Answers.Body: <p>SparkPost is great, but the UI is a little lacking, but as far as sending is concerned, it works great. My company also just developed and extension for processing bounces from SparkPosts in Civi.</p>
  
  <p><a href="https://github.com/proexchange/com.pesc.sparkpost">https://github.com/proexchange/com.pesc.sparkpost</a></p>
  
Answers.ContentLicense: CC BY-SA 3.0
Answers.CreationDate: 2016-04-02T00:02:23.997Z
Answers.Text: In the most current release. we've added bounce processing for transactional emails
  
  https://github.com/proexchange/com.pesc.sparkpost/releases/tag/1.3.1
Answers.UserDisplayName: Jose Torres
Answers.ContentLicense: CC BY-SA 3.0
Answers.CreationDate: 2016-04-07T19:29:33.740Z
Answers.Text: FYI :  I couldn't get the latest version of this extension to work. When trying to configure email smtp setting, I got authentication failure [SMTP: STARTTLS failed (code: 220, response: 2.0.0 Ready to start TLS)] error message. After some digging I found the following post which suggested downgrading my site from PHP5.6 to php5.5.  The change worked immediately. http://osticket.com/forum/discussion/3422/failed-to-configure-email-smtp-settings
Answers.UserDisplayName: Davy Ivins
Answers.ContentLicense: CC BY-SA 3.0
Answers.CreationDate: 2016-04-11T16:06:11.387Z
Answers.Text: If PHP 5.6 is not working it might be helpful to post an issue.  The readme states: CiviCRM 4.4, 4.6 or higher
  PHP version 5.4 or higher, with the curl extension enabled
Answers.UserDisplayName: Sonicthoughts
Answers.ContentLicense: CC BY-SA 3.0
Answers.CreationDate: 2016-04-12T18:38:37.317Z
Answers.Text: We need to look into this further. Looks like it's really a CiviCRM/PHP issue. if nothing else we will make a change to readme so people are aware. I know there are a few other questions regarding this in the CivCRM Stack exchange.
  
  http://civicrm.stackexchange.com/questions/10964/smtp-connection-failing-problem/10966
  
  http://civicrm.stackexchange.com/questions/9467/outbound-mail-fails-after-upgrading-to-4-7-1/10934
Answers.UserDisplayName: Jose Torres
Answers.ContentLicense: CC BY-SA 3.0
Answers.CreationDate: 2016-05-19T16:53:21.240Z
Answers.Text: This is still a problem with CiviCRM 4.7.7 as of today (May 19 2016). I've written a ticket at https://github.com/proexchange/com.pesc.sparkpost/issues/22 Downgrading to PHP 5.5 started the mailing immediately.
Answers.UserDisplayName: tabletguy
Answers.ContentLicense: CC BY-SA 3.0
Answers.CreationDate: 2016-05-31T19:48:38.997Z
Answers.Text: Unfortunately this is not something we can fix within this extension and is related to core civicrm. This issue will also impact users of any other smtp service that use SMTP over SSL/TLS. http://civicrm.stackexchange.com/questions/10964/smtp-connection-failing-problem?answertab=votes
Answers.UserDisplayName: Jose Torres
Answers.ContentLicense: CC BY-SA 3.0
Answers.CreationDate: 2016-03-08T19:15:40.373Z
Answers.LastActivityDate: 2016-03-09T19:50:22.777Z
Answers.LastEditDate: 2016-03-09T19:50:22.777Z
Answers.UserDisplayName: Jose Torres
Answers.Body: <p>I was asked to post a roundup of a variety of alternatives--the writeup is here: <a href="https://civicrm.org/blog/andrewhunt/alternatives-to-mandrill" rel="nofollow">https://civicrm.org/blog/andrewhunt/alternatives-to-mandrill</a></p>
  
  <p>Tommy also suggested I build a <a href="https://aghstrategies.com/smtp-cost-calculator" rel="nofollow">calculator to compare costs</a>.</p>
  
