SendGrid is Free (100/day) / $19.95/mo. Pony Express is a self-hosted alternative at $0.99/mo. Here's when each makes sense.
| Pony Express | SendGrid | |
|---|---|---|
| Hosting | Self-hosted, your infra | Managed SaaS (cloud only) |
| Data location | Your server, your disk | SendGrid's cloud |
| Free tier | 500 emails/mo | Free |
| Pro pricing | $0.99/mo | Free (100/day) / $19.95/mo |
| Dependencies | None (single binary + SQLite) | N/A (managed) |
| Setup time | ~30 seconds | Account signup |
| Dashboard | Built-in at /ui | Cloud dashboard |
| License | BSL 1.1 | Proprietary SaaS |
Pony Express is a single Go binary with embedded SQLite. Install it with one command, and you are running in under a minute. Your data stays on your server.
curl -fsSL https://stockyard.dev/ponyexpress/install.sh | sh
Teams evaluating SendGrid alongside Pony Express tend to split on two axes: feature depth and data residency. SendGrid wins on feature depth — it is a mature product with integrations, mobile apps, and a dedicated support team. Pony Express wins on residency — your transactional email sender data lives on your server in a SQLite file you can inspect, back up, and migrate without asking anyone for permission.
The operational difference is significant. SendGrid requires you to trust their infrastructure, their security practices, and their business continuity. Pony Express requires you to run a process and keep the data directory backed up. If your server dies, restore the binary and the SQLite file to a new server. The entire recovery procedure fits in a single paragraph because there is nothing else involved.
Moving from SendGrid does not have to be all-or-nothing. Some teams run Pony Express for new data while keeping SendGrid as a read-only archive of historical records. The API makes it straightforward to build a sync script if you need both systems to reflect the same data during a transition period.
Single binary. Free to start. $0.99/mo for Pro.