SendGrid’s free plan became a 60-day trial in May 2025, so most people searching for a SendGrid alternative are developers whose sending stopped on day 61. Notix gives you a free plan that stays free (5,000 emails a month, no card), a Pro plan at $15 for 50,000 emails, an OTP API and a pre-send deliverability check, and billing in naira or shillings. Stay on SendGrid if you send millions of emails a month, need dedicated IPs and IP warm-up, or your company already has a Twilio contract and support plan that covers it.
From 27 May 2025 the Email API free plan became a 60-day trial at 100 emails a day. When the trial ends, sending stops until the account is upgraded; SendGrid’s own support article describes the change. A side project or a staging environment that sent a few hundred emails a month now needs a paid plan.
Essentials starts at $19.95 a month for 50,000 emails on the Twilio pricing page. For a team sending 5,000 transactional emails a month that is a fixed cost for volume it does not use, and dedicated IPs, email validation and an SLA sit on Pro from $89.95.
The Email API and Marketing Campaigns are sold and configured separately, and suppressions are split into bounces, blocks, spam reports, global unsubscribes and group unsubscribes. Teams that want one send log, one suppression list and one bill for both kinds of mail end up stitching the two together.
SendGrid figures were read from Twilio’s pricing and support pages on 2026-09-13; Notix figures are the ones on our pricing page.
| Criterion | SendGrid | Notix |
|---|---|---|
| Free tier | 60-day trial, 100 a day; sending stops when the trial ends (the free plan was retired from 27 May 2025) | 5,000 emails a month, 200 a day, no card, no end date |
| Entry paid plan | Essentials from $19.95 a month | Pro $15 a month |
| Included on that plan | 50,000 to 100,000 emails a month on Essentials, volume-priced | 50,000 emails, usage past that metered on the same invoice |
| SMTP relay | Yes | Yes, on every plan |
| SDKs | Node, Python, PHP, Ruby, Go, Java, C# | TypeScript, Python, Go, PHP |
| Webhooks | Yes | Yes, signed, for email, contact and domain events |
| OTP / verification API | No | Yes, email and SMS codes |
| Deliverability check before sending | Email validation API on Pro and above | Yes, a pre-send check API |
| Billing outside USD | USD by card | USD by card; naira and shillings from a prepaid wallet |
| SLA | Stated for Pro and Premier plans | 99.9% on Pro, credits on the pricing page |
| Prices and limits read from the vendors' own pages: www.twilio.com on 2026-09-13. Notix figures are from its own pricing page. | ||
SendGrid is built for volume. If you send millions of messages a month, it offers dedicated IP addresses with automated warm-up, sub-user accounts for separating brands or customers, and support plans with a named contact. Marketing Campaigns is broader than anything in Notix: an automation builder, A/B tests, signup forms and a drag-and-drop editor with years of polish. Its SDK list is longer (seven languages to our four), its Email Validation API is a product Notix does not sell, and an existing Twilio contract can fold SendGrid into procurement you have already cleared. If those describe you, the table above is the whole argument for staying.
5,000 emails a month and 200 a day, on your own verified domain, with no card and no trial period. See the plans.
Transactional sends, batch sends, scheduled sends and campaigns share one email API, one send log, one suppression list and one set of signed webhooks.
The transactional email API includes a verification endpoint that sends and checks one-time codes by email or SMS, and a pre-send check that scores a message before it goes out.
Frameworks that only speak SMTP point at the Notix relay and get the same tracking and suppression as an API send.
Pro carries a 99.9% uptime commitment with credits stated on the pricing page. Teams in Nigeria and Kenya pay from a prepaid wallet in naira or shillings; everyone else pays in dollars.
Three steps, in the order that keeps your sending reputation intact: verify the domain, swap the client, then bring the suppression list across before the first send.
1. Verify your domain. Add the SPF, DKIM and DMARC records the dashboard shows you for the domain SendGrid was sending from. Your existing DKIM records for SendGrid can stay until you have switched; the two do not conflict. The quickstart walks through it.
2. Swap the client. Replace @sendgrid/mail with notix-js (or the Python, Go or PHP SDK) and the API key. The send call has the same shape: from, to, subject, html. If your app sends over SMTP, change the host to smtp.usenotix.dev, the user to notix and the password to a Notix API key; ports 465, 587, 2465 and 2587 all work.
3. Import your suppressions. Export bounces, unsubscribes and spam reports from SendGrid as CSV and drop the file into the Notix Suppressions page (one address per line, .txt or .csv). Do this before the first send: an address that bounced on SendGrid will bounce on Notix too, and a recipient who unsubscribed must stay unsubscribed.
// Before: SendGrid
import sgMail from "@sendgrid/mail";
sgMail.setApiKey(process.env.SENDGRID_API_KEY);
await sgMail.send({
from: "receipts@acme.com",
to: "customer@example.com",
subject: "Your receipt",
html: "<p>Thanks for your order.</p>",
});
// After: Notix
import { Notix } from "notix-js";
const notix = new Notix(process.env.NOTIX_API_KEY);
const { data, error } = await notix.emails.send({
from: "receipts@acme.com",
to: "customer@example.com",
subject: "Your receipt",
html: "<p>Thanks for your order.</p>",
});
# Before: SendGrid SMTP
SMTP_HOST=smtp.sendgrid.net
SMTP_PORT=587
SMTP_USER=apikey
SMTP_PASS=<SendGrid API key>
# After: Notix SMTP relay
SMTP_HOST=smtp.usenotix.dev
SMTP_PORT=587 # 465, 2465 and 2587 also work
SMTP_USER=notix
SMTP_PASS=<Notix API key>
# 1. In SendGrid: Suppressions -> Bounces / Unsubscribes -> Export CSV
# 2. Keep one address per line (a .txt or .csv is accepted as-is)
# 3. In Notix: Suppressions -> Bulk add -> drop the file in
bounced@example.com
unsubscribed@example.com
complained@example.com
SendGrid figures from the Twilio pricing page on 2026-09-13; Notix figures from our pricing page. Both are list prices for transactional email.
| Emails a month | SendGrid | Notix |
|---|---|---|
| 10,000 | Essentials, $19.95 (the trial allows 100 a day and ends after 60 days) | Pro, $15 (Free covers 5,000) |
| 50,000 | Essentials, $19.95 | Pro, $15 |
| 100,000 | Next Essentials tier; see the pricing page | Pro, $15 plus metered usage above 50,000 on the same invoice |
At 50,000 emails Notix is $4.95 a month less than SendGrid’s first paid tier and includes the OTP API and the deliverability check. Below 5,000 a month, Notix costs nothing and does not expire, which is the whole difference for a small sender.
What changes when you leave a 60-day trial for a free plan that stays, and where SendGrid's scale still wins.
NotixA free plan with no card, and Pro at $15 a month for 50,000 emails. Only sent volume is metered.
AlternativesSame free tier shape, $5 a month less at 50,000 emails, plus OTP and deliverability APIs and naira or shilling billing.
AlternativesSame $15 entry, 50,000 emails instead of 10,000, and a suppression list shared across transactional and marketing.
ProductOTPs, receipts and alerts with idempotency keys, a deliverability pre-check and a shared suppression list.
ProductPoint any framework's mailer at one host and port; the relay turns SMTP into the same tracked, suppressed send.
5,000 emails a month, no card, no 60-day clock. Verify a domain, import your suppression list, and send.