How this page was made. Every figure was read from each vendor's own pages on 19 September 2026 and is linked at the bottom. We are one of the three and say plainly where the other two are stronger. Prices change; check the linked pages before buying.
Side by side
| Smartlead | Instantly | emailcampaign.ai | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Starting price | $32.50 a month annual ($39 monthly) for 2,000 contacts and 6,000 emails | $37.60 a month annual ($47 monthly) for 5,000 emails and 1,000 contacts | Free 14-day trial; Basic $39 a month; Pro $94 a month |
| Pricing model | Plan by contacts and emails; unlimited mailboxes and warm-up; client workspaces $29 a month each on Pro and above; SmartServers $39 a server | Plan by emails and contacts; unlimited email accounts and warm-up; pre-warmed Google accounts $10 each a month in batches of five, domains $15 a year | Plan by emails per month; unlimited mailboxes and warm-up on every plan; infrastructure at cost plus $5 setup per mailbox |
| Provisions mailboxes and domains | Yes via partners: Google $13 a domain a year plus $4.50 a mailbox a month; Outlook via Zapmail or InfraInbox; pre-warmed $18 plus $9 | Yes, Google only: pre-warmed accounts with DNS pre-configured; Instantly retains domain ownership and administrator access | Yes: domains (about $12 a year), Google Workspace seats ($8.40 a month), Microsoft 365 seats at Microsoft's rate, or self-hosted servers from $39 a month; you own the domains and accounts |
| DNS | SPF, DKIM, DMARC and tracking records configured automatically on partner mailboxes | Pre-configured on provisioned accounts | SPF, DKIM (selectors read from the provider), DMARC and postmaster records written through the registrar and shown before they go live |
| Warm-up | Included, unlimited, private pool | Included, unlimited | Included, unlimited, with a maintenance level after the ramp; never reaches your inbox |
| Placement test | SmartDelivery from $49 a month for 120 tests | Yes, a separate Inbox Placement product with 25 free credits | Yes, per mailbox at Gmail and Outlook |
| White-label | Pro and above, enabled by support: app on your own domain, client access to reports and campaigns; $29 a client workspace | Hypergrowth ($77.60) and Light Speed plans: custom domain and logo for a client portal; clients with campaign access see every campaign in the workspace | Yes: a complete webmail and admin console on the client's own domain, plus dashboard branding |
| Reviews | G2 4.6 from 306; Trustpilot 3.0 from 141 with 46 percent one-star | G2 4.8 from 4,134; Trustpilot score withheld, 1,165 reviews with 25 percent one-star | New listing; reviews being gathered |
| Best for | Agencies running many clients from one account who are comfortable with partner-supplied mailboxes | Teams that already own their mailboxes and want the largest community and template library | Teams that want the mailboxes, domains, DNS and warm-up done for them behind one approval, and agencies that need a client-branded door |
| Watch out for | Reviews cite support response of two to three days, cancellation friction, and warm-up pausing without warning | Provisioned domains stay owned by Instantly; reviews report features behind paywalls that only appear after purchase and pre-warmed domains arriving with poor reputation | The recommended 8 to 10 sends a day per mailbox means volume comes from fleet size; if you want 100 a day from one mailbox, nothing here will let you |
Where each one is strongest
Smartlead
The agency shape: unlimited mailboxes and warm-up from $32.50 a month, client workspaces at $29 each, the app on your own domain, and SmartDelivery for placement tests. Mailboxes come from partners at $4.50 to $9 a mailbox, which is convenient and also means infrastructure support is a second vendor's job. Reviews are strong on G2 and weak on Trustpilot, with support speed and cancellation the recurring themes.
Instantly
The community and the library: the most reviews in the category, a huge template and prompt collection, an academy, and a placement-test product with free credits. Pre-warmed Google accounts are an add-on at $10 each, Google only, with Instantly keeping domain ownership. White-label is a branded client portal on the two upper plans. Trustpilot withholds its score.
emailcampaign.ai
The infrastructure and the door: one approval buys the domains, creates Google Workspace, Microsoft 365 or self-hosted mailboxes under your ownership, writes and confirms the DNS, warms everything and caps sending at the numbers that keep placement. For agencies, a complete webmail and administration console on each client's own domain. It is new, so it has few reviews, and its recommended 8 to 10 sends a day per mailbox is lower than what the other two let you set.
Decide by the question you are actually asking
- "I already have mailboxes and want the biggest community." Instantly.
- "I run many clients and need per-client workspaces on my domain." Smartlead, or emailcampaign.ai if clients' staff will work inside the inbox.
- "I want the domains, mailboxes and DNS done for me and owned by me." emailcampaign.ai.
- "I need Microsoft 365 provisioned, not just Google." Smartlead's partners or emailcampaign.ai; Instantly's add-on is Google only.
- "I want the lowest software price at ten mailboxes." Smartlead by a few dollars; all three include unlimited mailboxes and warm-up.
Sources: Smartlead: Pricing · Smartlead: White-label · Smartlead: Trustpilot · Instantly: Pricing · Instantly: Pre-warmed accounts · Instantly: White-label · emailcampaign.ai: Pricing · emailcampaign.ai: Infrastructure ·
Questions, answered straight
- Smartlead or Instantly: which is better for cold email?
- They are close. Instantly has the bigger community, template library and review count; Smartlead has per-client workspaces and the app on your own domain, which agencies want. Both include unlimited mailboxes and warm-up; both have Trustpilot scores far below their G2 scores, with support and cancellation the common complaints.
- Where does emailcampaign.ai fit against them?
- It starts one step earlier: it buys the domains, creates the Google Workspace, Microsoft 365 or self-hosted mailboxes under your ownership, writes the DNS and warms them, then runs the campaigns. For agencies it adds a complete client-branded webmail and admin console rather than a portal. It has far fewer reviews than either, because it is new; the pages on this site are where it makes its case.
- Which is cheapest at 10 mailboxes?
- For the software: Smartlead $32.50, Instantly $37.60, emailcampaign.ai $39 a month (or free on trial), all with unlimited mailboxes and warm-up. For the mailboxes: Smartlead's partners about $4.50 a mailbox plus domains; Instantly's pre-warmed Google accounts $10 each plus $15 domains; emailcampaign.ai Google's $8.40 seat plus $5 setup plus about $12 domains, owned by you.
- Which has the strongest white-label?
- Smartlead and Instantly brand a dashboard and, on Smartlead, give each client a workspace at $29. emailcampaign.ai gives each client a door on their own domain where their staff sign in and their administrator runs privacy, forwarding, deleted-mail review and connected Gmail. If clients will live in the inbox, that difference is the whole decision.
Published 19 September 2026. Updated 19 September 2026. Written by the team that runs the infrastructure; numbers come from the platform's own provisioning and sending, and from the providers' published documentation at the time of writing.