Political direct mail postage runs from $0.255 per piece for a carrier-route saturation letter to $0.78 for a single stamped letter, with the common campaign cases in between: $0.395 for a Marketing Mail postcard or letter sorted to five digits, $0.453 for the same postcard at First-Class presort, and $0.26 for an EDDM flat to every door on a route, per the U.S. Postal Service price list effective October 4, 2026. Postage is usually a third to a half of what a campaign pays per piece. Data, design, print and mail-shop processing make up the rest, and none of those has a national published price, so this post gives you the postage exactly and the other four honestly.
What a political mail program is made of
Five costs appear on every mail invoice. Only one of them is published.
| Component | What it covers | Priced how |
|---|---|---|
| Postage | What USPS charges to deliver the piece, by class, shape, weight and sort level | Published by USPS (tables below) |
| Data | The voter universe: who gets the piece, with addresses standardized and deduplicated against the national change-of-address file | Per record or per universe; the same file your texting program targets |
| Design | Creative, copy, versioning by universe, compliance disclaimers | Per piece design or per program |
| Paper stock, size, color, finish, quantity | Per thousand; falls with quantity, rises with size and stock | |
| Mail shop | Addressing, sorting to the postage level claimed, bundling, drop, postal paperwork | Per thousand; the sort it performs is what earns the automation and carrier-route postage |
USPS postage for political mail, October 4, 2026
Most political mail travels as USPS Marketing Mail, which prices by shape (letter or flat) and by how finely the mail shop sorts it; the deeper the sort, the lower the postage. A standard postcard or a letter-size mailer up to 3.5 ounces pays the letter rate; an oversize mailer pays the flat rate. Carrier-route prices apply when a piece goes to enough addresses on a route to be bundled for the carrier; saturation means nearly every address on the route.
| Sort level | Commercial | Nonprofit |
|---|---|---|
| Carrier route: saturation | $0.255 | $0.16 |
| Carrier route: high density plus | $0.286 | $0.178 |
| Carrier route: high density | $0.389 | $0.181 |
| Automation: 5-digit | $0.395 | $0.185 |
| Automation: 3-digit / SCF | $0.435 | $0.225 |
| Automation: mixed | $0.467 | $0.257 |
| Sort level | Commercial | Nonprofit |
|---|---|---|
| Saturation | $0.308 | $0.186 |
| EDDM (through a mail house, BMEU) | $0.309 | $0.187 |
| EDDM Retail (brought to the Post Office, up to 3.3 oz) | $0.26 | n/a |
| High density plus | $0.373 | $0.227 |
| High density | $0.404 | $0.324 |
| Basic | $0.504 | $0.424 |
| Piece | Automation 5-digit | Automation 3-digit | Automation mixed | Retail (stamp) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Postcard | $0.453 | $0.478 | $0.495 | $0.65 |
| Letter, 1 oz | $0.621 | $0.672 | $0.707 | $0.78 |
Sources: USPS Price List Notice 123 (opens in a new tab), effective October 4, 2026; USPS, Every Door Direct Mail (opens in a new tab); both read October 21, 2026.
Who gets the nonprofit rate (most campaigns do not)
Candidate committees and PACs do not qualify for Nonprofit USPS Marketing Mail prices. The Domestic Mail Manual authorizes a short list of political committees to mail at nonprofit prices without regard to nonprofit status: a national committee of a political party, a state committee of a political party, and the four congressional campaign committees (the DCCC, DSCC, NRCC and NRSC). Source: Domestic Mail Manual 703.1.3 (opens in a new tab), read October 21, 2026. The difference is large: at the 5-digit automation letter rate, nonprofit postage is $0.185 against $0.395 commercial, which is why party committees often mail on behalf of their candidates. A 501(c)(3) with its own nonprofit authorization also qualifies; a 501(c)(4) advocacy group generally does not.
Worked examples, postage only
Postage alone, no entry discount, from the tables above. Add data, design, print and mail shop to reach the delivered cost; the print and processing portion for a standard postcard typically lands in the same order of magnitude as the postage, and rises faster than postage for oversize pieces and heavy stocks.
| Program | Per piece | Postage total |
|---|---|---|
| 10,000 postcards, Marketing Mail letter rate, automation 5-digit | $0.395 | $3,950 |
| 10,000 postcards, First-Class presort, automation 5-digit | $0.453 | $4,530 |
| 50,000 letters, Marketing Mail, automation 5-digit | $0.395 | $19,750 |
| 50,000 letters, Marketing Mail, carrier-route saturation | $0.255 | $12,750 |
| 50,000 oversize flats, Marketing Mail, carrier-route high density | $0.404 | $20,200 |
| 50,000 letters at a state party committee's nonprofit rate, automation 5-digit | $0.185 | $9,250 |
- Sort depth is worth more than negotiation. The same 50,000 letters cost $23,350 at mixed automation and $19,750 at 5-digit; a universe dense enough for carrier-route saturation drops to $12,750. Targeting decides postage.
- First-Class buys speed, not reach. A presorted First-Class postcard costs $0.453 against $0.395 at Marketing Mail, about 15% more; campaigns pay it for the final-week drop that has to land on a date, and use Marketing Mail for everything earlier.
- Oversize costs more to mail and more to print. A flat at carrier-route high density pays $0.404 against $0.389 for a letter-size piece at the same sort, before the print difference.
What moves the price
- Shape and weight. Letter-size up to 3.5 oz pays the letter table; anything larger is a flat and pays the flat table. Heavy stock can tip a piece over a weight step.
- Sort level. Decided by how many pieces share a ZIP, a 3-digit area or a carrier route. A persuasion universe scattered across a state sorts worse than a saturation drop in a city.
- Class. First-Class for pieces that must arrive by a date; Marketing Mail for everything that can travel on USPS's slower, unguaranteed schedule.
- Quantity. Print and mail-shop prices fall per thousand as runs grow; postage does not.
- Entry. A mail house that drops pieces at a destination facility earns the DSCF or DDU discounts shown in the price list, a few cents a piece.
- Eligibility. Party committees at nonprofit rates pay roughly half the commercial letter postage.
Timing: when the piece has to be in the mail
USPS Marketing Mail is deferred mail: it is cheaper because it travels when there is room, with no service guarantee, so a GOTV piece sent as Marketing Mail goes out earlier than the date it needs to land. First-Class is the class campaigns buy for the last drop. A mail plan therefore works backward from the election calendar: early-vote and mail-ballot pieces first, persuasion in the middle, and the First-Class reminder last. A dated calendar for a race, with every mail drop on it, is what the GOTV plan builder produces, and the texting that runs beside it is in GOTV text message templates.
How FullPAC prices mail
FullPAC prices political direct mail per program, quoted on the universe, the piece and the drop schedule, with postage passed through at the USPS rate the sort earns. Handwritten mail, with real-ink addresses, signature and PS, is quoted separately. The universe is the same voter file the campaign texts and calls against, so a household that has already voted comes off the mail list at the same time it comes off the text list. For what the texting side of the budget looks like, see How much does political texting cost?; for the term itself, see What is GOTV?