Dedicated vs shared IP
Shared IPs pool your mail with other senders; a dedicated IP isolates the history but makes its cost, warming, and reputation entirely yours.
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What it is
A shared IP pool carries mail for many customers, so the provider combines their volume and manages the pool's reputation. A dedicated IP carries only your account's mail, giving you control over its volume pattern and leaving you solely responsible for the reputation it earns. In both cases, your sending domain still has a reputation of its own.
Shared is usually the better fit for low, seasonal, or unpredictable volume because the pool stays active when you do not. Dedicated starts to make sense when volume is large and steady, isolation is worth the cost, and someone can monitor and warm the IP. Amazon SES offers both a shared pool and dedicated IP options; its managed dedicated mode handles warmup and scaling for you.
Dedicated does not mean premium. A private IP exposes your own bad list and volume spikes with no healthy neighbors to average them out, and too little mail leaves receivers with a thin, erratic history. Shared pools carry neighbor risk, but a well-run ESP polices abusive senders and can outperform a cold dedicated address.
Ask AI for it
Recommend shared or dedicated sending IPs for an Amazon SES account using 90 days of daily volume, peak hourly volume, transactional and marketing splits, seasonality, complaint rate, hard bounce rate, and recipient-domain mix. Compare the SES shared pool, Dedicated IP Standard, and Dedicated IP Managed. Choose one option, show the minimum operational work it requires, and explain how low or spiky volume affects the choice. If dedicated wins, design separate configuration sets and IP pools for transactional and marketing mail, include an IP warming and rollback plan, and name the CloudWatch and SES event metrics to watch. Do not claim a dedicated IP repairs domain reputation or poor list quality.