Softwr

Email Marketing · head to head

Sailthru vs Shortwave

Sailthru logo

Sailthru

Email Marketing

Retail and publisher email personalisation, now one product inside the Marigold portfolio

From
On request
Rated
-
Full reviewWebsite
Shortwave logo

Shortwave

Email Marketing

AI-powered email assistant for intelligent inbox management

From
Free
Rated
-
Full reviewWebsite

The short version

  • Only Shortwave has a free tier, so it costs nothing to try first.
  • Each has a real cost: Sailthru the product sits in a portfolio with several overlapping platforms under one owner, so roadmap investment is a portfolio decision rather than a product decision and is worth asking about in writing.; Shortwave per-seat pricing increases team costs compared to flat-rate email solutions
  • They diverge on capability: Sailthru covers Interest profiles, Shortwave covers AI Email Filtering.
  • Prices and features above were last checked on 31 August 2026.

Where they differ

Only the attributes on which Sailthru and Shortwave actually diverge.

Attributes where Sailthru and Shortwave differ
AttributeSailthruShortwave
Starting priceOn requestFree
Pricing modelquoteUnknown
Free tierNoYes
PlatformsWeb, REST APIiOS, Android, macOS, Windows

Identical on both: user rating (Not yet rated), category (Email Marketing).

What each one covers

Drawn from each product's published feature list. An absence here means we hold no record of it - not that the product lacks it.

Only in Sailthru

  • Interest profiles
  • Personalisation engine
  • Prediction Manager
  • Site personalisation
  • Zephyr templating
  • Lifecycle optimiser

Only in Shortwave

  • AI Email Filtering
  • Intelligent Autocomplete
  • Voice-Style Composition
  • Meeting Scheduling
  • Email-to-Todo Conversion
  • AI-Powered Search
  • Team Collaboration
  • Email Summaries

What people use each for

The jobs each tool is most often brought in to do.

Sailthru

  • A publisher sending a personalised daily newsletter assembled per reader from a content cataloguenot Shortwave
  • A retailer that wants email and on-site recommendations driven by the same affinity modelnot Shortwave
  • High-cadence sending where per-recipient content assembly matters more than journey branchingnot Shortwave
  • Teams that want churn and lifetime value scores available as native campaign conditions rather than imported fieldsnot Shortwave

Shortwave

  • Reducing inbox overload through AI-powered organizationnot Sailthru
  • Drafting professional emails using natural languagenot Sailthru
  • Scheduling meetings without back-and-forth coordinationnot Sailthru
  • Searching email archives using conversational queriesnot Sailthru
  • Converting emails to tasks for team task trackingnot Sailthru

Where each one falls short

Documented limitations, not opinions. Every one is a constraint you would hit in normal use.

Sailthru

  • The product sits in a portfolio with several overlapping platforms under one owner, so roadmap investment is a portfolio decision rather than a product decision and is worth asking about in writing.
  • Pricing counts stored profiles, so retained inactive readers keep costing money long after they stopped opening anything.
  • On-site personalisation requires a developer to implement the JavaScript and maintain the content feed, which puts the highest-value feature behind engineering time.
  • Zephyr is a proprietary templating language, so template maintenance skills are scarce compared with the Liquid syntax used by most competitors.
  • It is built for high-cadence content and retail sending, and B2B lifecycle programmes with long sales cycles sit poorly on the model.

Shortwave

  • Per-seat pricing increases team costs compared to flat-rate email solutions
  • AI features may require higher tier plans, limiting value for smaller teams
  • Dependency on third-party integrations for full feature depth
  • Learning curve for effective use of AI-powered features
  • Limited customization for AI filter behavior compared to manual rules

Pricing, plan by plan

Sailthru

On request
  • Sailthru$undefined/year
    • Priced on stored profiles and send volume
    • Site personalisation and prediction features licensed by module
    • Annual contract through Marigold

Shortwave

Free
  • FreeFree
    • Email search and organization
    • Basic inbox tools
    • Limited AI features
  • Business$30/month
    • Full standard search history
    • 5 years AI search history
    • Max 50 threads per AI search
  • Premier$45/month
    • Everything in Business
    • 2x more AI usage
    • Unlimited AI search history
  • Max$120/month
    • Everything in Premier
    • 6x more AI usage
    • Max 150 threads per AI search

Which should you pick?

Choose Sailthru if

  • You need interest profiles.
  • You work on Web, REST API.
  • You also want personalisation engine.
Sailthru review

Choose Shortwave if

  • You need ai email filtering.
  • You want to start without paying.
  • You work on iOS, Android, macOS, Windows.
  • You also want intelligent autocomplete.
Shortwave review

Questions people ask

Is Sailthru or Shortwave better?
Neither clearly leads. Sailthru starts at On request and Shortwave at Free, and user ratings are close enough to be indistinguishable. Choose on capability and platform support.
Which is cheaper, Sailthru or Shortwave?
Shortwave has a free tier; the other does not. Paid plans start at On request for Sailthru and Free for Shortwave.
Does Sailthru or Shortwave run on more platforms?
Sailthru runs on Web, REST API. Shortwave runs on iOS, Android, macOS, Windows.
Can I use Shortwave for free?
Yes. Shortwave has a free tier, so you can try it without paying. Sailthru starts at On request.
What is Sailthru best used for?
Sailthru is most often used for a publisher sending a personalised daily newsletter assembled per reader from a content catalogue, a retailer that wants email and on-site recommendations driven by the same affinity model, high-cadence sending where per-recipient content assembly matters more than journey branching, teams that want churn and lifetime value scores available as native campaign conditions rather than imported fields. Of those, a publisher sending a personalised daily newsletter assembled per reader from a content catalogue and a retailer that wants email and on-site recommendations driven by the same affinity model are not what Shortwave is typically brought in for.
What can Sailthru do that Shortwave cannot?
Sailthru covers Interest profiles, Personalisation engine, Prediction Manager, Site personalisation. Shortwave covers AI Email Filtering, Intelligent Autocomplete, Voice-Style Composition, Meeting Scheduling.

Answered from the vendors’ own pages

Sailthru: Who owns Sailthru now?

Marigold, formerly CM Group, which also owns Campaign Monitor, Emma, Selligent, Liveclicker and Cheetah Digital.

Shortwave: Is there a free trial for Shortwave?

Yes, Shortwave offers a 14-day free trial for all paid plans with no credit card required.

Source
Sailthru: Does that affect the roadmap?

It can. Overlapping products in one portfolio compete for investment, so ask which platform is the strategic one for your segment before signing multi-year.

Shortwave: What platforms does Shortwave support?

Shortwave is available on iOS, Android, macOS, and Windows for full cross-platform email management.

Source
Sailthru: Is it worth it just for newsletters?

For personalised daily newsletters at publisher scale it remains one of the strongest options. For simple broadcast sending it is heavily over-specified.

Shortwave: How much AI usage do I get per plan?

Business plan includes 3 AI-powered filters and standard AI usage. Premier (2x more AI) and Max (6x more AI) plans provide increasing levels of AI feature access.

Source
Shortwave: What integrations does Shortwave support?

Shortwave integrates with Slack, Calendar, Notion, Asana, HubSpot, and 3,000+ apps via Tasklet.

Source
Share

Related pages

More on Sailthru

More on Shortwave

Keep looking

Other head to heads