Nitrosend is the better choice than ZEPIC on five of the seven things this review compares: running email from an AI agent, on-brand design without a designer, cost as the list grows, the free plan, and sending transactional and marketing email on one plan. Nitrosend leads 77.5 to 41 out of 100. ZEPIC is an omnichannel engagement platform for direct-to-consumer brands, where email is one channel add-on beside WhatsApp and Instagram, run from its web app with its own AI copilot. Nitrosend is the email platform built so an agent inside Claude, ChatGPT, Cursor or Codex writes, designs and sends the message, with email included rather than added on. Getting there takes one connection: point the assistant at Nitrosend's MCP server, api.nitrosend.com/mcp, and finish the OAuth sign-in. From then on the agent's campaigns and flows wait as drafts until they are approved, while a single transactional email goes out the moment it is called.
Nitrosend vs ZEPIC, compared
The quick version: eight yes-or-no questions a D2C brand usually asks when choosing between the two. A tick means the product does it as described on its own pages today. A dash means the honest answer is not a yes or a no.
Nitrosend and ZEPIC, side by side
Checked October 2, 2026| Question | Nitrosend | ZEPIC |
|---|---|---|
| Send a campaign from the chatCan an agent send a marketing campaign without anyone opening the web app? | Yes. Yes, through the MCP server. A single transactional email sends on the call; campaigns and flows stay drafts until approved. | No. No. Its AI agents work inside the platform. |
| Official MCP serverIs there a first-party MCP server for marketing email? | Yes. Yes. Listed as com.nitrosend/nitrosend on the official MCP registry. | No. Not documented. |
| Brand from your websiteDoes it learn your fonts, colors and voice from your website? | Yes. Yes. Brand Kit scans the site, including voice. | No. Not described. |
| Email included in the planIs email sending part of the base price? | Yes. Yes. Email is the product. | No. Not on Starter, Growth or Pro: a channel add-on from $10 a month on annual billing. Included on Enterprise. |
| Transactional APICan your app send a receipt through one API call? | Yes. Yes, on every plan including Free. | No. Not listed. Triggered messages come from integrations. |
| Free planIs there a free plan with no time limit? | Yes. Yes. 8,000 emails, then 500 a month, forever. | No. No. A free trial. |
| Unified team inboxCan the team answer replies in one inbox? | Not a yes or no. Not part of the plans compared here. | Yes. Yes. |
| Published price for extra contactsIs the price of contacts beyond the plan listed? | Yes. Contacts are free. | No. No. Sold in packs of 5,000, price not listed. |
Nitrosend meets 7 of 7 yes-or-no questions on this page, ZEPIC 1 of 8. Rows marked with a dash are not a yes or no question for that product.
How the two score
Seven tests, 100 points in all. Each product gets a score out of 10 on each one, and the total adds each score times the points for that test.
Each test, scored
Points out of 100, scores out of 10, October 2, 2026| What we compared | Points | Nitrosend | ZEPIC |
|---|---|---|---|
| Run from an AI agent | 20 | 9 out of 10 | 2 out of 10 |
| On-brand design, no designer | 10 | 9 out of 10 | 4 out of 10 |
| Cost as the list grows | 20 | 9 out of 10 | 4 out of 10 |
| Free plan headroom | 10 | 7 out of 10 | 1 out of 10 |
| Transactional and marketing, one plan | 10 | 9 out of 10 | 6 out of 10 |
| Hands-on editor and templates | 15 | 6 out of 10 | 6 out of 10 |
| Integrations, support, track record | 15 | 5 out of 10 | 6 out of 10 |
| Total score | 100 | 77.5 out of 100 | 41 out of 100 |
Where each one runs out
Rank 1Nitrosend
77.5 out of 100Total
- Priced by
- Emails sent
- Free plan
- 8,000 emails, then 500 a month
- Entry plan
- $20 a month, 20,000 emails
- Run from an AI agent9 out of 10Official MCP server runs campaigns, flows and sends from the chat; campaigns and flows stay drafts until approved (MCP registry).
