MailerLite review: the most email marketing per dollar for small businesses

MailerLite is an email marketing platform for small businesses, bloggers and creators. It handles newsletters, automated sequences, signup forms and pop-ups, landing pages, simple websites, and sales of digital products, bookings and paid newsletters. The company has run the service since 2010. In the US, paid plans start at $12 a month for up to 500 subscribers.

On the Cybernock research rubric MailerLite scores 8.6/10, first in our best email marketing software list. Price and the number of tools packed into each plan carry that result. Two things pull it back: a much smaller free plan than it used to have, and shallower ecommerce automation than Klaviyo.

How does MailerLite work?

You import or collect subscribers, sort them with groups and segments, then send campaigns or build automations that fire on signups, clicks, dates or purchases. Forms, pop-ups, landing pages and a basic website live in the same account. For a small business, that means the whole list-building funnel runs without a second subscription.

Billing depends on two numbers: active subscribers and send volume. MailerLite counts anyone with an active status at any point in the billing cycle. Unsubscribed and bounced contacts don’t count. That’s a real saving next to Mailchimp, which still bills for unsubscribed contacts.

What does MailerLite cost at your list size?

Comfort costs $12 a month at 500 subscribers, $33 at 2,500, $89 at 10,000 and $319 at 50,000 on monthly billing. Yearly payment takes 10% off. These are the US dollar tiers built into the official pricing page in October 2026, and there’s no intro rate that jumps at renewal.

Comfort lets you send ten times the top of your tier each month. For most lists that covers two newsletters a week with room to spare. Power lifts the monthly cap under a fair-use policy and adds unlimited seats plus live chat. In practice the choice is simple: take Power when you send daily or several colleagues need logins, and stay on Comfort otherwise.

The free plan is the weak spot. It now stops at 250 subscribers and 2,500 emails a month, the same ceiling Mailchimp and Klaviyo set. When you need a free tier that lasts, look elsewhere: Kit’s free plan covers 10,000 subscribers, and Brevo stores up to 100,000 contacts free with a 300-email daily cap.

Which MailerLite features matter most?

• Automation builder: a visual editor with templates, 50 active automations of up to 100 steps on Comfort, and unlimited workflows with multiple triggers each on Power.
• Websites and landing pages: one of each on Free, ten on Comfort and unlimited on Power, with templates, an AI page builder, blog sections and custom domains.
• Three email editors: drag and drop, rich text and custom HTML, plus A/B testing on all plans and multivariate testing from Comfort.
• Monetisation: digital products and bookings (1 on Free, 5 on Comfort, unlimited on Power), paid newsletter subscriptions and recurring payments through Stripe.
• Integrations: 100+ apps including Shopify, WooCommerce and Stripe, an API, and MailerSend for transactional email.

How good is MailerLite’s deliverability?

Solid, judging by the dated third-party evidence. In EmailToolTester’s last published seed-list round, from January 2024, MailerLite delivered 89.8% of test emails overall. That sits close to Mailchimp’s 89.5% and behind ActiveCampaign’s 94.2%. EmailToolTester has since stopped publishing inbox-placement rankings and now rates deliverability features instead; its 2026 rating gives MailerLite 3.5 out of 5 (EmailToolTester).

No platform rescues a neglected list. Since February 2024, Google has required bulk senders to Gmail to authenticate with SPF, DKIM and DMARC, offer one-click unsubscribe and keep spam complaints under 0.30% (Google sender guidelines). MailerLite supports all three records on your own domain. Don’t skip that setup step: without it, Gmail can reject or junk your bulk mail whichever platform sends it.

Where does MailerLite fall short?

The tiny free plan is the first gap. A new blog with 400 subscribers now pays from day one. Ecommerce depth is the second. MailerLite offers store triggers and product blocks, yet Klaviyo’s predictive analytics, browse-abandonment flows and per-product segmentation go much further for a shop doing serious volume.

Automation is good rather than great. Comfort handles welcome series, tag-based sequences and date-based emails well, but multiple triggers per workflow need Power, and there’s no built-in CRM with deal stages. Live chat support also starts on Power or at 50,000 subscribers. Below that, help arrives by email.

Who should not use MailerLite?

Three groups should look elsewhere. A Shopify store that earns most of its email revenue from cart and browse-abandonment flows will outgrow MailerLite’s commerce triggers; Klaviyo is built for that. A sales team that scores leads and moves deals through stages needs a CRM, which ActiveCampaign includes and MailerLite doesn’t. And if you’re a creator who wants to stay free until 10,000 subscribers, Kit’s free plan lets you, while MailerLite’s caps you at 250.

How does MailerLite compare with Brevo, Kit and Mailchimp?

Brevo is cheaper if you email a large list once or twice a month, because it charges by emails sent rather than list size. Kit suits creators who want a big free tier and a recommendation network. Mailchimp has a larger template library but costs more and bills unsubscribed contacts. GetResponse undercuts MailerLite above 10,000 subscribers and adds webinars, though it offers no free plan.

Should you choose MailerLite?

Yes, if you run a small business or creator brand with a few hundred to 50,000 subscribers and want one affordable tool for emails, automations, forms and a simple site. The pricing evidence backs that: at 10,000 contacts it costs $89 against Mailchimp’s $110 and Kit’s $139. Start on Comfort with monthly billing. Switch to yearly once you’re sure, and move to Power only when unlimited sending or extra seats matter.

The verdict flips in three cases. Shopify stores should weigh Klaviyo. Teams needing pipelines and lead scoring should weigh ActiveCampaign. Writers building a paid newsletter as their main business should compare beehiiv. The full email marketing ranking and all email marketing reviews hold the side-by-side numbers.