Free cold email software (2026): what is actually free, and what it costs you anyway

Most cold email platforms advertise "start free", and most of them mean a trial. Instantly, Smartlead, lemlist, Saleshandy, Woodpecker and QuickMail all end in a paid plan after a week or two. A handful of tools have a plan that stays free, and each one caps something: daily sends, recipients, connected mailboxes, or credits.

Below is what we send with for clients, then every tool we could confirm has a free plan on its own pricing page today, then the trials and cheap paid plans worth knowing. Some links are referral links that may earn us a credit, which never changes what you pay or who is listed. If you are setting up from scratch, the software is usually the smaller cost. Mailboxes, domains and list verification are where the money goes, so read what free really costs before you pick.

By Garrett Wolfe, founder of OneGTM (Clay Artisan Solutions Partner) and former GTM engineer at Unify. Updated October 15, 2026.

Key takeaways

Instantly and Smartlead have no free plan, only free trials. Instantly's trial covers 250 contacts and 1,000 emails.
Xpoudy is a newly launched tool that markets itself as a free Instantly and Smartlead alternative, with unlimited mailboxes, warmup and contacts on a $0 plan.
Snov.io, Hunter and Apollo have free plans that include sequences, with tight caps on recipients, credits or mailboxes.
Gmail mail merge tools (Mailmeteor, YAMM, Streak) are free at 20 to 50 emails a day, fine for testing and too small for real outbound.
The software is rarely the expensive part. Budget for mailboxes, domains and email verification either way.

What OneGTM uses (and why we pay for it)

We send client campaigns from Instantly, on mailboxes and domains set up through ScaledMail. At the volume a real outbound program runs, a paid sender pays for itself: unlimited connected mailboxes, warmup on every account, inbox rotation, and a support team that answers when a domain gets flagged. If you are sending a few hundred emails a month to test a message, start with a free option below and move when the caps start to bite.

Instantly

OneGTM uses this

Cold email platform with unlimited connected mailboxes and automated warmup on every plan, plus a unified inbox and A/Z testing. There is no free plan. The 14-day free trial needs no card and covers 250 uploaded contacts and 1,000 emails.

Best for: Sending at volume from many mailboxes

Pricing: Free 14-day trial. Outreach Growth $47/month ($37.60/month billed annually) for 5,000 emails and 1,000 contacts; Hypergrowth $97/month.

Cold email software with a real free plan

These tools have a plan that does not expire, confirmed on each vendor's pricing page on October 15, 2026. Full sequencers come first, then Gmail mail merge add-ons.

Xpoudy

New in 2026

A newly launched cold email platform (its domain was registered in August 2026) that positions itself as a free Instantly and Smartlead alternative. The $0 plan, described as free forever and not a trial, lists unlimited mailboxes across Google Workspace, Microsoft 365 and SMTP, unlimited peer-to-peer warmup, unlimited contact uploads, multi-step sequences with spintax, mailbox rotation, custom tracking domains and a unified inbox. It does not publish daily send limits or fair-use terms, and it has no track record yet, so test it with a couple of mailboxes before you move a live program.

Best for: Testing a free Instantly or Smartlead replacement

Pricing: Free plan $0, no card required. A paid Pro tier adds lead data and verification credits; a founding lifetime Pro offer starts at $499 one-time. Check current pricing.

Snov.io

Email finder, verifier and sequencer in one. The free Trial plan renews every month with 50 credits, 100 recipients and warmup for one mailbox at a time, and campaigns are unlimited. A/B tests, integrations, bulk verification and the API are paid only.

Best for: Finding and emailing a small list in one tool

Pricing: Free Trial plan renews monthly. Starter $39/month for 1,000 credits and 5,000 recipients.

Hunter

Best known as an email finder, Hunter also runs Campaigns, a basic sequencer that sends from your own Gmail or Outlook account. The free plan connects one email account, allows 500 recipients per sequence, and includes 50 search and verification credits a month.

Best for: Founders sending from one inbox

Pricing: Free plan. Starter $49/month ($34/month billed annually) with 3 email accounts and 2,000 credits.

Apollo

Contact database with a built-in sequencer. Email campaigns are included on every account, including the free plan, which has no time limit. Free accounts can only connect Gmail, and credits and sequences are capped tightly, so it works for light testing more than steady volume.

