# React Email gave Resend a path from templates to sending

Markdown copy of https://realalpha.app/s/react-email-gave-resend-a-path-from-templates-to-sending/ on Real Alpha, the best minutes from long interviews with the people building AI. Cite and link the page, not this copy.

- Speaker: [Zeno Rocha](https://realalpha.app/people/zeno-rocha/) · Zeno Rocha is cofounder and CEO of Resend. · Co-founded Resend, an email platform for developers, and launched React Email, open-source components for building email templates.
- Host: [Shawn Wang (swyx)](https://realalpha.app/people/swyx/) · Co-founder, AI Engineer · Wrote “The Rise of the AI Engineer” and founded Smol AI, maker of AI News.
- Host: [Alessio Fanelli](https://realalpha.app/people/alessio-fanelli/) · Founder, Kernel Labs · Partner at Decibel, backing technical founders who build developer tools.
- Show: Latent Space
- Episode: [Designing for Agents — Zeno Rocha, Resend](https://realalpha.app/v/bdIoODXsu8k/), Nov 10, 2026
- Moment: 23:51 to 26:41 of the episode (3 min), playing on https://realalpha.app/s/react-email-gave-resend-a-path-from-templates-to-sending/; the episode from there: https://realalpha.app/v/bdIoODXsu8k/?t=1431

## Quote

> “if people are, like, building the, like, the email template using React, like, now they'll need a **platform to send it**.”
> — [Zeno Rocha](https://realalpha.app/people/zeno-rocha/) at [24:37](https://realalpha.app/v/bdIoODXsu8k/?t=1477) · Latent Space

## Takeaways

1. Open source brought developers into an email-template workflow.
2. Docs covered SendGrid, MailChimp and Mailgun.
3. Resend positioned sending as the next problem to solve.

## About this segment

Zeno Rocha treated React Email as an open-source entry point, writing setup guides for rival sending services. Once developers had templates, Resend could be the next step to deliver them.

From “Designing for Agents — Zeno Rocha, Resend”, Nov 10, 2026. [Watch the full episode](https://realalpha.app/v/bdIoODXsu8k/)

## Transcript

From the transcript Latent Space publishes with the episode.

[23:55](https://realalpha.app/v/bdIoODXsu8k/?t=1435) You had-- You made React Email the year before. Yeah. So you did dip your toes in open work. Yeah. Um, and then came the company. Yeah, React Email is our Next.js, right? So we wanted like an open source channel for top of the funnel, and I remember doing some things very intentionally. If you go to the docs, for example, you'll find there are docs about How do you set this up with SendGrid and MailChimp and Mailgun? I wrote every single one of those docs over there. Mm.

[24:26](https://realalpha.app/v/bdIoODXsu8k/?t=1466) Um, and I just wanted like, okay, this is for everyone, and we're trying to redefine how this is. And it was a strategy of like, we're gonna give, give, give, and then we ask. Uh, and if people are- Is, uh, Gary Vee? Yeah. And, and if, if people are, like, building the, like, the email template using React, like, now they'll need a platform to send it. Where do they do that? Here's Resend. So it was a, like, a storytelling kind of way of approaching the market.

[24:56](https://realalpha.app/v/bdIoODXsu8k/?t=1496) Like, we're gonna fix the first part of the, the journey, which is building the template, and then once you have the template, now that that problem is fixed, you need a platform to send it. Here's the platform. But, uh, did you have the idea for Resend when you started React Email, or was it a side project that- Yeah... then became a company? We started Resend, and as we were building Resend, I was, like, doing a lot of user research, and people were saying like, "Oh, the pain of writing the template. I get the f- the Figma file from my designer.

[25:24](https://realalpha.app/v/bdIoODXsu8k/?t=1524) It, it sucks. Like, it's HTML tables and, and everything." They would cut the images, right? Yeah. Oh my gosh. And [laughs] Uh-huh. It's, it's in there. Because there's nothing. And then there's, like, a special syntax of HTML that only works on email. Yeah. Right? It, it's a mess. Or, or CSS. Yeah. It, it's all inline CSS. Yeah. Inline CSS. Well, yeah. That's right. And then, like, for Outlook, you have, like, some special comments, and then you gotta... It's such a mess. It's like a- Yeah... it's a mess. Um. And so, like, I-- to me, the reason that React- Mm-hmm...

[25:53](https://realalpha.app/v/bdIoODXsu8k/?t=1553) works is that it is- Mm-hmm... basically a compiler. Yes. It's like, it's like, well, somebody writes this once, and then as long as you fit the API, it's going to work everywhere. Yeah. And you can import your tokens from Tailwind. Now you have a, a type definition with TypeScript. So no more, "Hey," empty comma, you know, like, on your emails. Yeah. Like, you can actually have, like, a string validation or whatever you want. Yeah. I think one of the initial people that pushed back on React Email was like- Mm-hmm... "Well, you're not actually using React.

[26:19](https://realalpha.app/v/bdIoODXsu8k/?t=1579) There's no state." Yeah. And, like, React [laughs] is supposed to be, uh, views as a function of state. Yeah. Uh, but so it's, it's mostly JSX is templating? Yes. Or is there actually, like, animations? Is there interactivity? No. Expanding, like accordions? No. Nothing, nothing like that. Okay. There's-- So you cannot ship JavaScript on an email. So then what you do is, yeah, w- we basically use- But CSS-...