  <p>[edit follows] We also have some clients using SendGrid, which has worked fairly nicely.  An extension by IMBA is available on GitHub (mentioned in the blog post), but at the moment (May 2016) it only works for Drupal.  I made some changes to it in order to work for some WordPress clients, and I offered it as a <a href="https://github.com/imba-us/com.imba.sendgrid/pull/1" rel="nofollow">pull request</a> for them.  If you are using WordPress or Joomla, you should look at [my fork] instead.  I'll try to remember to update this when things change.</p>
  
Answers.ContentLicense: CC BY-SA 3.0
Answers.CreationDate: 2016-04-16T09:16:00.423Z
Answers.Text: nice work Andie
Answers.UserDisplayName: petednz - fuzion
Answers.ContentLicense: CC BY-SA 3.0
Answers.CreationDate: 2016-04-15T21:34:15.740Z
Answers.LastActivityDate: 2016-05-23T20:53:08.193Z
Answers.LastEditDate: 2016-05-23T20:53:08.193Z
Answers.UserDisplayName: Andie Hunt
Answers.Body: <p>We are using mailjet and it works fine, but they are VERY cautious (eg. they threatened to block us because our spam rate came around 0.08% in three separate mailings, where we are normally &lt; 0.01%) . The main reason we use mailjet is that it's based in the EU, so for privacy reason and with the problems around the safe harbour agreement, we preferred them. </p>
  
  <p>One other organisation doing lots of mailing is using sendgrid, but not sure what's the status of integration with civi</p>
  
Answers.ContentLicense: CC BY-SA 3.0
Answers.CreationDate: 2016-03-04T16:53:15.357Z
Answers.Text: You could use the cool Email Amender extension to reduce your bounce rate :)
Answers.UserDisplayName: JohnFF
Answers.ContentLicense: CC BY-SA 3.0
Answers.CreationDate: 2016-03-28T19:52:55.047Z
Answers.Text: +1 for Mailjet - I used it for one of my clients
Answers.UserDisplayName: Andy Clark
Answers.ContentLicense: CC BY-SA 3.0
Answers.CreationDate: 2016-02-25T09:42:24.657Z
Answers.LastActivityDate: 2016-02-25T09:42:24.657Z
Answers.UserDisplayName: Xavier
Answers.Body: <h1>Mailgun</h1>
  
  <h2>MailGunny extension</h2>
  
  <p>@netzih points out another MailGun extension (by @artfulrobot) which looks more up to date, uses current webhooks and other non-legacy settings. I will do some testing with it, too:</p>
  
  <blockquote>
    <p><a href="https://github.com/artfulrobot/mailgunny" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https://github.com/artfulrobot/mailgunny</a></p>
  </blockquote>
  
  <h2>Team Singer extension</h2>
  
  <p>I have set up a Mailgun account and done some testing, and the SMTP functionality seems to work fine. </p>
  
  <p>I've recently installed this extension on a site that is using MailGun and preliminary results look good:</p>
  
  <blockquote>
    <p><a href="https://github.com/blackbricksoftware/uk.teamsinger.civicrm.mailgun" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https://github.com/blackbricksoftware/uk.teamsinger.civicrm.mailgun</a></p>
  </blockquote>
  
  <p>(This is a fork of <a href="https://github.com/teamsinger/uk.teamsinger.civicrm.mailgun" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https://github.com/teamsinger/uk.teamsinger.civicrm.mailgun</a> which hasn't been updated recently, but may be in the future according to the author).</p>
  
  <p>The setup is a little more complex than (for example) the Sparkpost or Mandrill usage where you just input the API information, but perhaps that will be improved upon in future versions. This version requires you to set up a "Mail Account" for Bounce Processing using the "MailgunDB" protocol, and then have the "Fetch Bounced Messages" scheduled job active. "Legacy Webhooks" need to be defined in MailGun. Sending is done using basic SMTP credentials.</p>
  
