Lumail vs Courier
Lumail
Courier
Multichannel notification platform
Lumail and Courier pricing and feature comparison
Free emails / month
Lumail
3,000
Courier
10,000
Unlimited subscribers · $0
$0
Paid entry
$20/month, 40,000 included, then $0.60/1,000
$0.005 per send
Pricing basis
Unlimited subscribers; pricing follows email volume
Per notification sent on any channel; your email and SMS providers bill separately
Automation
Graph workflows with triggers, branches, goals, exits, and A/B paths
Visual journeys with API and webhook triggers, delays, branches, and digests
AI and developer access
ChatGPT OAuth, MCP, skills, CLI, SDK, REST API, and visual editor
Hosted MCP with 145 tools, a CLI, and agent skills
Transactional email
Included through API, SMTP, SDK, CLI, and agent tools
Core use case, delivered through your own email provider
Publishing surface
Capture pages and custom web domains; not a general website builder
Templates and one-off broadcasts; no newsletter or capture pages
Choose Lumail if…
- You want campaigns, subscribers, and transactional email in one account
- You want Lumail to deliver the email instead of adding a second provider
- You want 89 MCP tools built for running a newsletter
Choose Courier if…
- You need SMS, push, Slack, and an in-app inbox with user preferences
- You already pay an email provider and only need routing
- You need per-tenant branding or AI steps inside journeys
Where Courier is strong
A real alternative, not a straw man.
Courier is a developer notification layer that routes product messages across email, SMS, push, chat, and in-app, billed per send on top of your own providers. People pick Courier when they need product teams that need notifications routed across channels on one API.
- One API and journeys across email, SMS, push, Slack, WhatsApp, and an in-app inbox
- MCP with 145 tools, a CLI, SDKs, and agent skills
- $0.005 per send with 10,000 free sends a month
Don't trust the table. Run one journey.
Checklists lie by flattening the work. Build one real path: a trigger, a wait, a branch, a goal, an exit. Then open one subscriber and see what actually happened. That tells you more than any feature row.
- 1. Import a small, consented sample. Not the whole list.
- 2. Recreate one campaign and the audience it actually hits.
- 3. Publish one automation with a goal you can measure.
- 4. Fire a test and read every event on one person.
- 5. Compare the weekly work, not the setup afternoon.
Try it on a real send
Keep the whole list. Pay when you send.
3,000 emails free, no card. Rebuild one campaign, one workflow, and one transactional message before you move anyone. If it feels worse than Courier, stay.
The questions people actually ask
Is Lumail cheaper than Courier?
Sometimes. Lumail is $0 for 3,000 emails, then $20 for 40,000. Courier's number only makes sense after you know what they cap: contacts, seats, a daily send limit, or a feature they hide behind a paid plan. Read the honest take above, then price a normal month and a launch month on both pages.
What is the main difference between Lumail and Courier?
Choose Courier when product notifications need one API for email, SMS, push, Slack, and an in-app inbox. Choose Lumail for a newsletter platform with capture pages, workflows, and transactional email delivered without a separate email provider.
Can I migrate from Courier to Lumail?
Yes. Don't move the whole list on day one. Export a small consented sample, rebuild one campaign and one automation, authenticate your domain, then watch one subscriber go through the run. If that feels right, move the rest.