With the recent (well, not too recent) announcement from MailChimp about the shift to a paid model for their Mandrill email service, PHP developers have been busy looking for alternatives. In this post to the php[architect] site Sandy Smith explores some of the other options out there, how they compare and what they have to offer.

n case you might have missed the announcement, MailChimp is changing Mandrill to be an add-on to paid MailChimp accounts, thus eliminating the generous free tier. We’re big fans of MailChimp and use its mailing list service for our own announcements, but a full MailChimp account isn’t going to be for everybody. [...] Many people also know Mandrill by reputation and will need options in the future. For you, we’ve put together this list of viable transactional email alternatives with PHP and major PHP application support.

Included in their list are services like:

• SparkPost (includes a special plan for current Mandrill users)
• SendGrid
• Amazon SES
• Mailgun
• Postmark

For each service he includes a paragraph talking about what integrations and libraries there are for their use as well as what's included in their "free" levels.