maddy alternatives
Providers that compete with maddy on at least one of: Self-hosted
Composable all-in-one mail server.
Switching as early-stage startups
At an early stage the deciding factors are what the free tier actually covers, what the first paid invoice looks like, and how much of a founding engineer's week the setup costs. Feature depth that only matters at a million sends a month is noise until it is not.
maddy does not cover scheduling, SDK breadth, and webhook coverage. Novu, Ghost, and Plunk close that gap. The order below weighs this audience's priorities first, so it differs from a general popularity ranking.
ranked for early-stage startups
- 01
Novu
Notifications Self-hostedOpen-source notification infrastructure.
Adds scheduling, SDK breadth, and webhook coverage over maddy, with nothing given up on these priorities.
30,000 events/mo on cloud, free self-hosted · $250/mo (Business cloud) - 02
Ghost
Newsletter Self-hostedOpen-source publishing with built-in memberships and email.
Adds scheduling, SDK breadth, and webhook coverage over maddy, with nothing given up on these priorities.
Self-hosted is free (your infra cost) · Ghost Pro from $9/mo - 03
Plunk
Self-hosted MarketingOpen-source unified email platform.
Adds scheduling, SDK breadth, and webhook coverage over maddy, with nothing given up on these priorities.
3,000/mo on hosted free plan · $19/mo or self-host - 04
Listmonk
Newsletter Self-hostedSelf-hosted newsletter and mailing list manager.
Adds scheduling and webhook coverage over maddy, with nothing given up on these priorities.
Free, self-hosted · Self-hosted only - 05
Postal
Self-hosted TransactionalOpen-source mail delivery platform.
Adds SDK breadth and webhook coverage over maddy, with nothing given up on these priorities.
Free, self-hosted · Self-hosted only - 06
mailcow
Self-hostedDockerized groupware and email server suite.
Matches maddy on every priority weighed here, so the decision is price and preference.
Free self-hosted, GPL-3.0 · Free self-hosted - 07
Cuttlefish
Self-hosted TransactionalOpen-source transactional email server with a web UI.
Matches maddy on every priority weighed here, so the decision is price and preference.
Free self-hosted, open source · Free self-hosted
maddy and its alternatives, side by side
Columns are the priorities early-stage startups weigh, in order. maddy is the first row so the trade in each direction is readable at a glance.
| Provider | Best published rate per 1,000 | DX score | Operating since | Scheduling | SDKs | Webhooks |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| maddy | Tiers not published in comparable form | 6/10 | Not published | No | None | No |
| Novu | Tiers not published in comparable form | 8/10 | 2021 | Yes | node, python, go, php, java, dotnet | Yes |
| Ghost | Tiers not published in comparable form | 7/10 | 2013 | Yes | node | Yes |
| Plunk | Tiers not published in comparable form | 7/10 | Not published | Yes | node, python | Yes |
| Listmonk | Tiers not published in comparable form | 7/10 | Not published | Yes | None | Yes |
| Postal | Tiers not published in comparable form | 6/10 | Not published | No | node, ruby, php | Yes |
| mailcow | Tiers not published in comparable form | 7/10 | Not published | No | None | No |
| Cuttlefish | Tiers not published in comparable form | 6/10 | Not published | No | None | No |
Novu, Ghost, and Plunk add capability without giving anything up on these priorities. The rest trade one thing for another.