Answers.ContentLicense: CC BY-SA 4.0
Answers.CreationDate: 2019-11-18T20:16:34.040Z
Answers.Text: If editing this already, maybe add the mailgunny https://github.com/artfulrobot/mailgunny
Answers.UserDisplayName: netzih
Answers.ContentLicense: CC BY-SA 4.0
Answers.CreationDate: 2019-11-19T05:34:47.337Z
Answers.Text: Thanks! I didn't know about that one.
Answers.UserDisplayName: Laryn
Answers.ContentLicense: CC BY-SA 4.0
Answers.CreationDate: 2019-11-19T07:26:36.500Z
Answers.Text: I didn't either until very recently. Just started using it and seems pretty promising.
Answers.UserDisplayName: netzih
Answers.ContentLicense: CC BY-SA 4.0
Answers.CreationDate: 2016-02-25T05:39:20.147Z
Answers.LastActivityDate: 2019-11-19T05:39:49.713Z
Answers.LastEditDate: 2019-11-19T05:39:49.713Z
Answers.UserDisplayName: Laryn
Answers.Body: <p>A good alternative is <a href="https://www.sendinblue.com/" rel="nofollow">SendinBlue</a>, because they offer a free plan allowing you to send up to 9k emails/month forever. And the same account can be used to send both transactional emails and newsletters. Plus they have some interesting plugins (WP, PrestaShop,..)</p>
  
Answers.ContentLicense: CC BY-SA 3.0
Answers.CreationDate: 2016-03-25T14:49:23.693Z
Answers.LastActivityDate: 2016-03-25T14:49:23.693Z
Answers.UserDisplayName: Alexya
Answers.Body: <p>We use sendgrid, simple to setup for the entire server. It is free if you have less than 12,000 emails a month. We are moving to 4.7 the sendgrid extension does not support it yet. </p>
  
Answers.ContentLicense: CC BY-SA 3.0
Answers.CreationDate: 2016-03-25T11:05:14.553Z
Answers.LastActivityDate: 2016-03-25T11:05:14.553Z
Answers.UserDisplayName: user469
Answers.Body: <p>SparkPost has <a href="https://www.sparkpost.com/pricing" rel="nofollow">pretty amazing pricing</a> and is apparently the <a href="https://www.sparkpost.com/mandrill-migration-guide" rel="nofollow">only alternative Mandrill refer to</a>. Anyone have experience with them?</p>
  
Answers.ContentLicense: CC BY-SA 3.0
Answers.CreationDate: 2016-03-08T19:28:51.350Z
Answers.Text: Where do Mandrill state that SparkPost are 'official' or recommended alternative (i know the latter is not your phrase but I see others using it on that post). I see "SparkPost has offered to take on any departing Mandrill users and to honor Mandrill’s pricing for those users". Notifying your clients that there 'is' an alternative, is not the same imo.
Answers.UserDisplayName: petednz - fuzion
Answers.ContentLicense: CC BY-SA 3.0
Answers.CreationDate: 2016-03-08T19:31:25.323Z
Answers.Text: Agreed. @Laryn, Where does it state that Sparkpost is the "official" alternative to mandrill?
Answers.UserDisplayName: Yossi
Answers.ContentLicense: CC BY-SA 3.0
Answers.CreationDate: 2016-03-08T19:44:04.800Z
Answers.Text: Yes, I put the word official in quotes to indicate it is not truly officially, but as it is the only recommended/suggested alternative from Mandrill it is (IMO) de facto official. Sorry if that feels misleading, and feel free to change it. I was trying to keep the answer section clean and just modify an existing answer rather than adding another with essentially the same info.
Answers.UserDisplayName: Laryn
Answers.ContentLicense: CC BY-SA 3.0
Answers.CreationDate: 2016-03-08T23:47:39.783Z
Answers.Text: @petednz-fuzion - also this page interprets it the same way (although that is from the Sparkpost side), https://www.sparkpost.com/mandrill-migration-guide, claims "MailChimp recommends SparkPost as a Mandrill alternative for developers looking for a transactional email provider" and in the comments an official Mandrill employee repeatedly mentions SparkPost.
Answers.UserDisplayName: Laryn
Answers.ContentLicense: CC BY-SA 3.0
Answers.CreationDate: 2016-03-08T23:56:03.260Z
Answers.Text: The frequent usage of the word "transactional" in mandrill's - as well as others here - wording suggests that we are the customers they are trying to jettison with this change. Certainly, we use it for transactional emails.  We also however use it for newsletters.  Not a ton, but we do.  Obviously they want us to use Mailchimp for that instead.  Sparkpost also emphasizes transactional email.  Is there anything in Sparkpost that would prevent newsletters & other legitimate marketing?
Answers.UserDisplayName: Rob Brandt
Answers.ContentLicense: CC BY-SA 3.0
Answers.CreationDate: 2016-03-09T01:20:17.343Z
Answers.Text: I did go ahead and edit, to ... "only alternative Mandrill refer to' which seems to be a true claim currently.
Answers.UserDisplayName: petednz - fuzion
Answers.ContentLicense: CC BY-SA 3.0
Answers.CreationDate: 2016-02-26T06:45:06.953Z
Answers.LastActivityDate: 2016-03-09T01:19:34.810Z
Answers.LastEditDate: 2016-03-09T01:19:34.810Z
Answers.UserDisplayName: Yossi
Answers.Body: <p>I've been very happy with the services of CiviSMTP <a href="https://www.civismtp.com/drupal/pricing" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https://www.civismtp.com/drupal/pricing</a></p>
  