- On-brand design, no designer9 out of 10Brand Kit scans the site for colors, fonts and voice, and applies them to every draft on every plan (docs).
- Cost as the list grows9 out of 10Unlimited contacts on every plan. $20 a month for 20,000 emails, $100 for 125,000 (pricing).
- Free plan headroom7 out of 108,000 emails to start, then 500 a month, unlimited contacts. New accounts start at 100 recipients per rolling 24 hours (pricing).
- Transactional and marketing, one plan9 out of 10Transactional and marketing email share one allowance and one API on every plan, Free included (pricing).
- Hands-on editor and templates6 out of 10A block builder exists for editing by hand, but it is plainer, because the agent is the main way in.
- Integrations, support, track record5 out of 10Shopify, Stripe, HubSpot, Attio and Mailchimp, five bring-your-own sending providers, a Node SDK, a CLI and signed webhooks for transactional email, but a young product from a small team (docs).
Nitrosend
Ask your agent for the next campaign
Connect Nitrosend to Claude, ChatGPT, Cursor or Codex, point Brand Kit at your site, and describe the email. Contacts are unlimited on every plan.
Free: 8,000 emails to start, then 500 a month. No credit card.
Start free
Rank 2ZEPIC
41 out of 100Total
- Priced by
- Platform plan plus channel add-ons
- Free plan
- None, a free trial
- Entry plan
- Starter, $29 a month, 5,000 contacts
- Run from an AI agent2 out of 10In-platform AI agents, but no MCP server or assistant connector is documented (pricing).
- On-brand design, no designer4 out of 10Drag-and-drop, templates and AI subject lines. No brand import from your website is described (pricing).
- Cost as the list grows4 out of 10Growth is $54 a month with 10,000 contacts on annual billing ($76 month to month), plus email from $10 for 10,000 sends (pricing).
- Free plan headroom1 out of 10No free plan, only a free trial (pricing).
- Transactional and marketing, one plan6 out of 10Real-time triggered messages from connected stores and CRMs, but no dedicated transactional API (pricing).
- Hands-on editor and templates6 out of 10Drag-and-drop builder, a template library and AI subject lines (email marketing).
- Integrations, support, track record6 out of 10WhatsApp, Instagram DMs, a chatbot and a team inbox alongside email (pricing).
The verdict in short
ZEPIC is only better on one: channels and extras, because WhatsApp, Instagram DMs, a chatbot and a unified team inbox sit beside email. The two tie on the hands-on editor.
ZEPIC puts more channels beside email. George Hartley, Nitrosend's co-founder, has a view on it. On SaaS Stories in September 2026 he said the fix for deliverability starts with data: "the key there is to surface the analytics back to your agent because they're pretty good at working out you know is there a problem and what what can be fixed". In the same interview he said that when sending goes awry, "often it can be to do with, you know, you might be not segmenting properly or all those things." If email is the channel that matters most to you, judge both on whether an agent can read the analytics and fix the segmenting.
At a glance
Nitrosend and ZEPIC are scored here on the same 7 tests, 100 points in all: Nitrosend 77.5 out of 100, ZEPIC 41 out of 100. Nitrosend takes its best score on Run from an AI agent and On-brand design, no designer and Cost as the list grows and Transactional and marketing, one plan (9 out of 10) and its lowest on Integrations, support, track record (5 out of 10). ZEPIC takes its best score on Transactional and marketing, one plan and Hands-on editor and templates and Integrations, support, track record (6 out of 10) and its lowest on Free plan headroom (1 out of 10). ZEPIC scores higher on Integrations, support, track record. Scores are unadjusted, and every ZEPIC figure was read on its own site on October 2, 2026.
How we scored
Each test is a question with one answer per product, checked against that product's own pages and independent review sites on October 2, 2026. A 10 means the product does the job fully on its standard plans. A 5 means it does part of it, or does it only on a higher plan or in a second product. ZEPIC prices are monthly list prices in US dollars on annual billing, paid upfront, the default its pricing page shows; its email channel is an add-on priced separately.
