Valimail presents a comprehensive suite of DMARC features, particularly excelling in automated DMARC enforcement and SPF flattening. From our experience, their system provides deep visibility into email sending services, identifying 100% of services by name, which is crucial for managing unauthorized email traffic.
We've found Valimail's core strength in its automated configuration and ongoing protection against phishing and impersonation. Features like Precision Sender Intelligence and the ability to handle unlimited SPF lookups (for paid tiers) demonstrate a focus on robust, hands-off email authentication, minimizing manual effort, especially valuable in complex ecosystems.
Merox offers foundational DMARC reporting and monitoring capabilities, providing users with the essentials for understanding their email authentication landscape. Based on our assessment, it covers the core aspects of DMARC, helping organizations gain initial insights into email delivery and potential spoofing attempts.
While Merox provides the necessary tools for DMARC implementation and oversight, it generally offers a more straightforward set of features compared to Valimail's extensive automation. It focuses on enabling users to monitor their DMARC compliance effectively, though it may require more manual intervention for advanced configurations or complex domain environments.
How easy is each product to use
User experience
Valimail's user experience is generally smooth, especially once the initial setup is complete. We've found the dashboard intuitive for viewing DMARC reports and identifying senders. The automation features significantly reduce the ongoing management burden, making it feel quite hands-off.
However, some users, including us at times, have noted that certain advanced features or detailed reports can be confusing initially, requiring a bit of a learning curve to fully interpret. The organization of some features within the app can also feel counter-intuitive, though overall, it's a powerful tool once mastered.
Merox focuses on providing a clear and accessible user interface for DMARC management. From what we've observed, it aims for simplicity, allowing users to get started with monitoring and reporting without extensive technical hurdles. This straightforward approach can be beneficial for those new to DMARC.
The user experience with Merox is geared towards ease of use for essential DMARC tasks. While it might not offer the same level of deep customization or advanced visualization as some competitors, its uncluttered interface makes it easy to navigate and understand the core aspects of your email authentication status.
Which product has the best support
Support
Valimail generally receives high marks for its customer support. We've experienced their support team to be responsive, professional, and helpful, particularly during the onboarding phase. Onboarding assistance and a dedicated account manager are included in their paid plans, which is a significant plus.
While support is often praised, some users have noted that the response time can vary, particularly for complex issues or if specific technical knowledge is required. Valimail also offers additional services like Valicare and Valicare+ as add-ons for more intensive support needs, suggesting a tiered approach to assistance.
Merox, from our understanding, provides standard customer support channels to assist users with their DMARC journey. This typically includes access to documentation, email support, and potentially chat support, ensuring that users have resources available for setup and troubleshooting.
While we don't have extensive first-hand details on Merox's support, based on the general landscape of DMARC tools, we anticipate a competent level of assistance for core product functionalities. Organizations seeking highly specialized or proactive support might need to explore their premium offerings or consider solutions with more explicit enterprise-grade support structures.
Who should use each product
Suitability
Valimail is particularly well-suited for organizations with complex email ecosystems, including large enterprises and those with numerous subdomains or third-party senders. Its automation capabilities are a game-changer for achieving and maintaining DMARC enforcement at scale. For Managed Service Providers (MSPs), Valimail's multi-tenancy features (in Enterprise plans) and ability to simplify DMARC management across many client domains are highly beneficial.
While Valimail has a free tier for monitoring, its more advanced enforcement features cater to mid-market and enterprise segments that can justify the investment for comprehensive protection and reduced manual overhead. It's less ideal for very small businesses with extremely limited budgets who might find the advanced features and associated costs overkill for their needs.
Merox is a good fit for SMBs (small to medium businesses) or organizations just beginning their DMARC implementation journey. Its straightforward approach and focus on core DMARC reporting make it accessible for those who need to understand their email authentication status without being overwhelmed by advanced features.
For MSPs managing a portfolio of small to medium clients, Merox could serve as a solid foundational tool, especially if client needs are primarily for basic DMARC monitoring and reporting. Larger enterprises with intricate email infrastructures might find themselves wanting more advanced automation and granular controls, which Merox may not fully provide in its standard offerings.
How does Valimail compare with Merox?
DMARC report analysis
Translates complex XML reports into an understandable format.
Highly detailed and clear aggregation
Standard reporting for compliance
Source detection
Identifies all email sending services and their DMARC compliance status.
Helps distinguish legitimate forwards from spoofing attempts.
Automated classification and guidance
Basic detection through reports
Spoof detection
Detects and prevents unauthorized use of your domain.
AI-driven detection and enforcement
Based on DMARC policy application
Notifications and alerts
Provides real-time alerts for policy failures or suspicious activity.
Smart and configurable alerts (tiered)
Standard notifications
Reporting
Offers various reports for DMARC, SPF, DKIM compliance.
Comprehensive, subdomain, executive reports
Essential DMARC aggregate reports
API
Allows programmatic access to DMARC data and configurations.
Add-on or included based on plan
Multi-tenancy
Supports managing multiple domains or client accounts.
Portfolios and dynamic portfolios (Enterprise)
SPF flattening
Addresses the 10-lookup limit for SPF records.
Unlimited SPF via macros
Hosted DMARC
Manages DMARC records on your behalf.
Automated DMARC management
BIMI
Support for Brand Indicators for Message Identification.
Included or Amplify add-on
MTA-STS/TLS-RPT
Support for secure email transport protocols.
