing- Vendor pricing page
- Substack Official Pricing- Vendor pricing page
Related Articles
Best Email Marketing for Agencies (2026)
Compare email marketing pricing for agencies: ActiveCampaign ($15/mo), Amazon SES ($0/mo), AWeber ($12.50/mo). Hand-picked tools that fit teams of 10-50 people.
Best Email Marketing for Enterprise (2026)
Compare email marketing pricing for enterprise: ActiveCampaign ($15/mo), Amazon SES ($0/mo), AWeber ($12.50/mo). Hand-picked tools that fit teams of 100+ peo...
Best Email Marketing for Small Teams (2026)
Compare email marketing pricing for small teams: ActiveCampaign ($15/mo), Amazon SES ($0/mo), AWeber ($12.50/mo). Hand-picked tools that fit teams of 2-10 pe...
Track Price Changes
Get notified when pricing changes for these tools.