Answers.ContentLicense: CC BY-SA 4.0
Answers.CreationDate: 2022-07-08T04:51:09.807Z
Answers.Text: unfortunately they are closing down July 2022
Answers.UserDisplayName: petednz - fuzion
Answers.ContentLicense: CC BY-SA 4.0
Answers.CreationDate: 2019-11-19T15:46:18.580Z
Answers.LastActivityDate: 2019-11-19T15:46:18.580Z
Answers.UserDisplayName: ericG
Body: <p>Mandrill users are being notified that the service is being integrated into Mailchimp, and you must have a paid account by the end of April.</p>
  
  <p>What alternatives are out there that work well with CiviCRM?  Some that look interesting might be Sendgrid, Mailjet or Mailgun.</p>
  
  <p>Any experiences with these?</p>
  
Comments.ContentLicense: CC BY-SA 3.0
Comments.CreationDate: 2016-02-25T02:53:17.317Z
Comments.Text: Does your hosting provider not provide an email server?
Comments.UserDisplayName: frTommy
Comments.ContentLicense: CC BY-SA 3.0
Comments.CreationDate: 2016-02-25T16:43:37.413Z
Comments.Text: We have our own server, and the last thing I want to manage is a mail server.
Comments.UserDisplayName: Rob Brandt
Comments.ContentLicense: CC BY-SA 4.0
Comments.CreationDate: 2019-11-20T01:43:34.457Z
Comments.Text: Update for 2019: Sparkpost was a popular option two years ago when they offered a generous free tier (100,000 emails/month) "for life".  Unfortunately, [that was a lie](https://www.reddit.com/r/webdev/comments/cdpjb5/sparkpost_promised_twice_that_they_were_gonna/).  As of July 2019, the free plan is 500 emails/month.  They're no longer recommended by most in the community.
Comments.UserDisplayName: Jon G - Megaphone Tech
Tags: <civimail><mandrill><mailserver><mailchimp>
Title: What low-cost third-party mailing platforms work well with CiviMail?
ThreadText: # What low-cost third-party mailing platforms work well with CiviMail?
  
  (Asked by: username_0 on 2016-02-25)
  
  Mandrill users are being notified that the service is being integrated into Mailchimp, and you must have a paid account by the end of April.
  
  What alternatives are out there that work well with CiviCRM? Some that look interesting might be Sendgrid, Mailjet or Mailgun.
  
  Any experiences with these?
  
  **Tags:** civimail, mandrill, mailserver, mailchimp
  
  > **Comments:**
  > **username_1**: Does your hosting provider not provide an email server?  
  > **username_0**: We have our own server, and the last thing I want to manage is a mail server.  
  > **username_2**: Update for 2019: Sparkpost was a popular option two years ago when they offered a generous free tier (100,000 emails/month) "for life".  Unfortunately, [that was a lie](https://www.reddit.com/r/webdev/comments/cdpjb5/sparkpost_promised_twice_that_they_were_gonna/).  As of July 2019, the free plan is 500 emails/month.  They're no longer recommended by most in the community.  
  
