Issue Mint vs Buttondown
Buttondown is a small, well-made newsletter tool with a devoted following, built around writing in one plain text box. It is deliberately simple, it is priced fairly, and it is run by somebody who clearly cares about it. If you want nothing at all in your way, it is excellent.
The short version
Buttondown gives you a clean text box; Issue Mint gives you a structure built for one particular format. If you are happy writing your roundup by hand and pasting the links in yourself, Buttondown will do it with less ceremony and probably less money. If you want the links gathered through the week, grouped, reorderable, tracked one by one and tied to the sponsor who paid for the slot, that structure is the entire point of Issue Mint.
Feature by feature
| Capability | Issue Mint | Buttondown |
|---|---|---|
| How you write | A structured composer, one note per link | One plain text document |
| Link library and browser button | Yes | No |
| Sections and drag to reorder | Yes | Format it yourself each time |
| Which links your readers clicked | Yes, every link ranked | Basic click tracking |
| Sponsorship inventory | Yes | No |
| Who sends the email | We do, and you can take it over whenever you want | The platform, always |
| Charging readers a subscription | No | Yes |
| Connecting it to other software | Limited for now | Well documented and thorough |
Compared on capability rather than price, because Buttondown changes its plans from time to time and a stale figure here would be worse than none. Check their current pricing directly.
When Buttondown is the better choice
- You want to write in one box, in plain text, and be done with it.
- You want to plug your newsletter into other software you already run.
- You want to charge readers a subscription.
- You value a very small independent tool with a long track record and a fair price.
When Issue Mint is the better choice
- Collecting links through the week is the part you keep failing to do consistently.
- You want to sell sponsorships with real slots and dates rather than tracking them in a spreadsheet.
- You want the archive and the link tracking on your own domain, and the option of taking the sending too.
Questions about switching
Can I connect Issue Mint to other software?
Only partly, for now. There is an interface behind the browser button covering newsletters, issues and the link library, but it is not documented for general use yet. If that is central to how you work, Buttondown is ahead of us here and we would rather tell you than let you find out.
Try it against your own next issue.
14 days, no card. Import your list, connect your sending, and see whether the workflow fits before you move anything permanently.
Start your trial