If you compared MailDeck and ScaledMail in early 2026, the comparison was straightforward: two competitors, both publishing per-domain or per-inbox numbers, easy to put in a spreadsheet. That's not the comparison anymore.
MailDeck simplified their homepage down to a single line: "Enterprise cold email infrastructure starting from $45/month. Flat-rate pricing with unlimited mailbox creation." The "Order Now" CTA became "Go to Dashboard" and "Order Inboxes." Their full tier breakdown still lives on a /pricing page, but everything there is currently displayed as a "Limited Offer" sale price with the regular rate struck through. Several inventory lines (Pre-Warmed Google Workspace, Pre-Warmed Private SMTP, Leveraged SMTP) are marked SOLD OUT.
If you're choosing cold email infrastructure right now and considering MailDeck, this is the honest comparison. From someone managing 217,600+ inboxes at ScaledMail.
What MailDeck Actually Publishes Today
Walking through what's currently on the site, exactly as written:
- Homepage pricing section: One sentence. "Enterprise cold email infrastructure starting from $45/month. Flat-rate pricing with unlimited mailbox creation." No tier names, no per-inbox or per-domain numbers, no comparison table.
- Homepage CTAs: "Go to Dashboard," "Order Inboxes," "Get Started." All point at app.maildeck.co. The signup flow has moved into the dashboard.
- /pricing page: Full tier breakdown still exists, but every price is tagged "Limited Offer: Extra 30% Sale" (Outlook) or "Extra 20% Sale" (Google, SMTP) with the standard rate struck through. The price you see today is the promotional price, not the price you'll renew at if the promotion ends.
- SOLD OUT inventory: Pre-Warmed Google Workspace and Pre-Warmed Private SMTP are marked SOLD OUT. So is Leveraged SMTP (1M+ emails/month tier). Some of the products MailDeck lists are not currently available for purchase.
- BYO domains: $12/domain if you need MailDeck to source them.
- New product lines: "Diversification" packages (bundles across Outlook + SMTP + Google) and "Pre-Warmed Inboxes" (priced at the tenant level for Outlook, SOLD OUT for Google and SMTP).
None of that is a critique on its own. Sites get redesigned and inventory runs out. The thing is, it changes what you're actually committing to when you buy MailDeck. You're committing to (a) whatever the post-promotion rate turns out to be, and (b) inventory availability that varies by SKU and changes week to week.
What That Means For Your Budget
Cold email infrastructure budgets have to be predictable to be useful. If you're running 200 inboxes and your provider's "real" price is 30-40% higher than today's sale price, your unit economics shift the moment the promotion ends. We've seen agencies build campaign math around promotional rates and then absorb the difference quietly when renewal hits.
The /pricing strikethroughs are the clearest signal. MailDeck's Outlook Normal License shows $45/month per domain crossed out, $30/month current. Google Starter shows $49/month crossed out, $39/month current. Private SMTP shows $0.60/inbox crossed out, $0.50/inbox current. The struck-through price is what they call "regular." That's the budget you have to plan for, not the discounted line item you click on at signup.
ScaledMail publishes flat per-mailbox and per-domain rates with no strikethroughs and no "limited offer" framing. Google Workspace mailboxes are $3.50/mailbox/month. Microsoft Outlook is $50/domain/month with 25 mailboxes included. SMTP is $3.75/domain/month with 4 mailboxes. Whatever the sticker says today is the price next quarter. Full pricing here.
Inventory Availability Matters More Than People Think
"SOLD OUT" on an infrastructure product is unusual. ESPs don't run out of mailboxes the way physical inventory does. When a provider marks SKUs sold out, it usually signals one of two things: capacity constraints with the underlying ESP relationship, or a deliberate pause on a product line that isn't performing. Either way, it's a real planning constraint.
If you walk into MailDeck wanting Pre-Warmed Google Workspace inboxes (one of their newer products), today you can't buy them. Same for Pre-Warmed Private SMTP. If those were the products that made MailDeck attractive vs. an alternative, you have to wait or substitute.
ScaledMail's pre-aged domain pipeline has been running long enough to keep hundreds of domains in active rotation. We don't sell a "pre-warmed" SKU separately because warmup-ready setup is baked into every package. The reason is architectural. Warmup-friendly DNS, sending limits, and IP behavior have to be in place from day one or warming the inbox doesn't accomplish much.
The Density Question Hasn't Changed
The pricing and inventory volatility is new. The architectural critique we've been making about MailDeck for the past year is the same one we'd make today.
MailDeck's Outlook product is still 100 inboxes per domain. Their licenses, Normal and Premium, are priced per domain. The math works out to a low per-inbox cost only if you actually run 100 inboxes on a single domain.
Standard cold email best practice is 2-3 inboxes per domain on Google Workspace, and even on Microsoft 365, 25 inboxes per domain through a managed Azure tenant configuration is dramatically more conservative than 100. The reason most experienced operators cap density: ESPs evaluate reputation at the domain level. One spam complaint wave or one filter change targeting your domain takes down every inbox on it simultaneously. More on this here.
We've watched this play out. An agency running 50 inboxes across 2 domains (25 each) had one domain spam-flagged after a list quality issue. They lost 25 inboxes overnight. If those 50 had been packed onto one domain, they'd have lost everything. If they'd been on the MailDeck 100-per-domain model, the loss would have been catastrophic.