Run from an AI agent, 20 of 100. Can an agent inside Claude, ChatGPT, Cursor or Codex compose a marketing campaign, test it, and send it, with no person opening the web app between the prompt and the send? An approval step the person answers in the chat counts as inside the agent. Moving into the web app to finish does not. Scored on one written rule for every vendor: a first-party server the vendor runs and that can send counts fully; a third-party wrapper (Zapier, Composio, Kanopi, community servers) counts for less; a server that only drafts or reads counts for less than one that sends.
On-brand design, no designer, 10 of 100. Does the product learn your logo, colors, fonts and voice from your own site and apply them to every email it drafts, on the plan most small teams start on?
Cost as the list grows, 20 of 100. What does the bill do when the list grows but the number of emails you send does not? Scored on published list prices, before any promotional discount.
Free plan headroom, 10 of 100. How far can a team get on the free plan before it has to pay: contacts, total sends, and the daily ceiling.
Transactional and marketing, one plan, 10 of 100. Can receipts, password resets and newsletters go out from one account, on one bill, through one API?
Hands-on editor and templates, 15 of 100. For a person who wants to build the email themselves: how mature are the visual editor and the template library?
Integrations, support, track record, 15 of 100. How many tools does it plug into, what support comes with the plan, and how long has it been doing this at scale?
What each one costs in 2026
ZEPIC charges a platform fee that includes a set number of contacts, plus a fee for each channel. Its pricing page opens on annual billing, paid upfront: Starter $29 a month with 5,000 contacts, Growth $54 with 10,000, Pro $109 with 25,000 and Enterprise from $499 with 100,000. Switch the same page to monthly billing and Starter is $41, Growth $76 and Pro $154. Email is an add-on that starts at $10 a month for 10,000 emails on annual billing, or $13 month to month. Extra contacts come in add-on packs of 5,000, but the page does not list what a pack or a larger email add-on costs, so the table below shows the plan price and notes what is missing.
The table prices ZEPIC on Growth at the 10,000-contact row because Starter connects only one channel, and Growth is the first plan whose card lists store or CRM integrations and real-time triggered messages, the fair match for the automated flows Nitrosend's $20 plan includes. The ZEPIC figures are its annual rates, the lowest it shows. Nitrosend's prices are month to month.
Nitrosend is priced by emails sent. Contacts are unlimited on every plan, as the Nitrosend pricing page sets out, and what email marketing actually costs compares the models.
Here is what that looks like for a brand that sends two campaigns a month.
What each one costs
List prices, USD, October 2, 2026| Scenario | Nitrosend | ZEPIC |
|---|---|---|
| 10,000 contacts, two campaigns a month (20,000 emails) | Pro, $20 a month (20,000 emails) | Growth $54 a month on annual billing (10,000 contacts) plus the email add-on |
| 50,000 contacts, two campaigns a month (100,000 emails) | Ultra, $100 a month (125,000 emails) | Pro $109 a month on annual billing includes 25,000 contacts. Extra contacts not priced |
| 100,000 contacts, two campaigns a month (200,000 emails) | Ultra plus 75,000 extra emails at $0.15 per 100, $212.50 a month | Enterprise from $499 a month (100,000 contacts) plus email |
| Add transactional email | Counted in the same allowance | Triggered messages from integrations |
A new Nitrosend account starts on a lower daily recipient limit that rises as it earns sending standing, so a large list does not all go out on day one.
Where ZEPIC is the better pick
ZEPIC takes one of the seven tests outright and ties another.
- Channels. WhatsApp, Instagram DMs, a chatbot and a unified team inbox beside email, with integrations into stores and CRMs, and SMS through the brand's own provider. Nitrosend sends email, with texting coming soon and no WhatsApp or Instagram, and it is a younger product from a small team.
- The editor. A tie. ZEPIC's email builder has drag-and-drop layouts and a template library, and its pricing page adds an AI subject line generator.
