Email Marketing

Resend pricing, features & alternatives

Email API and SMTP delivery for transactional messages, with separate marketing broadcasts.

Researched by Ajay Kumar

Price checked 5 Oct 2026
Verified on vendor site
Confidence: High

Visit Resend See pricing

Choose it if

SaaS teams sending password resets, receipts and application notifications through an API

Skip it if

You need an entirely nontechnical CRM suite or assume an email API guarantees inbox placement

Starting price

$20/month for Pro; Free available

3,000 transactional emails/month, capped at 100/day, three domains

Resend overview

Decision checklist

Buying consideration: Pro and Scale list $0.90 per extra 1,000 transactional emails with pay-as-you-go enabled. Inbound counts toward the transactional quota. Broadcasts do not. Monthly billing only; dedicated IP and SSO have separate eligibility and charges.
Operational fit: Cloud API / SMTP; support: Ticket support; Scale adds dedicated Slack support; Enterprise contractual support.
Evidence context: Verified on vendor site, with facts checked 5 Oct 2026.

An email API for product workflows

Resend serves developers adding event-driven email to an application. Password resets, order confirmations and account notifications need an application trigger, verified sending domain and API credentials. Marketing Broadcasts are a separate sending path.

Resend email pricing: daily capacity matters

A monthly allowance can conceal a daily bottleneck. Free allows 3,000 messages per month but only 100 per day. A launch with several hundred signups can exceed that daily cap while the month remains below quota. Estimate both ordinary traffic and the largest expected burst before relying on Free for customer-facing messages.

What affects your Resend API bill

Resend API pricing depends on the transactional allowance and enabled overages, not just the advertised subscription. The cost example includes 55,000 transactional messages. Received messages also consume the transactional allowance, and the pay-as-you-go setting controls continued usage beyond quota. Track that setting alongside application rate limits. A newsletter sent through Broadcasts belongs to a different quota and pricing decision.

Migration checks

Use a test domain and representative templates. Confirm authentication, links, attachments and the application’s response to failed requests. Check that webhook handlers record events without duplicating business actions. These are recommended validation steps, not deliverability results from our testing. Compare Postmark, SendGrid, Mailgun and Amazon SES for your exact sending pattern.

Resend pricing

Official pricing page

Starting price: $20/month for Pro; Free available. Model: Monthly transactional email quota with optional overages; separate marketing pricing.

Worked exampleA SaaS sending 55,000 transactional emails/month on Pro with overages enabled pays $20 + 5 × $0.90 = $24.50/month, or $294 over 12 months at constant usage, before tax.

Free

3,000 emails/month and 100/day

Pro

$20/month

50,000 emails/month and no daily email cap

Scale

$90/month

100,000 emails/month with expanded domains and webhooks

Enterprise

Contact sales

Custom usage and contractual support

Pro and Scale list $0.90 per extra 1,000 transactional emails with pay-as-you-go enabled. Inbound counts toward the transactional quota. Broadcasts do not. Monthly billing only; dedicated IP and SSO have separate eligibility and charges.

Key features

REST email API
SMTP relay
Official SDKs
React Email templates
Signed webhook events
Inbound emails
Domain authentication
Separate marketing Broadcasts

Resend pros and cons

Strengths

Clear transactional quota and public overage rate
API and SMTP support different application stacks
Webhooks expose email events for application handling

Limitations

Domain and DNS setup requires technical access
Inbound mail consumes transactional quota
Dedicated IP and SSO add-ons increase cost

Biggest limitation: Free is capped at 100 emails/day, so short traffic spikes can exceed the limit even below the monthly quota.

Resend at a glance

Pricing model: Monthly transactional email quota with optional overages; separate marketing pricing
Free access: 3,000 transactional emails/month, capped at 100/day, three domains
Support: Ticket support; Scale adds dedicated Slack support; Enterprise contractual support
India readiness: Usable by Indian developers. USD billing, domain DNS ownership and local tax/currency costs need consideration. No India-only data residency claim verified.
Deployment: Cloud API / SMTP
Use cases: Email API, Email notifications, Transactional email
Industries: Ecommerce, SaaS, Technology

Resend alternatives

Closest alternative: Postmark. Here is how the shortlist compares on price and fit.

Resend compared with alternatives
Compare	Resend	Brevo	Buttondown	Mailmeteor
Best for	SaaS teams sending password resets, receipts and application notifications through an API	Small businesses coordinating email campaigns and transactional messages with predictable send volume and a maintained contact database	Independent writers, technical newsletters and small publishers sending regular editorial updates without a complex sales stack	Individuals, teachers, recruiters and small teams sending personalised emails to warm lists from Gmail
Starting price	$20/month for Pro; Free available	Free plan; Starter from US$9/month for 5,000 sends and up to 500 stored contacts	Free basic newsletter for first 100 subscribers; larger-list base price requires current calculator or vendor confirmation	Free; paid from $5.99 per user/month (Starter)
Free plan / trial	3,000 transactional emails/month, capped at 100/day, three domains	Permanent Free: 300 emails/day, up to 100,000 stored contacts and one user; no card required	Basic newsletter free for first 100 subscribers; paid optional features still cost separately	Free Hobby plan: 500 emails a month, 50 a day
Biggest limitation	Free is capped at 100 emails/day, so short traffic spikes can exceed the limit even below the monthly quota.	Early paid tiers can auto-upgrade when stored contacts exceed their cap even if email volume is low; Free also has a daily rather than monthly send ceiling.	The subscriber allowance does not make add-ons free: segmentation, analytics, RSS, custom archive domains and team features each affect the budget.	Daily and monthly sending caps, plus Gmail's own limits, bound campaign size

Prices are taken from each vendor's own pricing page on the dates shown. Taxes and add-ons may apply; confirm before you buy.

Resend vs Brevo Resend vs Buttondown Resend vs Mailmeteor

Resend FAQs

Can Free send all 3,000 emails in one day?

No. The monthly allowance also has a 100-email daily limit. Use a paid plan when launch-day or notification bursts exceed that.

Do received emails count toward my allowance?

Yes. Resend’s official pricing FAQ counts inbound emails against the transactional email quota.

Do newsletters consume the transactional quota?

Broadcasts sent through the Broadcasts interface or /broadcasts API do not count against /emails transactional limits. Marketing pricing is separate.

What happens above 50,000 Pro emails?

If transactional pay-as-you-go is enabled, extra emails are billed in 1,000-email buckets at $0.90 each. Without it, upgrade or limit handling is required.

Do I need a domain before sending product emails?

The setup documentation requires a domain verified with Resend and an API key. Arrange DNS access before planning a migration.

Should a small sender buy a dedicated IP?

It is an eligible Scale add-on for customers exceeding 3,000 emails/day. Assess volume and operational needs rather than assuming a dedicated IP improves every sender.

Sources and how we checked

We read pricing and plan limits from Resend's own pages (listed above) on the dates above. Where a vendor does not publish a price we can verify, we say so rather than estimate. Spotted something out of date? Tell us.

Profile updated 10 Oct 2026 · facts checked 5 Oct 2026