A few months back I was asked to try out for a position by programming a simple graphic based mobile-friendly email followed by a review of the structure and code by the company's head programmer. I used Coffee Cups Email Designer so the email would be mobile friendly and quick to build. The company didn't care how I built the email as the job requirement was more for design with a preference for email programming.

Upon completion, I sent the resulting HTML file thinking this was right on. However, the head programmer's feedback was that the email was way to code-heavy for their standards. I hadn't considered this as I have not had issues with emails I sent to my contract clients.

So I decided to do a comparison using another drag and drop interface that is subscription-based and online. I crafted the exact same email, tested it and then was amazed at the resulting code from this online service. Looking under the hood I found it was 500 lines of HTML code less than the Coffee Cup code. And, it was easier to get into the code to tweak things or make simple edits without going through the whole process of editing the original then re-exporting to html.

Now I am wondering if CoffeeCup email designer is a little bloated especially for mobile emails. I'd love to hear if anyone has thoughts on this heavy code vs less code issue I discovered. Does it matter or???

I haven't used the CC Email Designer very often, nor have I looked very deeply into the code. But what I know is, that it is made to be usable with every thinkable e-mail programme 'out there'. Maybe that makes it code heavy, I don't know. But this adaptability has to be taken into consideration when comparing it to some other similar software. Others, who have used it more, will have to give their tuppence worth.

I would agree with Inger,

I was around and helped in the testing and troubleshooting for this software. The code that is in there is supported by many different platforms and email clients. I believe over 20 different clients or more were tested and tweaked from the very common ones like Outlook to the obscure ones like Roundcube. The code is very condensed and minimal considering all the platforms it covers.

I would agree with Steve.
Was the rendering of the other apps email tested in all email clients to confirm it looked good in all?

Thank you all for the responses.
So what I am hearing is that there are so many email readers and platofrms out there, Responsive Email Designer was built to make sure the code plays nicely with them all. Well, I can certainly understand that. If it works I am fine with it - I wonder if anyone has come across issues with load times?

The other online service's email display fine in apple mail, on both desktop and mobile ios. I don't have access to other mail programs to test, nor do I have access to other mailing platforms like MailChimp or HubSpot to load the Html. I don't expect any issues with either and am currently waiting to hear back from a client that will be loading my Html into their platform. Actually I had two email projects recently. I set one up with Responsive Email Designer and one with the online email builder to see how both work, although both are going to different platforms. I conducted tests via apple mail and both worked fine.

I hate to pay another monthly service so maybe I stick with the CoffeeCup program for his year...

No load time issues ever for me on any platform I tested on.