Best for: Pulling contacts and emailing them in one place

Pricing: Free plan with limited credits. Check current pricing for Basic and Professional.

Mailmeteor

Mail merge for Gmail and Google Sheets. The free Hobby plan sends 50 emails a day (500 a month) with open tracking. Follow-ups are not included until the Premium plan.

Best for: One-off personalized sends from Gmail

Pricing: Free Hobby plan. Starter $5.99/user/month; follow-ups from Premium at $17.99/user/month.

YAMM (Yet Another Mail Merge)

Google Sheets mail merge with open, click, reply and bounce tracking and scheduled sends. The free plan covers 20 recipients a day for one user, with no branded footer.

Best for: Very small sends from a spreadsheet

Pricing: Free plan. Pro allows 400 recipients a day on gmail.com or 1,500 on Google Workspace; prices vary by country, check current pricing.

Streak

A CRM that lives inside Gmail, with mail merge built in. The free plan includes 50 mail merge sends a day. Automatic follow-ups are described on the paid plans.

Best for: Tracking deals and sending from Gmail

Pricing: Free plan. Pro $49/user/month billed annually ($59 monthly).

Free trials and cheap paid plans worth knowing

None of these has a free plan. Each has a free trial, and the entry tiers are cheap enough that most teams outgrow a free tool and land on one of them or on Instantly.

Smartlead

Cold email platform with unlimited mailboxes, inbox rotation and warmup, popular with agencies. Every plan starts with a free trial and no card.

Best for: Agencies sending from many mailboxes

Pricing: Free trial. Base $39/month ($32/month billed annually) for 2,000 active leads and 6,000 emails.

Saleshandy

Cold email sequencer with unlimited prospect storage; the plan limit applies only to prospects in live sequences.

Best for: Budget sequencing at moderate volume

Pricing: 7-day free trial, no card. Starter $41/month ($34/month billed annually) for 2,000 active prospects and 6,000 emails.

Woodpecker

Cold email sequencer priced by prospects contacted rather than seats, with free catch-all verification and warmup for several mailboxes.

Best for: Low-volume senders who want to pay per prospect

Pricing: Free trial of 14 days or 100 cold emails, whichever comes first. Usage-based from $7 per 100 contacted prospects on monthly billing.

lemlist

Multichannel outreach across email, LinkedIn and calls, with its lemwarm warmup included. Priced per user, so it costs more than the email-only senders.

Best for: Email plus LinkedIn from one tool

Pricing: 14-day free trial, no card. Email plan $69/user/month ($55 billed yearly).

GMass

Mail merge and sequences inside Gmail. The trial lasts seven days and sends 50 emails per rolling 24 hours; after that a paid plan is required. Sequences and follow-ups start on Premium.

Best for: Gmail users who want sequences without a new tool

Pricing: 7-day trial. Standard $29.95/month ($20/month billed annually); Premium with sequences $39.95/month.

QuickMail

Cold email platform built around deliverability and team workflows. The trial asks for a card but does not convert to paid on its own.

Best for: Small teams and agencies with a few clients

Pricing: 14-day free trial. Starter $49/month for 1,000 contacts and 5,000 emails.

Prices are from each vendor's site as of October 2026 and change often, so check before you buy. This is an opinionated list, not a paid ranking. Some links are referral links that may earn us a credit; that never changes what you pay or who makes the list.

Free cold email software compared

Tool	Best for	Starting price
Instantly (OneGTM uses)	Sending at volume from many mailboxes	Trial, then $47/mo
Xpoudy	Testing a free Instantly or Smartlead replacement	Free
Snov.io	Finding and emailing a small list in one tool	Free, then $39/mo
Hunter	Founders sending from one inbox	Free, then $34/mo
Apollo	Pulling contacts and emailing them in one place	Free
Mailmeteor	One-off personalized sends from Gmail	Free, then $5.99/mo
YAMM (Yet Another Mail Merge)	Very small sends from a spreadsheet	Free
Streak	Tracking deals and sending from Gmail	Free, then $49/mo
Smartlead	Agencies sending from many mailboxes	Trial, then $39/mo
Saleshandy	Budget sequencing at moderate volume	Trial, then $41/mo
Woodpecker	Low-volume senders who want to pay per prospect	Trial, then usage
lemlist	Email plus LinkedIn from one tool	Trial, then $69/mo
GMass	Gmail users who want sequences without a new tool	Trial, then $20/mo
QuickMail	Small teams and agencies with a few clients	Trial, then $49/mo

Starting prices as published by each vendor in October 2026.

