Core difference
Amazon SES is an AWS-native set of regional email primitives. It gives you credentials, identities, configuration sets, event destinations, templates, account suppressions, and optional receipt rules, but sender governance remains something you design around those primitives. MailChannels is a transactional email delivery API for platforms with many downstream senders. It adds API credentials, JSON payloads, DKIM, Domain Lockdown, HTTPS webhooks, explicit suppressions, and controls that help detect risky senders, contain abuse, and keep good mail flowing.Feature mapping
Send payload notes
The migration is usually a code-level integration rewrite because SES is often called through an AWS SDK rather than a provider-neutral HTTP client.Template migration
SES templates should be exported and moved into application-owned storage. If the existing application calls SES with template names and template data, replace those calls with application-side template selection and MailChannelsdynamic_template_data.
Suppression policy
Recommended defaults:Event migration
SES event destinations frequently feed AWS-native systems. A MailChannels migration changes both transport and event schema. Plan this as a downstream integration rewrite, not just a webhook URL swap.Inbound migration
SES receipt rules do not map to MailChannels Email API resources. Replace inbound flows with a dedicated receiving provider, an application-managed mailbox workflow, or another AWS-native receiving path that remains separate from MailChannels sending.Cutover checklist
- Inventory every SES region that sends or receives mail.
- Replace AWS SDK send calls with MailChannels API calls.
- Recreate DKIM and domain authentication through MailChannels.
- Move SES templates into application-owned storage.
- Replace event destinations with MailChannels webhook consumers where needed.
- Rebuild inbound receipt-rule workflows outside MailChannels.
- Merge regional suppression lists intentionally.