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Notix vs Amazon SES.

Amazon SES is raw sending capacity priced per thousand emails, from $0.10; Notix is a platform priced per month, from $0 with no card and $15 for 50,000 emails on Pro. SES leaves you the dashboard, the webhooks, the templates and the suppression handling to build; Notix ships them. Many email APIs are widely reported to send through SES underneath, and the SES-directly-or-a-layer explainer covers what that means. This page compares the two as you would buy them.

At a glance

The two services, criterion by criterion.

SES figures were read from its pricing page on 2026-09-13; the date is repeated under the table. Notix figures come from its own pricing page.

Figures read from aws.amazon.com on 2026-09-13; Notix figures come from its own pricing page.
CriterionAmazon SESNotix
Free tier$200 in AWS Free Tier credits for new accounts, valid for 6 months; new accounts start in a sandbox5,000 emails a month, 200 a day, no card, no end date
Entry paid planPay as you go, $0.10 per 1,000 emails à la cartePro $15 a month
Included on that planNone: $0.16 per 1,000 on the Essentials plan, $0.12 per GB of attachments50,000 emails, usage past that metered on the same invoice
SMTP relayYes, an SMTP interface and an APIYes, on every plan
SDKsEvery AWS SDK languageTypeScript, Python, Go, PHP
WebhooksThrough SNS event destinations, which you wire yourselfYes, signed, for email, contact and domain events
OTP / verification APINoYes, email and SMS codes
Deliverability check before sendingNoYes, a pre-send check API
Billing outside USDUSD, on the AWS billUSD by card; naira and shillings from a prepaid wallet
SLAAWS SES service level agreement99.9% on Pro, credits on the pricing page
Prices and limits read from the vendors' own pages: aws.amazon.com on 2026-09-13. Notix figures are from its own pricing page.

Pricing.

SES charges $0.10 per 1,000 emails à la carte, or $0.16 per 1,000 on its Essentials plan, plus $0.12 per gigabyte of attachments; managed dedicated IPs are $15 a month per account plus a per-email fee. New AWS accounts get $200 in credits for six months. Notix Free is 5,000 emails a month and 200 a day with no card and no end date; Pro is $15 for 50,000, with usage past that metered on the same invoice at the rate on the pricing page. At 50,000 emails SES is about $5 and Notix is $15; the difference buys what the next six rows describe.

Sending API.

SES has the SESv2 API through every AWS SDK, and an SMTP interface with credentials generated in the console. There is no idempotency key on the send; a retried request that succeeded the first time sends twice unless you track it. Notix takes a JSON body with an idempotency key so a retry cannot double-deliver, and has batch and scheduled sends on the same endpoint family; its email API also covers contacts, templates and campaigns under one key. Both accept SMTP on every plan.

Deliverability tooling.

SES verifies domains with DKIM and lets you publish SPF and DMARC yourself, reports bounces and complaints through SNS, and keeps an account-level suppression list. Its Virtual Deliverability Manager is a paid add-on. Notix onboards a domain with the SPF, DKIM and DMARC records shown in one place, checks a message before sending and returns the findings that would block it, and shares one suppression list across transactional and marketing mail. The transactional email API page describes both. Neither vendor here makes latency claims.

Marketing features.

SES is sending capacity; contact lists, templates with a visual editor, sign-up forms, double opt-in, campaigns and journeys are not part of it. AWS points marketing use cases at other services or at building on top of SES yourself. Notix has contact books with double opt-in, a template editor, campaigns and journeys in the same account as transactional sending, on one suppression list. If you send marketing mail at all, this row is most of the build you avoid.

SDKs.

SES is reachable from every AWS SDK language, which is more than any email vendor publishes, and the client is the same one you already use for S3 or DynamoDB. Notix publishes TypeScript, Python, Go and PHP, and everything else uses the JSON endpoint with a plain HTTP client, as the docs show for curl. The SES client is heavier to configure (credentials, region, configuration set); the Notix one is an API key and a call.

