Best for
Best for consumer brands with a serious mobile app, where wallet passes, in-app experiences and push carry the relationship and email is one channel among several.
- Small and mid-sized
- Enterprise
Email Marketing Comparison
Airship vs. Mautic
At a glance
At a glance
Best for
Best for teams that need marketing automation without a per-contact bill, and have someone able to run a PHP application.
- Small and mid-sized
- Enterprise
Cataleo does not name a winner. Both statements come from the vendors themselves.
Full Comparison
| Criterion | Airship | Mautic |
|---|---|---|
| Starting price | Not stated | Free and open source if self-hosted; managed hosting from €247.50 / month The software carries no licence cost, but the server and the email sending provider are your own. Managed hosting through the official partner Dropsolid starts at €247.50 per month billed annually, or €275 per month billed quarterly. |
| Free trial | Not stated | 14-day trial of the hosted offering, no credit card required |
| Users | The vendor states thousands of global brands and more than 15 years in mobile messaging | Not stated |
| Commercial use | Not stated | Yes, GPL v3 |
| API | Yes, REST APIs, mobile and web SDKs and real-time data streaming, plus an open-source MCP server | Yes, a REST API plus an in-app marketplace of community plugins and themes |
| Hosting | Cloud (SaaS) | Self-hosted on your own infrastructure, or managed hosting through certified partners |
| Made in | United States | Not stated |
| Campaign types | Email for both promotional and transactional sends, mobile and web push notifications, SMS, RCS and MMS, mobile wallet passes, and native app and web experiences including scenes, surveys and preference centres | Email campaigns and newsletters alongside SMS, push notifications and WhatsApp, plus landing pages and forms that embed in a site or open as a popup |
| Automation and journeys | Journey orchestration that connects messaging, app and web experiences into one flow, built either in the no-code builder or conversationally through the Journeys AI Agent, with continuous testing and optimisation of timing, content and channel | Yes, a drag-and-drop campaign builder for multi-step journeys from capture through to conversion |
| Segmentation and personalisation | Real-time segmentation on behaviour, preferences and context, fed by customer data management that activates existing data and captures zero-party preferences through in-session surveys, forms and preference centres | Yes, contact segmentation driven by behaviour and engagement tracking, with customisable point-based lead scoring to prioritise contacts |
| Templates and editor | Drag-and-drop email blocks with generative AI for content, plus the Native Experience AI Agent that builds app and web experiences from a text description or an image upload, and partner design workflows that export from Figma through Email Love or from EmailShepherd as content templates | Yes, a drag-and-drop email builder with personalisation and A/B testing, plus a landing page builder and a form builder; community themes come through the marketplace |
| Deliverability and testing | Built-in previews and Litmus-powered inbox rendering tests, subject line tests and cross-channel control groups, with strategic services offered for migrations and deliverability optimisation | Sending runs through a provider you supply, not one bundled with the product. SMTP is the default transport, configured as a DSN, and since version 5 the Symfony Mailer transports add SendGrid, Amazon SES and others by Composer; a SparkPost plugin is available from the Mautic Marketplace. The documentation warns that the Symfony transports do not support batch sending or the bounce-management callbacks the dedicated plugins handle |
| Ecommerce and CRM data | Integrations across analytics and attribution, customer data platforms, data warehouses and commerce, including Adobe Experience Platform, Salesforce Data Cloud, Segment, Tealium, Treasure Data, LiveRamp, Snowflake, Databricks, Google BigQuery, Amazon Redshift, Shopify, RevenueCat and Talon.One | Contacts, companies and lead scoring are native, and CRM, ecommerce and SMS systems connect through marketplace plugins or webhooks rather than shipping preconfigured |
| Integrations and API | Yes, REST APIs, mobile and web SDKs and real-time data streaming, plus an open-source MCP server that works with Claude Code, Claude Desktop and Cursor for querying channel data, sending test pushes, inspecting tags and attributes and running guided SDK migrations | Yes, a REST API for contacts, campaigns and data transfer, webhooks, and an in-app marketplace of community plugins |
| AI features | stated Yes | No |
| MCP-ready | stated Yes | No |
| Deployment | Cloud (SaaS), Browser-based | more entries On-premise, Cloud (SaaS), Browser-based |
| Support | more entries Email helpdesk, Phone, Community forum | Community forum |
| Onboarding | more entries Documentation and knowledge base, Personal consulting | Documentation and knowledge base |
| Company size | Small and mid-sized, Enterprise | Small and mid-sized, Enterprise |
| Integrations | more entries Adobe Experience Platform, Salesforce Data Cloud, Segment, Tealium, Treasure Data, LiveRamp, Snowflake, Databricks, Google BigQuery, Amazon Redshift, Shopify, RevenueCat, Talon.One, Adjust, Branch, Amplitude, Mixpanel, Adobe Analytics, Google Analytics, Movable Ink | SMTP, SendGrid, Amazon SES, SparkPost |
Add a tool
Adds a column to the table, from the tools in this category.
