For your requirements—automatic lead capture, centralized contacts, segmentation, Amazon SES, WhatsApp bulk campaigns, automated follow-ups, low operating costs, and complete data ownership—Mautic is my first recommendation.

However, the three platforms solve different problems:

1. Mautic — Best overall for lead generation and marketing automation

Built for capturing leads, managing contact profiles, scoring prospects, segmenting audiences, and running multi-step marketing campaigns.

2. listmonk — Best for inexpensive bulk email marketing

Lightweight, fast, and excellent for newsletters, subscriber lists, Amazon SES campaigns, and scheduled broadcasts.

3. Dittofeed — Best for developer-driven multichannel journeys

Designed for event-triggered customer engagement across email, SMS, WhatsApp, push notifications, and webhooks. More infrastructure-intensive than the other two.

Comparison based on official documentation and currently available project information as of October 26, 2026. “Dittofee” is interpreted as Dittofeed.

The most important distinction is that email broadcasting, lead nurturing, and WhatsApp automation are three different capabilities. Not every self-hosted email tool provides a complete marketing automation system.

1. Feature-by-feature comparison

Legend: ✅ Built in or directly supported · ◐ Requires an integration or has limitations · ❌ Not natively available

Mautic has the broadest native marketing feature set. listmonk is primarily a mailing-list manager, while Dittofeed is based around user events and journeys.

Important discovery: Dittofeed’s maintenance status

On August 10, 2026, a Dittofeed maintainer confirmed on GitHub that the project had entered maintenance mode, with new feature development halted and only occasional bug fixes planned.

That makes Dittofeed a riskier choice for a new, long-term deployment, even though its existing features are useful.

2. Amazon SES integration and actual email costs

All three can use Amazon SES, but integration depth differs.

Mautic supports SMTP and Symfony Mailer transports. listmonk has particularly clear documentation for connecting SES bounce and complaint notifications through SNS.

Verified Amazon SES prices

AWS now offers Essentials, Pro, Enterprise and à-la-carte pricing options. For the first 10 million emails per month, Essentials is $0.16 per 1,000, while à-la-carte outbound email is $0.10 per 1,000.

Monthly SES sending cost estimatorEmail recipients per month

100,000

SES EssentialsÀ la carte

Estimated email sending cost

$16.00 / month

$0.16 / 1,000

USD

Based on AWS published sending rates for this volume range. Excludes hosting, optional features, attachment-related charges, taxes, and WhatsApp messaging. Assumes one recipient per email.

New or qualifying inactive SES account/region combinations have been defaulted to Essentials since July 21, 2026, but AWS permits switching to à-la-carte.

3. WhatsApp bulk messaging: the important limitation

None of the three provides unrestricted, free WhatsApp mass messaging simply because you self-host it.

For legitimate business campaigns, use the official WhatsApp Business Platform with appropriate customer opt-in, approved outbound templates and Meta’s applicable messaging charges.

Dittofeed’s own documentation includes a WhatsApp webhook example, while listmonk has a general-purpose HTTP messenger interface. Mautic requires an additional integration for WhatsApp functionality.

There is also another tool worth considering for this particular requirement:

Chatwoot supports WhatsApp Cloud API campaigns and a shared team inbox. Its current documentation confirms that the self-hosted Community Edition includes WhatsApp campaign sending, although advanced campaign analytics require a paid self-hosted plan.

This makes Mautic + Chatwoot a particularly interesting combination when you need both lead nurturing and two-way WhatsApp conversations.

4. Self-hosting and infrastructure costs

All three have free open-source editions, but their infrastructure and maintenance requirements differ significantly.

Dittofeed also has licensed features outside its MIT core, including enterprise-oriented options such as white-labelling and multi-tenancy.

Importantly, none requires hosting its application on AWS just because you’re using Amazon SES. You can host on a VPS, dedicated server, or your own physical server, while using SES only for outbound email.

For the lowest operating overhead, listmonk wins. For overall functionality relative to cost, Mautic is the stronger fit for your stated requirements.

5. Recommended architecture

For a complete system, I’d design it this way:

Websites, Landing Pages, Contact Forms

Leads from multiple domains, signup forms and application APIs

Mautic — Central Marketing Platform

Contacts · Custom fields · Segments · Lead scores · Consent · Automated journeys

Amazon SES

Email campaigns and automated follow-ups

WhatsApp Cloud API

Approved campaigns through an integration

Optional: Chatwoot Shared Inbox

Receive replies, assign conversations to agents, follow up manually, and synchronize contact status

In this design, Mautic is the authoritative contact and consent database. Chatwoot is the conversational inbox and would have its own data store, with integration required to synchronize contacts, opt-outs and events.

6. What an automated campaign could look like

1. Day 0 — Lead capturedVisitor submits a website form. Contact is created or updated in Mautic and tagged with the source website.
2. Immediately — Welcome emailMautic sends an automated personalized email through Amazon SES.
3. Day 2 — Check engagementIf the lead hasn’t completed the intended action, send a relevant follow-up email.
4. Day 5 — WhatsApp follow-upIf the contact has explicitly opted in to WhatsApp marketing, trigger an approved message template through the API integration.
5. Day 7 — Lead qualificationUpdate the lead score, assign the lead to a team member, or enter another nurture campaign.
6. On conversion or opt-outStop inappropriate follow-ups and synchronize suppression status across connected channels.

Mautic’s campaign builder supports conditional decisions, scheduled actions and contact-triggered workflows, making this practical without developing the entire sequence yourself.

Mautic Documentation 0.1 documentation

For WhatsApp, explicit permission and approved business-initiated templates are required by Meta’s current policy.

WhatsApp for Business

7. Which should you actually install?

Implementation priorities

For production I would start with Mautic, establish email deliverability, and add WhatsApp after email automation is operating reliably.

1. Deploy a supported stable Mautic release with HTTPS, MariaDB/MySQL, backups, scheduled jobs and monitoring.
2. Connect website forms and tracking, using source tags and distinct consent permissions for each channel and brand.
3. Verify the sender domain in SES, configure SPF, DKIM and DMARC, request production sending access where required, and test bounce and complaint processing.
4. Create contact segments, lead scores, welcome journeys, abandonment follow-ups and inactivity workflows.
5. Integrate Meta WhatsApp Cloud API using tested middleware or a compatible maintained plugin; add Chatwoot for human replies if needed.
6. Implement cross-channel opt-out synchronization, deduplication, rate limiting, security updates, and database backup/restore testing.

Final decision: I would choose Mautic as your primary platform and would not install all three together. Add Chatwoot only when WhatsApp campaigns and customer conversations become important. Use listmonk instead if your actual requirement turns out to be mostly newsletters and inexpensive mass email rather than lead automation.

This gives you a sensible balance of rich marketing functionality, self-hosting, Amazon SES cost efficiency, and control over your customer records.

My single recommendation: Mautic

Mautic

Free · Open Source · Self-Hosted · Web DashboardOfficial website

It is the best overall match for your requirements without paying software license fees.

One important limitation: WhatsApp messaging is not built into Mautic’s core. You’ll need a compatible integration, and official WhatsApp business messaging can incur charges. Mautic is also easier to operate than to initially configure.

Mautic

+1

My decision: Install Mautic. It’s the closest fit to everything you asked for in one free, self-hosted marketing platform.