One-time codes.

SES sends the message you compose; a sign-in code means you generate it, store it with an expiry, count attempts and rate-limit the sender yourself, on top of the delivery. Notix has a verification API that does that in two calls, by email or by SMS, with code length, expiry, attempt limits and risk scoring handled before anything goes out. If you send OTP codes at all, this row is a week of work on one side and an afternoon on the other.

Billing regions.

SES is billed in US dollars on the AWS bill, which for many teams already exists and is the easiest possible invoice. Notix bills in US dollars by card, and additionally lets teams in Nigeria and Kenya fund a prepaid wallet in naira or shillings, from which Pro is charged each month, so a card that clears international charges is not required. If you have an AWS account with billing sorted, SES wins this row; if you are paying from Lagos or Nairobi without one, Notix does.

Support and SLA.

SES is covered by the AWS SES service level agreement, and support depends on the AWS Support plan your account pays for; the basic tier is documentation and forums. Notix states a 99.9 percent uptime commitment on Pro, with the credit schedule written on the pricing page, and email support on every plan; the free plan is best effort. Both figures are published commitments, not measurements, and this page treats them that way.

Verdict

Choose by who builds the rest.

Choose Amazon SES if

  • You are on AWS and have the engineering time to build suppression, events, templates and a dashboard.
  • Your volume is high enough that per-thousand pricing beats any flat plan, even counting the build.
  • You need every AWS SDK language, or your billing must stay on the AWS invoice.

Choose Notix if

  • You want a dashboard, signed webhooks, templates and one suppression list on day one.
  • You send OTP codes or marketing mail and would rather not build either layer.

Already decided? The switching from Amazon SES page has the SDK and SMTP swap and the suppression import.

FAQ

Questions this comparison gets asked.

Is Amazon SES cheaper than Notix?
Per email, yes, and it is not close: SES is $0.10 per 1,000 à la carte, so 50,000 emails cost $5 against $15 for Notix Pro. The difference is what you build around it. SES gives you sending, SNS events and an account-level suppression list; a dashboard, webhooks, templates, cross-product suppression and domain onboarding are yours to write and run. The crossover is engineering time, not the per-email price.
Does Notix run on Amazon SES?
This page does not say what Notix runs on, because that is not a fact its pricing page states and this comparison only quotes stated facts. Many email APIs are widely reported to send through SES; the explainer on using SES directly or through a layer covers what that means for you either way.
What is the SES sandbox?
A new SES account can only send to verified addresses and is capped at a low daily volume until you request production access through the AWS console, describing your use case. Approval is not instant. Notix accounts send to any address from the first call, within the free plan's daily limit.
Can I get delivery webhooks from SES?
Yes, by creating an SNS topic, an event destination on the configuration set, and a subscriber that receives and verifies the notifications. Notix has signed webhooks configured in the dashboard, with the event types and the signature check documented; there is nothing to provision.
Which should a small team pick?
If you are already on AWS and have engineering time for the plumbing, SES is the cheapest email you can buy. If you want a dashboard, suppression, OTP codes and marketing mail working on day one, a platform like Notix costs more per email and less in total once someone's time is counted.
Related
Alternatives

Amazon SES alternative

SES plus the dashboard, suppression, webhooks, templates and domain onboarding you would otherwise build yourself.

Notix

Pricing

A free plan with no card, and Pro at $15 a month for 50,000 emails. Only sent volume is metered.

Product

Transactional email API

OTPs, receipts and alerts with idempotency keys, a deliverability pre-check and a shared suppression list.

Compare

Compare email APIs

Every vendor in one table with read dates, and a straight answer to which transactional email API a startup should pick.

Learn

Amazon SES directly, or a service on top of it?

What SES gives you, what you build yourself, and when a layer on top of it is the cheaper choice.

Try the side that fits.

5,000 emails a month on Free, no card, no end date. Pro is $15 for 50,000 emails, by card or from a naira or shilling wallet.

Start free, no cardSES directly, or a layer?