How to Use Brevo to Send Order Emails and Newsletters

The short answer: add your domain in Brevo and let it authenticate automatically, create a transactional sender and templates, point your website or app at smtp-relay.brevo.com with an SMTP key rather than an API key, confirm delivery in the transactional logs, then send newsletters from the same authenticated domain within your plan's volume, 5,000 emails a month of both kinds on Starter, keeping promotions out of order emails.

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If your shop or app sends order confirmations through whatever the hosting company set up years ago, those emails are probably the most-read messages you send, and nobody is watching whether they arrive. Brevo puts them and your newsletters on one authenticated domain with one set of logs. For plans and prices, see the Brevo glossary entry.

Before you begin:

• Count the volume. On paid plans, campaigns and transactional emails share one monthly allowance (pricing page, checked on 24 October 2026). For example, 3,000 order emails plus two newsletters to 450 contacts is 3,000 + 900 = 3,900 a month, inside Starter's 5,000 at $9 a month on monthly billing.
• List what your site sends today. Order confirmation, shipping notice, password reset, contact form copy. Each becomes a template, and each needs a sender address on your domain.
• Know where you will look. Brevo's transactional Statistics and Logs pages show what was delivered; decide who checks them in the first week after the switch.

Step 1: Add your domain

In Brevo, open the account menu and go to Settings, Senders, Domains, IPs, Domains, then click Add a domain and enter the part of your email address after the @, as the domain authentication guide describes. Free addresses such as gmail.com cannot be authenticated.

Step 2: Authenticate it, preferably automatically

Choose Authenticate the domain automatically: you sign in to your domain provider from Brevo, and Brevo adds the Brevo code, DKIM and DMARC records and checks them. The guide recommends this route. One warning before you click: if the domain already has a DMARC record, Brevo asks whether to replace it, and if you do not want that, authenticate manually instead. The manual route lists three or four records to copy, a TXT for the Brevo code, one TXT or two CNAMEs for DKIM, and a TXT for DMARC; Ask someone else sends the instructions to whoever controls your DNS.

Step 3: Create senders and templates

Brevo's SMTP guide sets the order: authenticated domain first, then transactional senders, then templates. Create a sender such as orders@yourshop.com, then one template per message from your list, with the variables your site will fill in, like order number and total.

Step 4: Route your site's mail through Brevo SMTP

If your platform has a Brevo plugin, use it: it overrides the site's default mail settings without code. Otherwise configure SMTP by hand with these values from the SMTP guide:

• Server: smtp-relay.brevo.com
• User: your SMTP login, shown on the SMTP page; older accounts use the account email, newer ones an address ending in @smtp-brevo.com
• Password: an SMTP key, generated on the SMTP page. An API key will not work here.
• Port: 587, 465 or 2525, with encryption set only for 465

If your site already sends through another SMTP service, swapping in these credentials is enough to start.

Step 5: Confirm the mail arrives

Place a test order and trigger a password reset, then open Transactional, Logs and Statistics. The same guide points to webhooks for real-time notice of deliveries and bounces, worth wiring into whatever alerting your developers already use.

Step 6: Send the newsletter from the same domain

Build a campaign to your marketing list with the authenticated sender. On the free plan, plan around the daily cap: the free plan FAQ says a campaign to more than 300 recipients reaches 300 on the scheduled day and must be requeued for the rest, and once you have used the day's 300 you cannot schedule a campaign for the next day. Upgrading lifts the cap at once for emails sent after the upgrade.

Step 7: Keep receipts as receipts

Article 13 of the ePrivacy Directive (EUR-Lex) governs email sent for direct marketing, with prior consent as the rule for individuals. An order confirmation is not direct marketing, but a discount block added to it starts to look like one. Keep offers in the newsletter, sent to people who opted in, and keep transactional templates to the transaction.

Step 8: Give an agent a narrow key

Brevo's MCP server connects Claude, Cursor or VS Code to your account. Generate the key under Settings, SMTP & API, API Keys & MCP, switch on Create MCP server API key, and copy it at once; it is shown only once. Then connect the assistant to a single module rather than all 27, for example the campaign analytics endpoint at /v1/brevo_campaign_analytics/mcp. Ask it each Monday for last week's campaign opens and bounces next to the previous month's average; you decide what to change. The main endpoint can also create and send SMS and WhatsApp campaigns, which is reason enough to keep a reporting agent on the reporting module.

What Brevo's help centre warns about

• An API key in the SMTP password field. It must be an SMTP key.
• A second DMARC record. Automatic setup offers to replace yours; say no if another service depends on it.
• The daily cap on free. Unused sends do not roll over, and extra transactional mail beyond the cap waits in a retry queue of up to 1,000 emails, after which it is not delivered (free plan FAQ).
• DNS that never settles. If the domain is not authenticated after 48 hours, the domain guide says to contact support.

A plugin is the quickest route, and every plugin page is written to get you live today. Ask, before you install it, which emails it takes over: a plugin that reroutes every message the site sends also reroutes the ones you forgot existed.

FAQ

Which SMTP port should I use?

Brevo supports 587, 465 and 2525; set SSL or TLS encryption only for 465, per the SMTP guide.

Can I send transactional email on the free plan?

Yes, within the 300 daily sends shared with campaigns. The pricing FAQ says all plans include transactional APIs, SMTP and webhooks.

Do I need a developer for this?

Not if your platform has a Brevo plugin. Manual SMTP is a settings form most site admins can fill in; sending through the API from your own code is the part that needs a developer.