There's also a Microsoft tenant block angle. At 49, 99, or 100 inboxes per domain, you're far more likely to trigger "unusual activity" blocks from Microsoft. Those don't necessarily destroy your account, but they require you to interface with Microsoft support to get unblocked. That's days of downtime at best. Teams unfamiliar with the support process sometimes have to spin up entirely new infrastructure to get back to sending.
Feature Comparison: ScaledMail vs MailDeck
| Feature | ScaledMail | MailDeck |
|---|---|---|
| Public pricing | Flat per-mailbox / per-domain rates | Homepage shows "starting from $45/mo"; /pricing tiers all on Limited Offer sale |
| Inventory availability | All package types available | Pre-Warmed Google Workspace, Pre-Warmed SMTP, Leveraged SMTP marked SOLD OUT |
| Inbox density | 2-3/domain (Google), managed density (M365) | Up to 100 inboxes per domain |
| ESP options | Google Workspace + Microsoft 365 + SMTP | Outlook + Google + SMTP, with new "Diversification" bundles |
| Pre-aged domains / warmup | Bundled into every package | Pre-Warmed Inboxes is a separate SKU, partially SOLD OUT |
| DNS configuration | Fully managed by team | Self-serve via dashboard |
| Deliverability support | Dedicated Slack, human experts | Dashboard self-serve |
| Signup flow | Talk to a human, scoped to your volume | Dashboard signup ("Go to Dashboard" / "Order Inboxes") |
| Billing | Month-to-month, no promotional pricing | Per-domain or per-inbox at promotional rates |
Tracked-Keyword Internal Links
If you're researching the broader space, these guides cover the underlying mechanics:
- Cold Email Infrastructure: The Complete Guide. What infrastructure actually has to do for cold email at scale.
- Best Cold Email Infrastructure Providers (2026). How to evaluate providers across pricing, density, and management.
- How Many Inboxes Per Domain for Cold Email? The density math behind the 2-3 vs 100 debate.
- Cold Email Deliverability Guide. The operational side of email deliverability.
- Cold Email Account Warm-Up. Why email warmup has to be built into the infrastructure, not bolted on after.
- Buying Domains for Cold Outreach. Domain economics if you're comparing BYO vs provider-sourced.
Who Should Stay With MailDeck
MailDeck still makes sense if:
- You've already locked in a promotional rate and you're planning around the post-promotion price
- You want Outlook-focused infrastructure specifically and you're comfortable with high-density tenants
- You can self-manage DNS, warmup, and deliverability from a dashboard
- You don't need the SKUs that are currently SOLD OUT
- The "starting from $45/month" homepage signal is enough budget detail to commit
Who Should Switch to ScaledMail
ScaledMail is built for teams who:
- Want pricing they can put in a budget without translating from sale price to regular price
- Need inventory availability that doesn't depend on which SKUs are in stock this week
- Need conservative inbox density that protects against domain-level blowups
- Want warmup-ready infrastructure built into every package by default
- Value human expert management on Slack over a self-serve dashboard
- Have experienced the cascading failure that comes from high-density domains
Making the Switch
- Infrastructure assessment: We review your current MailDeck setup, density, ESP mix, and volume needs
- Multi-ESP provisioning: Google Workspace + Microsoft 365 on isolated, conservatively-densified infrastructure
- DNS configured: SPF, DKIM, DMARC set up by our team
- Fast deployment: Pre-aged domains for same-week launch, not a separately-priced SKU
- Ongoing management: Dedicated Slack, proactive monitoring, managed domain rotation
Frequently Asked Questions
Does MailDeck still publish numeric pricing?
Their homepage no longer does, beyond "starting from $45/month." Full tier numbers exist on /pricing, but every tier is currently displayed as a sale price with the standard rate struck through. The "regular" rate is what you should plan around, not the limited offer.
Why does MailDeck mark some products SOLD OUT?
That's their phrasing, not ours. As of this writing, Pre-Warmed Google Workspace, Pre-Warmed Private SMTP, and Leveraged SMTP are marked SOLD OUT. ESPs themselves don't run out of mailboxes, so this likely reflects either capacity constraints with their underlying ESP relationships or a deliberate pause on those product lines.
Is 100 inboxes per domain safe for cold email?
Technically possible, but it concentrates risk. ESPs evaluate reputation at the domain level. One spam complaint wave or filter change targeting your domain affects every inbox on it simultaneously. Standard practice is 2-3/domain on Google Workspace and managed density on M365.
What's the biggest difference between ScaledMail and MailDeck right now?
Two things. First, pricing predictability: ScaledMail's published rates aren't promotional, so the price doesn't reset when a sale ends. Second, management model: ScaledMail puts a human on Slack, MailDeck puts you in a dashboard.
Can I migrate from MailDeck to ScaledMail?
Yes. We provision new inboxes on isolated infrastructure with conservative density, warm them or use pre-aged domains, and you swap into your sequencer. Run both during transition. Most migrations complete in 48-72 hours.
Get Started
Want infrastructure that's priced predictably and built for resilience instead of density? Book a call to discuss your setup, or build your custom package now.
Month-to-month. No promotional pricing games. No SOLD OUT screens.