PushMail charges per email sent. No subscriber fees, no platform minimums. But there's a way to make it even cheaper: enable the branding discount and get 15% off every email you send.
The trade is simple. You let PushMail add a small "Sent with PushMail" line at the bottom of your emails. In return, every email you send costs 15% less. It's opt-in, transparent, and takes one API call to enable.
What the branding discount is
When you enable branding, PushMail appends a single line of text to the bottom of every outgoing email: "Sent with PushMail" with a link to pushmail.dev. It sits below your unsubscribe link, in small, muted text. It doesn't alter your email layout, inject banners, or add logos. It's the same approach Mailchimp uses on their free tier — except here, you're choosing it and getting a real discount for it.
The 15% discount applies to every email at the point of billing. It's calculated on the per-email cost within whatever volume tier you're in, so the savings scale with your volume.
The math at different volumes
PushMail uses volume-based pricing tiers. Here's what each tier costs with and without the branding discount:
| Volume | Standard cost | With branding (15% off) |
|---|---|---|
| First 10,000 | $0.003 | $0.00255 |
| 10,001 - 100,000 | $0.002 | $0.0017 |
| 100,001 - 1,000,000 | $0.001 | $0.00085 |
| 1,000,001+ | $0.0005 | $0.000425 |
At small volumes, the savings are modest. At scale, they add up fast.
10,000 emails/month: Standard cost is $30. With branding: $25.50. You save $4.50/month.
100,000 emails/month: Standard cost is $210 (10k at $0.003 + 90k at $0.002). With branding: $178.50. You save $31.50/month.
500,000 emails/month: Standard cost is $610 (10k at $0.003 + 90k at $0.002 + 400k at $0.001). With branding: $518.50. You save $91.50/month.
1,000,000 emails/month: Standard cost is $1,110. With branding: $943.50. You save $166.50/month.
2,000,000 emails/month: Standard cost is $1,610. With branding: $1,368.50. You save $241.50/month.
At high volume, the branding discount saves you more per month than most ESPs charge for their entire starter plan.
How to enable it
One API call. Send a PUT request to the branding endpoint:
curl -X PUT https://pushmail.dev/api/v1/org/branding \
-H "Authorization: Bearer pm_live_your_api_key" \
-H "Content-Type: application/json" \
-d '{ "enabled": true }'You'll get back a confirmation:
{
"data": {
"brandingEnabled": true
}
}You can also toggle it in the dashboard under Settings. The discount applies immediately to all future sends. There's no contract or lock-in. Disable it anytime with { "enabled": false } and the footer disappears from your next send.
To check your current branding status, send a GET to the same endpoint:
curl https://pushmail.dev/api/v1/org/branding \
-H "Authorization: Bearer pm_live_your_api_key"What the footer looks like
The branding footer is deliberately minimal. It's a single line of small, muted text appended after your email content and unsubscribe link:
Sent with PushMailThe text links to pushmail.dev. It uses your email's existing font at a smaller size, with a lighter color. It doesn't compete with your content or your own branding. Recipients who notice it see it the same way they'd see "Powered by Mailchimp" — as infrastructure attribution, not advertising.
PushMail doesn't add images, banners, or any other visual elements. Just text.
When branding makes sense
Early-stage products. If you're pre-revenue or bootstrapping, every dollar counts. The 15% discount reduces your email infrastructure costs while you're building. You can always disable it later when you've scaled.
Internal tools and notifications. If you're sending internal alerts, system notifications, or employee communications, a "Sent with PushMail" footer is irrelevant to your recipients. There's no brand perception to protect. Take the discount.
Newsletters and content creators. Many newsletter authors already use platforms with visible branding (Substack, Beehiiv, Ghost). If your audience is used to seeing platform attribution, enabling branding on PushMail is a non-issue — and it saves you money.
Developer tools. If you're sending transactional emails from a developer product — password resets, API notifications, billing alerts — your users understand infrastructure branding. They see "Powered by Stripe" on payment pages and "Sent via Twilio" on SMS messages. PushMail attribution fits the same pattern.
Side projects. If you're running a side project that sends email, branding is free savings with zero downside. Your side project's users aren't evaluating your email footer.
When it doesn't make sense
Enterprise and B2B contracts. If your clients expect fully white-labeled communications, third-party branding can undermine trust. Enterprise procurement teams notice these things. Skip the discount and keep your emails clean.
White-label products. If you resell or white-label a product, any third-party attribution breaks the illusion. Your customers' customers shouldn't know what email infrastructure you use.
Luxury and high-end brands. If brand presentation is core to your product — fashion, hospitality, premium SaaS — even subtle third-party text at the bottom of an email can feel off-brand. The 15% savings isn't worth the perception risk.
Regulated industries. In healthcare, finance, or legal communications, extra text in emails can raise compliance questions. If your compliance team would need to review and approve the footer, it's probably not worth the overhead.
The economics behind it
PushMail is an infrastructure company. We don't have a sales team. We don't run paid ads. Word-of-mouth from the branding footer is our most cost-effective distribution channel.
When a recipient sees "Sent with PushMail" and they happen to be a developer who sends email, that's a qualified lead we didn't have to pay for. The 15% discount is what we'd spend on customer acquisition anyway — we're just passing it directly to you instead of giving it to Google or Facebook.
It's a transparent trade. You get cheaper email. We get distribution. Both sides know exactly what they're getting.
If the trade works for you, enable it. If it doesn't, don't. Your email costs are competitive either way — the branding discount just makes them better.