Email hosting for developers: API, webhooks, and a single dashboard for every side project
Developers ship things. Each project gets its own domain, and each domain eventually needs email: a contact@ for the landing page, a noreply@ for transactional sends, maybe a support@ once users show up. Most email hosts are built for office workers, not people juggling five domains across three side projects and a client contract. SHIPMAIL gives you one dashboard, one API key, calendar, contacts, and shared inboxes that work without bolting on a second tool.
One dashboard, every domain
Most developers do not want to manage email. They want email to work so they can get back to building. The problem is that each new project means another domain, another provider login, another set of DNS records to remember.
SHIPMAIL puts every domain under one account. Add a domain, verify DNS, create mailboxes. The same dashboard and the same API key work across all of them. When a side project dies, delete the domain. When a new one launches, add it in two minutes.
Solo plan at $4/month covers 3 mailboxes across any number of domains. Pro at $9/month covers 10. For a developer running two or three projects, that is the entire email bill.
API and SDK built for developers
SHIPMAIL exposes a REST API with TypeScript and Python SDKs for everything the dashboard can do. Create mailboxes, list messages, send email, manage domains. Both SDKs are typed end-to-end, so your editor tells you what is available.
Webhooks fire on inbound email. Point them at your app to trigger support ticket creation, onboarding flows, or notification routing. The payload includes parsed headers, plain text, HTML, and attachments.
Outbound sending works through the API or standard SMTP. Use the API for transactional email from your app. Use SMTP for development and testing from a local mail client. Both authenticate against the same mailbox credentials.
Shared inboxes for small teams
Side projects sometimes turn into real products. When a co-founder joins or a contractor needs to handle support@, shared inbox is already there. No forwarding rules, no shared passwords, no second tool.
Each person logs in with their own credentials and sees the shared mailbox alongside their personal inbox. Replies go out from the shared address. The project keeps one face to its users regardless of who is responding.
When developers should use something else
If you need high-volume transactional email (tens of thousands per day), use a dedicated sending service like SES, Postmark, or Resend. SHIPMAIL handles day-to-day email and moderate transactional sends, not bulk delivery infrastructure.
If your project requires a full helpdesk with ticket queues, SLA tracking, and macros, a dedicated support tool (Linear, Intercom, Zendesk) is a better fit. SHIPMAIL shared inbox handles low-to-medium support volume without the complexity of a full helpdesk.
If you are building an email client or need JMAP/IMAP library-level access, Fastmail or a self-hosted solution gives you more protocol surface. SHIPMAIL's API covers common operations but does not expose every IMAP extension.
Core pain points
- +Too many providers. Each side project or client app ends up on a different email provider, or worse, on a free tier that stops working after 30 days. Managing credentials and billing across three or four providers is overhead that has nothing to do with building the product.
- +No API or bad API. Most email hosts either have no API or expose a limited one behind an enterprise paywall. Developers who want to create mailboxes, send transactional email, or process inbound messages programmatically end up stitching together SES, Postmark, and a forwarding service.
- +Per-user pricing for solo use. Google Workspace charges $7.20/user/month per domain. A developer running three side projects on separate domains pays $21.60/month before writing a line of code. Add a collaborator and the cost doubles.
Getting started
- 1Add your domains and verify them. SHIPMAIL generates the exact DNS records and tells you where to paste them. Most developers have this done in under five minutes per domain.
- 2Create mailboxes: contact@, support@, noreply@, or whatever each project needs. Mark any of them as shared if a co-founder or contractor needs access too.
- 3Grab your API key from the dashboard. Use the REST API or an SDK (npm install shipmail for TypeScript, pip install shipmail for Python) to create mailboxes, send email, and listen for inbound messages via webhooks.
- 4Set up webhooks for inbound email processing. Point webhook URLs at your app's endpoint to trigger workflows when messages arrive at any mailbox.
FAQ
Questions worth answering.
Common questions about using SHIPMAIL as a developer.
- Can I use SHIPMAIL for transactional email from my app?
- Yes. Send via the REST API or SMTP. The API accepts JSON with recipients, subject, and body (text or HTML). SMTP works with any language's built-in mail library. Both authenticate against your mailbox credentials.
- How many domains can I add?
- There is no domain limit on any plan. The limit is on mailboxes: 3 on Solo ($4/month), 10 on Pro ($9/month), 50 on Team ($29/month). Spread them across as many domains as you want.
- Is there an SDK?
- Yes. TypeScript (npm install shipmail) and Python (pip install shipmail). Both cover domains, mailboxes, sending, and webhook management. Both are typed end-to-end.
- Can I process inbound email programmatically?
- Yes. Set up a webhook URL in the dashboard or via the API. When a message arrives at any of your mailboxes, SHIPMAIL sends a POST request to your endpoint with the parsed message (headers, body, attachments).
- How does SHIPMAIL compare to using SES directly?
- SES is a sending service. It handles outbound email at scale but does not give you mailboxes, inbound hosting, shared inbox, webmail, or a dashboard. SHIPMAIL is a full email host that uses SES for outbound relay. If you need both hosting and sending, SHIPMAIL replaces the combination of SES + a separate inbox provider.
- Does SHIPMAIL have webhooks for inbound email?
- Yes. Set up a webhook URL in the dashboard or via the API. When a message arrives at any mailbox, SHIPMAIL sends a POST request to your endpoint with parsed headers, body, and attachments. Use it to trigger support tickets, onboarding flows, or notification routing.
Internal links
Related
More on SHIPMAIL pricing, comparisons, and how it handles shared inboxes.