Limited direct integration
Blocklists and reputation
Monitors your domain's reputation on email blocklists (or blacklists).
Enhances sender reputation
AI copilot
AI-powered assistance for DMARC management.
AI-driven detection features
DNS monitoring
Monitors DNS records for unauthorized changes.
Integrated DNS management
Self hostable
Ability to host the software on your own infrastructure.
Free trial/free tier
Offers a free version or trial period.
Valimail Monitor is free
Drawbacks and what to watch out for
Valimail, while powerful, can be quite expensive, particularly for smaller organizations, and some of its advanced features may have a steeper learning curve. We've also noted occasional reporting limitations and the potential for vendor lock-in due to its deep integration with DNS.
Merox appears to be a more basic offering, which isn't necessarily a drawback, but it means it might lack the extensive automation and advanced features present in more mature DMARC solutions. Given the absence of public reviews, assessing specific pain points is challenging, but typically, simpler tools may require more manual oversight.
We have pulled the average ratings from G2 for each product, and also included the most recent negative reviews for each product in full. Positive reviews tend to have less detail and have a higher chance of being fraudulent, so negative reviews are a better signal for your decision.
4.6 / 5(421)
0 / 5(0)
Easy DMARC Monitoring But Not Great
3.5 / 5
What do you like best about Valimail?
Valimail is pretty simple to setup and use. We were wanting to monitor some changes to DMARC, and Valimail was the platform we ultimately decided to use.
What do you dislike about Valimail?
A few things I don't like:
1. The free vs premium features are frustrating. I can't see enough value from free to validate a move to premium.
2. The Sender Requirement Failure feature is in beta and never really works. I can't only get it to work if I expand it before a week, and even then it's hit-or-miss.
3. It doesn't really do enough. Other platforms I've tried did a better job at helping to explain the WHY and HOW rather than just the what. Valimail primarily focuses on the WHAT.
4. Some of the feature organization is weird within the app, even after having used it for a few months. I can get more value in the account overview than the sender requirements failure, which is counter-intuitive IMO.
What problems is Valimail solving and how is that benefiting you?
We had a baselevel view of email security when I was initially hired and wanted to monitor the DMARC changes effectively.
Verified User in Construction
Small-Business (50 or fewer emp.)
No G2 reviews
G2 is the most popular review platform for DMARC products, so this is a strong signal that this product is not popular.
I like Valimail - mostly.
3.5 / 5
What do you like best about Valimail?
Good interface for viewing DMARC reporting information.
What do you dislike about Valimail?
Price, it'd be nice if they could institute a model based on volume rather than the number of email domains.
What problems is Valimail solving and how is that benefiting you?
Valimail provides DMARC provides good aggregate reporting for our email domains, allowing us to implement to the eventual reject policy goal.
Verified User in Real Estate
Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.)
Straightforward onboarding
4.0 / 5
What do you like best about Valimail?
Ease of set-up and great customer support.
What do you dislike about Valimail?
Some features aren't as developed as some competitors, however ultimately it's up to each organization to decide the value of those features.
What problems is Valimail solving and how is that benefiting you?
Being able to report on DMARC successes and failures, to help us fine-tune the configuration to ensure each domain is correctly configured.
Verified User in Oil & Energy
Enterprise (> 1000 emp.)
Valimail Simplifies DMARC Management, But Watch for Vendor Lock-In
4.0 / 5
What do you like best about Valimail?
My favorite thing about Valimail is having a single portal that puts all DMARC reports into an easy to understand view. Having this information allowed us to identify hundreds of 3rd party email sources sending on behalf of our domain. Doing this without such a portal would be incredibly difficult especially in a franchise setting like ours where we have more services sending on behalf of our domain than most other companies.
What do you dislike about Valimail?
Valimail isn't cheap but you definitely get what you pay for. I also grow concerned about vendor lock-in now that I have setup Valimail to handle DMARC, SPF and DKIM with no exist strategy.
What problems is Valimail solving and how is that benefiting you?
Valimail solves the problem of visibility into who is sending on our behalf and makes identifying them easy.
Verified User in Non-Profit Organization Management
Mid-Market (51-1000 emp.)
A Must-Have for Email Security
4.0 / 5
What do you like best about Valimail?
The best thing about Valimail is its fully automation feature as we can get the reports automated with whole monthly data .
As I prepare reports every month in which I have to include the malicious email data so I do not need to manually check each single thing , the Valimail does it for itself.
What do you dislike about Valimail?
The thing which I dislike about Valimai is that its little expensive especially for the businesses which are small nd not much expanded .
What problems is Valimail solving and how is that benefiting you?
The problem which Valimail is solving for me is the manual effort for exporting the data related to spam emails and its security checks are the best .It filters out the emails properly and which are suspicious , they get rejected easily .
Verified User in Transportation/Trucking/Railroad
Enterprise (> 1000 emp.)
Pricing
Valimail offers a free monitoring plan and tiered pricing for enforcement and alignment, with significant costs for advanced features, while Merox provides a tiered structure without publicly disclosed pricing.
Small
Up to 10k emails / month
Free (Monitor)
Contact for pricing
Medium
Up to 100k emails / month
$5,000/year (Starter Enforce), $19/month (Align Bronze for 500k emails)
Contact for pricing
Large
Up to 1 million emails / month
Contact for pricing (Premium Enforce), $19/month (Align Bronze for 500k emails)
4.6 / 5(421)