  ---
  
  ## 8 answers
  
  ### Answer by username_3 on 2016-03-08. Score: 8
  
  SparkPost is great, but the UI is a little lacking, but as far as sending is concerned, it works great. My company also just developed and extension for processing bounces from SparkPosts in Civi.
  
  <https://github.com/proexchange/com.pesc.sparkpost>
  
  > **Comments:**
  > **username_3**: In the most current release. we've added bounce processing for transactional emails  https://github.com/proexchange/com.pesc.sparkpost/releases/tag/1.3.1  
  > **username_4**: FYI :  I couldn't get the latest version of this extension to work. When trying to configure email smtp setting, I got authentication failure [SMTP: STARTTLS failed (code: 220, response: 2.0.0 Ready to start TLS)] error message. After some digging I found the following post which suggested downgrading my site from PHP5.6 to php5.5.  The change worked immediately. http://osticket.com/forum/discussion/3422/failed-to-configure-email-smtp-settings  
  > **username_5**: If PHP 5.6 is not working it might be helpful to post an issue.  The readme states: CiviCRM 4.4, 4.6 or higher PHP version 5.4 or higher, with the curl extension enabled  
  > **username_3**: We need to look into this further. Looks like it's really a CiviCRM/PHP issue. if nothing else we will make a change to readme so people are aware. I know there are a few other questions regarding this in the CivCRM Stack exchange.  http://civicrm.stackexchange.com/questions/10964/smtp-connection-failing-problem/10966  http://civicrm.stackexchange.com/questions/9467/outbound-mail-fails-after-upgrading-to-4-7-1/10934  
  > **username_6**: This is still a problem with CiviCRM 4.7.7 as of today (May 19 2016). I've written a ticket at https://github.com/proexchange/com.pesc.sparkpost/issues/22 Downgrading to PHP 5.5 started the mailing immediately.  
  > **username_3**: Unfortunately this is not something we can fix within this extension and is related to core civicrm. This issue will also impact users of any other smtp service that use SMTP over SSL/TLS. http://civicrm.stackexchange.com/questions/10964/smtp-connection-failing-problem?answertab=votes  
  
  ---
  
  ### Answer by username_7 on 2016-04-15. Score: 7
  
  I was asked to post a roundup of a variety of alternatives--the writeup is here: <https://civicrm.org/blog/andrewhunt/alternatives-to-mandrill>
  
  Tommy also suggested I build a [calculator to compare costs](https://aghstrategies.com/smtp-cost-calculator).
  
  [edit follows] We also have some clients using SendGrid, which has worked fairly nicely. An extension by IMBA is available on GitHub (mentioned in the blog post), but at the moment (May 2016) it only works for Drupal. I made some changes to it in order to work for some WordPress clients, and I offered it as a [pull request](https://github.com/imba-us/com.imba.sendgrid/pull/1) for them. If you are using WordPress or Joomla, you should look at [my fork] instead. I'll try to remember to update this when things change.
  
  > **Comments:**
  > **username_8**: nice work username_7  
  
  ---
  
  ### Answer by username_9 on 2016-02-25. Score: 3
  
  We are using mailjet and it works fine, but they are VERY cautious (eg. they threatened to block us because our spam rate came around 0.08% in three separate mailings, where we are normally < 0.01%) . The main reason we use mailjet is that it's based in the EU, so for privacy reason and with the problems around the safe harbour agreement, we preferred them.
  
  One other organisation doing lots of mailing is using sendgrid, but not sure what's the status of integration with civi
  
  > **Comments:**
  > **username_10**: You could use the cool Email Amender extension to reduce your bounce rate :)  
  > **username_11**: +1 for Mailjet - I used it for one of my clients  
  
  ---
  
  ### Answer by username_12 on 2016-02-25. Score: 2
  
  # Mailgun
  
  ## MailGunny extension
  
  @username_13 points out another MailGun extension (by @artfulrobot) which looks more up to date, uses current webhooks and other non-legacy settings. I will do some testing with it, too:
  
  > <https://github.com/artfulrobot/mailgunny>
  
  ## Team Singer extension
  
  I have set up a Mailgun account and done some testing, and the SMTP functionality seems to work fine.
  
