Email Marketing Platforms for Small Business, Compared

Choosing between email marketing platforms for small business is mostly a question of fit. Every major platform can send a newsletter. The differences show up later: how the price changes as your list grows, how much automation you get before paying, and whether the tool understands your store, your CRM or your subscribers. This guide compares seven platforms on features and pricing models taken from each vendor's own pricing page, checked on 26 September 2026. Prices and limits change often, so confirm on the vendor's page before you sign up.

BX runs email for clients on several of these platforms through our email marketing service. We do not resell any of them and have no affiliate arrangement with any vendor named here.

There is no single best platform. There is a best fit for how you sell. A shop on Shopify or WooCommerce needs purchase data flowing into its emails. A consulting firm needs leads to move from a form into a sales pipeline. A writer needs a clean newsletter, a sign-up page and room to grow a large free list. The table below lists what each vendor published on its pricing page on 26 September 2026.

The single most useful thing to understand before comparing is what each platform counts. Two tools with similar headline prices can cost very different amounts for the same business.

Mailchimp, ActiveCampaign, MailerLite, Kit and Zoho Campaigns price paid plans mainly by how many people are on your list. Mailchimp and ActiveCampaign also set a monthly send allowance as a multiple of your contact limit, so a larger plan buys more sends. Depending on the platform, contacts you no longer email may still count toward your plan, so check each vendor's help pages for how contacts are counted and clean your list regularly.

Klaviyo's pricing page counts active profiles. Its free plan allows up to 250 active profiles and 500 email sends a month. This suits stores where the list includes past customers you are still marketing to, and where you want to stop paying for profiles you no longer email.

Brevo prices its main plans by monthly email volume and lists a free plan of up to 300 emails a day. It also sells pay-as-you-go credits that, according to its pricing FAQ, do not expire, with one email sent equal to one credit. This model can suit businesses with a large list that they email only a few times a year.

Mailchimp offers Free, Essentials, Standard and Premium plans. Its pricing page lists more than 300 integrations, a nonprofit discount and a pay-as-you-go option for occasional senders. The free plan is small (250 contacts), so it works for testing or a very early list. Mailchimp is a common choice for general small businesses that want templates, forms and automations in one familiar tool.

Brevo's Starter plan includes a drag-and-drop editor, templates, segmentation and forms. Its Standard plan adds marketing automation, A/B testing and send-time optimization, according to its pricing page. Brevo also includes transactional email on all plans and sells SMS separately. It fits businesses that want email, SMS and transactional messages in one account.

Klaviyo describes itself as a B2C CRM and focuses on retail and ecommerce. Its free plan includes email, a small monthly allowance of mobile messages, web forms, the drag-and-drop editor, automations, segmentation and reporting. Klaviyo's FAQ notes that free plan users get full email support for the first 60 days. It fits online stores that want to use purchase and browsing data in flows such as cart recovery and post-purchase emails.

MailerLite lists four plans: Free, Comfort, Power and Enterprise. The free plan includes campaigns, three automations, one website and landing page, signup forms and all three email editors. Paid plans add more automations, templates and features such as a subscriber preference center. MailerLite suits small businesses that want a simple interface and a basic website builder in the same tool.

Kit is built for creators and is one of the most generous newsletter platforms at the free level, allowing up to 10,000 subscribers with unlimited broadcasts, landing pages and forms. Visual automations and email sequences sit in the paid Creator plan. Kit also supports selling digital products and paid newsletter subscriptions. It fits writers, coaches and course creators more than stores with large catalogs.

ActiveCampaign lists Starter, Plus, Pro and Enterprise plans and a 14-day free trial with no credit card, rather than a free plan. Its comparison table shows multi-step automation, segmentation levels by plan, and integrations with CRMs such as Salesforce, Pipedrive and Zoho. It fits service businesses and B2B firms where email is part of a sales process, not just a newsletter.

Zoho Campaigns lists a Forever Free plan of up to 2,000 contacts and 6,000 emails a month, plus Standard and Professional plans and pay-as-you-go credits. Its pricing page lists integrations with other apps on every plan. It fits businesses already running other Zoho software that want email in the same family of tools.

A platform gives you the tools. Following the law is still your responsibility. In the United States, the FTC's CAN-SPAM guide requires accurate header information, honest subject lines, a valid physical postal address, a clear way to opt out, and opt-out requests honored within 10 business days. In the Philippines, the Data Privacy Act of 2012 defines consent as a freely given, specific and informed indication of will, evidenced by written, electronic or recorded means, and gives people the right to be informed about how their data is processed.

Mailbox providers add their own rules. Google's email sender guidelines require all senders to Gmail accounts to set up SPF or DKIM and keep reported spam rates below 0.3%. Senders of more than 5,000 messages a day must also use DMARC and support one-click unsubscribe for marketing messages. Yahoo publishes similar sender best practices. If you sell to the UK, the ICO's guidance on direct marketing and electronic communications applies.

If you are still deciding what to send once the platform is chosen, our starter plan for email marketing for small business covers the first flows and campaigns. Automations that span email, forms and your CRM are part of our marketing automation service.