What free cold email really costs

A free sender still needs something to send from. Cold email should go out from secondary domains, not your main one, with a few mailboxes per domain and a low daily volume per mailbox. That means paying for domains every year and for Google Workspace or Microsoft 365 mailboxes every month, no matter which sending tool you pick. See sending infrastructure for how the pieces fit.

The other real costs are data and verification. Sending to unverified addresses pushes your bounce rate up, and that burns domains faster than any software fee. Free plans also cap the things that matter at volume: daily sends, recipients per month, connected mailboxes, or credits.

Domains: a few per sender, renewed yearly
Mailboxes: paid per mailbox per month on Google or Microsoft
Warmup: included free in most senders listed here, including Xpoudy, Instantly and Smartlead
Verification: needed for every list, especially catch-all domains
Lead data: free plans include little or none

Deliverability basics before you send anything

Free or paid, the tool does not decide whether you land in the inbox. Your DNS records, warmup and list quality do. Set up SPF, DKIM and DMARC on every sending domain, then run it through our free deliverability checker.

Give new mailboxes about two weeks of warmup before they send at full speed, and keep volume per mailbox low after that. Our email warmup tools guide covers what warmup can and cannot fix.

Free tools that are not built for cold email

Newsletter and marketing platforms show up in searches for free email software, and they will get your account closed if you use them for cold outreach. Brevo's free plan sends up to 300 emails a day, but its anti-spam policy prohibits purchased or scraped lists and requires recipient consent. Mailchimp and other newsletter tools work the same way.

HubSpot's free CRM is useful for tracking replies, but sequences need Sales Hub Professional or Enterprise, so it is not a free sequencer.

When to move from free to paid

Free plans are good for proving a message works. Move to a paid sender when the caps start deciding your volume instead of your list.

You need more than one or two mailboxes to hit your daily volume
You are sending more than a few hundred emails a month
You want inbox rotation, A/B tests or a shared inbox for replies
You need integrations or an API to push leads in from Clay or a CRM
A free tool's limits or terms are unclear and the program now matters

When to get help

If you are picking a sender and setting up domains for the first time, a short review saves a lot of burned domains. I look at your DNS, mailbox count, volume and list source and tell you what to fix before you send.

You are launching cold email and want the setup right the first time
Replies dropped and you are not sure if it is the list, the copy or deliverability
You are moving off a free tool and want to size mailboxes and domains

Book a cold email review

Free cold email software FAQ

Is there a free version of Instantly?

No. Instantly has a 14-day free trial with no card required, capped at 250 uploaded contacts and 1,000 emails. After that the Outreach plans start at $47 a month, or $37.60 a month billed annually.

What is the best free Instantly or Smartlead alternative?

Xpoudy is the only tool we found that offers unlimited mailboxes, warmup and contacts on a $0 plan, which is the closest match to how Instantly and Smartlead work. It launched in 2026 and does not publish send limits yet, so test it before relying on it. Snov.io and Hunter have stable free plans with sequences but cap recipients and mailboxes.

Does Smartlead have a free plan?

No. Smartlead offers a free trial on every plan with no card required. The Base plan is $39 a month, or $32 a month billed annually.

Can I send cold email for free?

You can send small volumes free with tools like Mailmeteor, YAMM, Streak, Hunter or Snov.io, and Xpoudy lists unlimited sending on its free plan. You will still pay for domains and mailboxes, because cold email should not go out from your main domain.

Does Apollo's free plan include sequences?

Yes. Apollo includes email campaigns on every account, including free. Free accounts can only connect Gmail, and credits and sequences are tightly capped, so it suits light testing.

Can I use Brevo or Mailchimp for cold email?

No. Both are built for opted-in lists. Brevo's anti-spam policy prohibits purchased or scraped lists and requires consent, and sending cold email through these tools gets accounts suspended.

How many cold emails can I send per day for free?

It depends on the tool. Mailmeteor and Streak allow 50 a day, YAMM allows 20, and the GMass trial allows 50 per rolling 24 hours. Separately from the tool, keep each mailbox at a low daily volume to protect deliverability.

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