  I've recently installed this extension on a site that is using MailGun and preliminary results look good:
  
  > <https://github.com/blackbricksoftware/uk.teamsinger.civicrm.mailgun>
  
  (This is a fork of <https://github.com/teamsinger/uk.teamsinger.civicrm.mailgun> which hasn't been updated recently, but may be in the future according to the author).
  
  The setup is a little more complex than (for example) the Sparkpost or Mandrill usage where you just input the API information, but perhaps that will be improved upon in future versions. This version requires you to set up a "Mail Account" for Bounce Processing using the "MailgunDB" protocol, and then have the "Fetch Bounced Messages" scheduled job active. "Legacy Webhooks" need to be defined in MailGun. Sending is done using basic SMTP credentials.
  
  > **Comments:**
  > **username_13**: If editing this already, maybe add the mailgunny https://github.com/artfulrobot/mailgunny  
  > **username_12**: Thanks! I didn't know about that one.  
  > **username_13**: I didn't either until very recently. Just started using it and seems pretty promising.  
  
  ---
  
  ### Answer by username_14 on 2016-03-25. Score: 1
  
  A good alternative is [SendinBlue](https://www.sendinblue.com/), because they offer a free plan allowing you to send up to 9k emails/month forever. And the same account can be used to send both transactional emails and newsletters. Plus they have some interesting plugins (WP, PrestaShop,..)
  
  
  ---
  
  ### Answer by username_15 on 2016-03-25. Score: 1
  
  We use sendgrid, simple to setup for the entire server. It is free if you have less than 12,000 emails a month. We are moving to 4.7 the sendgrid extension does not support it yet.
  
  
  ---
  
  ### Answer by username_16 on 2016-02-26. Score: 0
  
  SparkPost has [pretty amazing pricing](https://www.sparkpost.com/pricing) and is apparently the [only alternative Mandrill refer to](https://www.sparkpost.com/mandrill-migration-guide). Anyone have experience with them?
  
  > **Comments:**
  > **username_8**: Where do Mandrill state that SparkPost are 'official' or recommended alternative (i know the latter is not your phrase but I see others using it on that post). I see "SparkPost has offered to take on any departing Mandrill users and to honor Mandrill’s pricing for those users". Notifying your clients that there 'is' an alternative, is not the same imo.  
  > **username_16**: Agreed. @username_12, Where does it state that Sparkpost is the "official" alternative to mandrill?  
  > **username_12**: Yes, I put the word official in quotes to indicate it is not truly officially, but as it is the only recommended/suggested alternative from Mandrill it is (IMO) de facto official. Sorry if that feels misleading, and feel free to change it. I was trying to keep the answer section clean and just modify an existing answer rather than adding another with essentially the same info.  
  > **username_12**: @username_8 - also this page interprets it the same way (although that is from the Sparkpost side), https://www.sparkpost.com/mandrill-migration-guide, claims "MailChimp recommends SparkPost as a Mandrill alternative for developers looking for a transactional email provider" and in the comments an official Mandrill employee repeatedly mentions SparkPost.  
  > **username_0**: The frequent usage of the word "transactional" in mandrill's - as well as others here - wording suggests that we are the customers they are trying to jettison with this change. Certainly, we use it for transactional emails.  We also however use it for newsletters.  Not a ton, but we do.  Obviously they want us to use Mailchimp for that instead.  Sparkpost also emphasizes transactional email.  Is there anything in Sparkpost that would prevent newsletters & other legitimate marketing?  
  > **username_8**: I did go ahead and edit, to ... "only alternative Mandrill refer to' which seems to be a true claim currently.  
  
  ---
  
  ### Answer by username_17 on 2019-11-19. Score: 0
  
  I've been very happy with the services of CiviSMTP <https://www.civismtp.com/drupal/pricing>
  
  > **Comments:**
  > **username_8**: unfortunately they are closing down July 2022  
  
  ---
  
  