Can I add a limit to a specific SMTP user with Amazon SES?

Question

I recently requested a limit increase for Amazon SES and was given a sending limit that's higher than I'd like. Is there a way I can set reasonable sending limits for each SMTP user?

I've read the docs for Controlling Access to Amazon SES, but I don't see a way to set any limits. Are there any options besides contacting support again and asking to have the global limit reduced?

To give a specific example, I have a sending limit of 50k message per 24 hour period. However, I want to set up one of my SMTP users for a machine that will send less than 100 messages per day. Since I know that machine won't need to send more than 100 messages per day, I'd like to limit that SMTP user to 100 messages per day.

Answer 1

The following are Amazon SES sending limits:

Sending Quota—The maximum number of emails that you can send in a 24-hour period. The sending quota reflects a rolling time period. Every time you try to send an email, Amazon SES checks how many emails you sent in the previous 24 hours. As long as the total number of emails that you have sent is less than your quota, your send request will be accepted and your email will be sent. If you have already sent your full quota, your send request will be rejected with a throttling exception. For example, if your sending quota is 50,000, and you sent 15,000 emails in the previous 24 hours, then you can send another 35,000 emails right away. If you have already sent 50,000 emails in the previous 24 hours, you will not be able to send more emails until some of the previous sending rolls out of its 24-hour window.

Maximum Send Rate—The maximum number of emails that Amazon SES can accept from your account per second. You can exceed this limit for short bursts, but not for a sustained period of time.

Note

The rate at which Amazon SES accepts your messages might be less than the maximum send rate.

Your Amazon SES sending limits for each AWS Region are separate. For information about using Amazon SES in multiple AWS Regions, see Regions and Amazon SES.

When you are in the Amazon SES sandbox, your sending quota is 200 messages per 24-hour period and your maximum sending rate is one message per second. To increase your sending limits, you need to submit an SES Sending Limits Increase case. For more information, see Moving Out of the Amazon SES Sandbox. After you have moved out of the sandbox and start sending emails, you can increase your sending limits further by submitting another SES Sending Limits Increase case, as discussed in Increasing Your Amazon SES Sending Limits.

Note

Sending limits are based on recipients rather than on messages. For example, an email that has 10 recipients counts as 10 against your quota. However, we do not recommend that you send an email to multiple recipients in one call to SendEmail because if the call to Amazon SES fails (for example, the request is improperly formatted), the entire email will be rejected and none of the recipients will get the intended email. We recommend that you call SendEmail once for every recipient.

And

Increasing Your Amazon SES Sending Limits When your account is out of the sandbox and you're sending high-quality production email, we might automatically increase the sending limits for your account. Often, we automatically increase these limits before you actually need them to be increased, and you don't need to take any action.

To qualify for automatic rate increases, all of the following statements have to be true:

You send high-quality content that your recipients want to receive –Send content that recipients want and expect. Stop sending email to customers who don't open your email.

You send actual production content – Sending test messages to fake email addresses can have a negative effect on your bounce and complaint rates. Also, sending messages only to internal recipients makes it difficult to determine if you're sending content that customers want to receive. However, when you send your production messages to actual customers, we can accurately assess your email-sending practices.

You send near your current quota – To qualify for an automatic limit increase, your daily email volume should regularly approach your quota without exceeding it.

You have low bounce and complaint rates – Minimize the number of bounces and complaints that you receive. Having a high number of bounces and complaints can have a negative impact on your sending limits.

Source: AWS