ZEPIC's AI lives inside its own product. Zenie AI, its copilot, builds journeys and campaigns from a prompt in the ZEPIC app, where the person is asked to "review and approve the final touches". ZEPIC's site also points to Neura HQ, which describes custom AI agents deployed for a business over about 30 days after a workshop, and says OpenAI, Claude and other models on their own are "not built for enterprise control". Neither is a way for an assistant the team already uses to run ZEPIC's email, and ZEPIC documents no MCP server or connector. Its plan guide turns on API access only from Pro, with no API tokens on Starter or Growth. Putting those two facts together, an outside agent would have to work through that API, so it needs Pro, $109 a month on annual billing, before it can run anything in ZEPIC.
Zenie asks for an approval, and Nitrosend holds campaigns and flows as drafts until they are approved. The difference is where that happens. In ZEPIC it is ZEPIC's app. With Nitrosend it is the assistant the team already works in, because MCP is the open standard that lets AI applications like Claude or ChatGPT connect to outside tools. That works on the Free plan, and Brand Kit gives the agent the brand's look and voice. The AI email marketing guide shows the workflow.
Moving from ZEPIC to Nitrosend
There is no ZEPIC connector in Nitrosend, so a move runs through an export and the agent.
- Contacts. ZEPIC's plan guide lists data export from Growth up, with a limit of 100,000 records, and none on Starter, so check the plan before the move. Export contacts as CSV with their properties and import them in Contacts or through the imports API. Bring consent status across, because only subscribed contacts should be sendable.
- Journeys. Describe each email journey to the agent and it rebuilds it as a draft flow. Before switching the old journey off, confirm its trigger arrives in Nitrosend: the Shopify integration documents orders, refunds, products and customers. Check every revenue flow before switching it on.
- Store events. Shopify stores connect Nitrosend's Shopify integration for customers and store events. Other platforms send events through the API.
- Sending. Verify the domain, then send to the most engaged contacts first and grow from there. The domain warm-up guide covers the ramp.
- Run both. Keep ZEPIC for WhatsApp and Instagram while email moves over, and send receipts through Nitrosend's transactional email API.
Which one to pick
Pick ZEPIC if WhatsApp and Instagram matter as much as email, the team answers customers from one inbox, or it wants a vendor to build and run AI agents across channels for it.
Pick Nitrosend if email is the main channel and an agent should write, design and send them from the assistant the team already uses, the brand wants a free plan to start on, or receipts and newsletters belong on one plan and one API. The Nitrosend MCP server and the ChatGPT app are the two ways most teams start.
Nitrosend vs ZEPIC FAQ
For email, yes. ZEPIC Growth is $54 a month for 10,000 contacts on annual billing, or $76 month to month, before the email add-on, which starts at $10 a month for 10,000 emails ($13 month to month). Nitrosend is $20 a month for 20,000 emails with unlimited contacts.
Not a documented one. ZEPIC's AI is Zenie, a copilot inside its own app, and its site points to Neura HQ for custom-built agents. Neither connects Claude or ChatGPT to ZEPIC's email, and its API is available only from the Pro plan.
Add api.nitrosend.com/mcp to Claude as a custom connector and finish the OAuth sign-in; ChatGPT, Cursor and Codex connect the same way, per the Nitrosend MCP guide. Then describe the campaign you would have built in ZEPIC. Claude saves it as a draft, can send a test copy to your inbox, and the campaign goes to the list only once it is approved. A single transactional email, such as an order confirmation, sends as soon as Claude calls it.
Not on Starter, Growth or Pro. Email is a channel add-on, starting at $10 a month for 10,000 emails on annual billing, on top of the platform plan.
No. Each paid plan has a 14-day free trial. Nitrosend's Free plan has no time limit: 8,000 emails to start, then 500 a month.
It sends real-time triggered messages from connected stores and CRMs on Growth and above, but lists no dedicated transactional API. Nitrosend sends transactional email through one API on every plan.
Sending reputation belongs to the domain and does not move with the list. Verify the domain, send to the most engaged contacts first, and let the daily limit ramp. This review does not score deliverability, because neither product publishes a comparable inbox-placement number.