Row where the values differ The small markers point at the lower number, the longer list or the stated feature. They describe the data, they are not a verdict.
The short version
Key Differences
- Deployment Airship Cloud (SaaS), Browser-based Mautic On-premise, Cloud (SaaS), Browser-based
- Hosting Airship Cloud (SaaS) Mautic Self-hosted on your own infrastructure, or managed hosting through certified partners
- Support Airship Email helpdesk, Phone, Community forum Mautic Community forum
- AI features Airship Yes Mautic No
- MCP-ready Airship Yes Mautic No
Every line is one datapoint from the table above, picked automatically. Nothing here is written text.
The trade-offs
Strengths and Limitations
Airship
Strengths
- Email, push, SMS, RCS, mobile wallet and in-app experiences are orchestrated as one journey
- Native app and web surfaces go well beyond what email-led platforms offer, including wallet passes and Live Activities
- The AI agent fleet covers campaign setup, journeys, recommendations and accessibility auditing with a human review step
- An open-source MCP server connects Claude Code, Claude Desktop and Cursor to channel data and test sends
- Broad data integrations in both directions, across CDPs, warehouses and attribution tools
Limitations
- No pricing is published for either the platform or the self-service Essentials tier, so evaluation starts with a quote
- The mobile-first design is wasted on a programme that is essentially an email newsletter
- Working conversationally through agents means reviewing machine-drafted campaigns rather than composing them
- The split between Essentials and the full platform is described by capability, not by any published limits
Mautic
Strengths
- No licence cost and no per-contact fee, so list growth does not change the bill
- Self-hosting keeps contact data in a jurisdiction you pick
- Campaign builder, email builder, landing pages, forms and lead scoring are all in the core product
- REST API, webhooks and an in-app marketplace for extending it
Limitations
- You supply and pay for the email sending provider separately
- Running and patching a PHP application is your responsibility unless you buy managed hosting
- Support is community forums and Slack; paid support comes only through partners
- Symfony Mailer transports do not batch-send or handle bounce callbacks
Plans
Pricing
Airship
- Airship Essentials Not stated A self-service platform with no code required, aimed at growth-focused teams building app and web experiences with native UI, automation and real-time orchestration. No price is published.
- Airship Experience Platform (AXP) Not stated Quoted. Cross-channel experiences across email, SMS, RCS and MMS, push, web notifications, mobile wallet, app and web, with customer data management, personalisation and segmentation, journey orchestration, testing and optimisation, partner integrations, reporting analytics and strategic services.
Mautic
- Self-hosted €0 The open source application under the GPL v3 licence. No licence cost; the server and the email sending provider are your own.
- Mautic Essential €247.50 Per month billed annually, or €275 per month billed quarterly. Managed shared hosting through Dropsolid, up to 50,000 emails per month and 50,000 contacts.
- Mautic Professional €1,237 Per month. Dedicated hosting, up to 3 million contacts, with a dedicated support manager.
- Mautic Enterprise Custom Quoted by the vendor. Dedicated infrastructure, up to 6 million emails per month, enterprise-grade security.
What users say
Review Scores · opens after launch
Airship
- Ease of use
- Not rated yet
- User interface
- Not rated yet
- Onboarding
- Not rated yet
- Support and service
- Not rated yet
- Value for money
- Not rated yet
- Features
- Not rated yet
No reviews yet. Nothing has been published here yet, and no score is shown. How a review is checked before it appears is described below.
Mautic
- Ease of use
- Not rated yet
- User interface
- Not rated yet
- Onboarding
- Not rated yet
- Support and service
- Not rated yet
- Value for money
- Not rated yet
- Features
- Not rated yet
No reviews yet. Nothing has been published here yet, and no score is shown. How a review is checked before it appears is described below.
How we check reviews
Before sending, the author has to confirm three things: that they have used the product themselves, that they work neither for the vendor nor for a competitor, and that nobody is paying them for the review. We also ask whether the vendor invited them to write it. That answer is required, either answer is accepted, and it stays with the review.
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Where this comes from
Where this comes from
Airship https://www.airship.com · checked against the official source on 2026-09-24
Mautic https://www.mautic.org · no check date recorded yet
This table lists factual criteria taken from information the vendors publish themselves. For how we put it together, see the methodology.