What is phpList used for?

phpList is open-source email marketing software for building, sending, integrating and analyzing newsletters and campaigns, self-hosted or hosted. It is a good fit for newsletters for organizations and publishers, and self-hosted email campaigns.

Is phpList open source?

Yes. phpList is open source under the AGPL-3.0 licence. Its source code is on GitHub at phpList/phplist3 and is written mainly in PHP.

Yes. phpList is open source, so the software itself is free to use. A managed cloud version is also available.

Can I self-host phpList?

Yes. phpList can be self-hosted on your own server or infrastructure.

What is phpList an alternative to?

phpList is an open-source alternative to Mailchimp, Constant Contact, MailerLite and Kit (ConvertKit). Other open-source alternatives to Mailchimp include Listmonk, Notifuse and Mautic.

Is phpList actively maintained?

Yes. The most recent commit to phpList was on 24 September 2026, and the latest release is v3.6.17, published on 9 August 2026. The project has 874 stars on GitHub.

phpList: open-source alternative to Mailchimp

About phpList

phpList is an email marketing manager for creating, sending and analyzing email campaigns and newsletters. Organizations use it to manage subscriber lists, personalize messages and track results from a web or command-line interface, rather than relying on a third-party newsletter platform.

Capabilities include real-time analytics on message responses and subscriber behavior, segmentation, content personalization based on subscriber attributes, message-queue management with throttling across accounts and campaigns, and automated bounce processing with policy and regex rules. You can schedule, pause, resume, repeat and requeue campaigns, import and export subscribers by CSV or Excel, attach files, and send web pages or RSS feed contents. Amazon SES is supported, and the plugin architecture and APIs allow integration.

phpList is written in PHP and licensed under AGPL-3.0. You can deploy it on your own server, or sign up for a hosted account at phplist.com, which the README describes as free to start with. A demo and a community are linked from the repository.

Key features

Real-time campaign analytics
Subscriber segmentation and personalization
Queue management with domain-based throttling
Automated bounce processing
CSV and Excel subscriber import
Built-in Amazon SES support
Plugin architecture and APIs

Good fit for

→Newsletters for organizations and publishers
→Self-hosted email campaigns

Built with: PHP
Tags: email-marketing; newsletter; php; self-hosted; bounce-handling; amazon-ses; campaigns

phpList: questions and answers

What is phpList used for?: phpList is open-source email marketing software for building, sending, integrating and analyzing newsletters and campaigns, self-hosted or hosted. It is a good fit for newsletters for organizations and publishers, and self-hosted email campaigns.
Is phpList open source?: Yes. phpList is open source under the AGPL-3.0 licence. Its source code is on GitHub at phpList/phplist3 and is written mainly in PHP.
Is phpList free?: Yes. phpList is open source, so the software itself is free to use. A managed cloud version is also available.
Can I self-host phpList?: Yes. phpList can be self-hosted on your own server or infrastructure.
What is phpList an alternative to?: phpList is an open-source alternative to Mailchimp, Constant Contact, MailerLite and Kit (ConvertKit). Other open-source alternatives to Mailchimp include Listmonk, Notifuse and Mautic.
Is phpList actively maintained?: Yes. The most recent commit to phpList was on 24 September 2026, and the latest release is v3.6.17, published on 9 August 2026. The project has 874 stars on GitHub.