Amazon SES adds guided SMTP setup via Mail Manager

Does Amazon SES now make SMTP setup faster with Mail Manager?

Yes. As of July 24, 2026, Amazon SES includes a guided console workflow that automates the configuration of Mail Manager resources needed for SMTP sending. Previously, developers had to set up those resources individually across multiple steps. The new flow handles that automatically and produces a working SMTP endpoint plus downloadable credentials.

What changed under the hood

Mail Manager is a capability inside SES designed for managing email flow, and it already supported SMTP-based sending. The problem was that wiring everything together required navigating several discrete configuration steps in the console. The new guided setup collapses that process, creating and linking the necessary Mail Manager resources on the developer's behalf.

The result is a usable SMTP endpoint and a credentials file that can be dropped directly into any application or framework with SMTP support. Amazon specifically calls out common use cases such as email notifications, password resets, and transactional messages as scenarios the feature targets.

Who benefits most

Teams that want a production-ready SMTP configuration without spending time on infrastructure setup are the primary audience. Because SMTP is a widely supported protocol, the credentials produced by the guided setup should work with most languages and frameworks without additional adaptation.

The feature is available in every AWS region where SES is offered, so there are no geographic restrictions to account for when deciding whether to adopt it.

What stays the same

The underlying Mail Manager architecture has not changed; developers who previously configured Mail Manager manually retain those setups. The guided experience is an additive path, not a replacement for existing configurations. Pricing information for Mail Manager or SES sending was not detailed in the announcement.

Getting started

The setup is accessible directly from the Amazon SES console. Once the guided flow completes, credentials are available for download and the SMTP endpoint is ready to accept connections. A rough integration might look like this for a Python application using the standard smtplib library:

import smtplib
from email.mime.text import MIMEText

smtp_endpoint = "<your-mail-manager-endpoint>"
smtp_port = 587
username = "<downloaded-username>"
password = "<downloaded-password>"

msg = MIMEText("Hello from SES Mail Manager SMTP")
msg["Subject"] = "Test"
msg["From"] = "sender@example.com"
msg["To"] = "recipient@example.com"

with smtplib.SMTP(smtp_endpoint, smtp_port) as server:
    server.starttls()
    server.login(username, password)
    server.send_message(msg)

The endpoint and credentials come directly from the guided setup output; no additional SES SDK calls are required to send via this path.