Mailchimp Pricing Changes: What You Need to Know

Source: EmailCloud Editorial

Mailchimp has adjusted its pricing structure again, and the changes affect senders at every tier. If you have been on Mailchimp for a while, or if you are evaluating it for a new project, here is what you need to know about the current pricing landscape and how it compares to the competition.

The Free Plan Is Not What It Used to Be

Mailchimp’s free plan was once the most generous in the industry. At its peak, the “Forever Free” tier supported up to 2,000 subscribers and 10,000 monthly sends — enough for a serious small business. Those days are gone.

The current free plan supports up to 500 contacts and 1,000 monthly email sends. That is enough to test the platform and send a few campaigns, but it is not a sustainable long-term solution for any business with growth ambitions. Automation is limited to single-step workflows. Reporting is basic. Customer support is email-only for the first 30 days, then self-service only.

For comparison, MailerLite’s free plan supports 1,000 subscribers with automation included. Brevo’s free tier allows unlimited contacts with 300 daily sends. Kit offers 10,000 free subscribers (though without automation). If you are starting out and budget is a primary concern, Mailchimp’s free plan is no longer the obvious choice.

Paid Plans: What They Cost Now

Mailchimp’s paid plans are structured in three tiers, all based on contact count.

Essentials starts at approximately $13 per month for 500 contacts. It includes basic email templates, A/B testing, and three audience segments. The plan supports up to 5,000 monthly sends (10x your contact limit). This tier is functional but limited — you get basic automation and scheduling, but no advanced segmentation or multivariate testing.

Standard starts at approximately $20 per month for 500 contacts and is Mailchimp’s recommended tier. It includes more advanced automation (customer journeys with branching logic), retargeting ads, custom-coded templates, and send-time optimization. The monthly send limit increases to 12x your contact limit. For most growing businesses, this is the minimum viable tier.

Premium starts at approximately $350 per month for 10,000 contacts. It includes advanced segmentation, multivariate testing, comparative reporting, and phone support. This tier is designed for larger senders with sophisticated segmentation needs.

The critical detail: Mailchimp charges based on your total contact count, including unsubscribed contacts. If you have 2,000 active subscribers and 500 unsubscribed contacts sitting in your account, you pay for 2,500. You need to manually archive or delete unsubscribed contacts to avoid paying for them. This billing quirk has been a source of frustration since Intuit acquired Mailchimp in 2021.

The Intuit Effect

Since Intuit acquired Mailchimp for $12 billion in November 2021, the platform has undergone significant changes. Pricing has increased, free plan limits have decreased, and the platform has been integrated more tightly with Intuit’s broader ecosystem (QuickBooks, TurboTax).

The business logic is straightforward. Intuit paid a premium for Mailchimp and needs to generate returns. Free users who never convert to paid plans are a cost center, not an asset. Reducing free plan limits and raising paid plan prices is the predictable result of a company that was once bootstrapped and profitable being absorbed into a public company with quarterly earnings targets.

This is not necessarily a criticism — businesses need to make money. But it does change the calculus for Mailchimp users, particularly small businesses and solo operators who chose Mailchimp specifically because it was the affordable, scrappy alternative to enterprise email platforms.

How Mailchimp Compares Right Now

The email marketing platform landscape has become far more competitive since Mailchimp’s dominant years. Here is how the current pricing compares for a sender with 2,500 contacts.

Mailchimp Standard: Approximately $60/month. Includes automation, templates, and basic analytics.

MailerLite Advanced: Approximately $25/month. Includes automation, landing pages, a website builder, and an unsubscribe page builder. No charge for unsubscribed contacts.

GetResponse Marketing Automation: Approximately $54/month. Includes automation, webinars, conversion funnels, and web push notifications.

Kit (formerly ConvertKit): Approximately $50/month on the Creator Pro plan. Includes automation, subscriber scoring, and newsletter referral system. Built specifically for creators and writers.

Brevo (formerly Sendinblue): Approximately $25/month on the Starter plan. Pricing is based on email volume, not contact count — a significant advantage for senders with large but lightly-emailed lists.

At the 2,500-contact level, Mailchimp is often the most expensive option for the features provided. The gap widens as your list grows. At 10,000 contacts, Mailchimp Standard costs approximately $110/month, while MailerLite Advanced costs approximately $54/month for equivalent or better functionality.

When Mailchimp Still Makes Sense

Despite the pricing increases, Mailchimp remains a reasonable choice in specific situations.

You are already on Mailchimp and everything works. Migration has real costs — time, potential subscriber loss during the transition, and the learning curve of a new platform. If your Mailchimp setup is running well and the pricing is within your budget, the switching cost may not justify the savings.

You need deep e-commerce integrations. Mailchimp’s Shopify integration (restored after a brief removal), WooCommerce integration, and product recommendation features are mature and well-tested. If you run an e-commerce operation and rely on purchase-based automation, Mailchimp’s integrations are strong.

You use other Intuit products. If your business runs on QuickBooks, the Mailchimp-QuickBooks integration creates a seamless flow between customer data and email marketing. This is a genuine competitive advantage for Intuit-ecosystem businesses.

When to Consider Alternatives

If you are price-sensitive and need strong automation, MailerLite offers comparable features at roughly half the cost. If you are a creator or writer, Kit is purpose-built for your workflow. If you have a large list but low send frequency, Brevo’s volume-based pricing could save you significantly. If you want an all-in-one marketing platform, GetResponse bundles webinars and conversion funnels that Mailchimp charges extra for.

The days when Mailchimp was the default recommendation for every email marketer are over. It remains a solid platform with excellent deliverability and a familiar interface. But the competition has caught up — and in many cases, surpassed it — on both pricing and features.

Our Recommendation

Before making any decision, calculate your actual cost at your current list size across two or three platforms. Factor in the features you actually use, not the ones that look good on a comparison chart. And if you are on Mailchimp’s free plan approaching the 500-contact limit, now is the time to evaluate alternatives before you are locked into a paid tier.

Use our ROI Calculator to understand what your email list is actually generating in revenue. If your email ROI is strong, the platform cost is a rounding error. If it is not, switching to a lower-cost platform is only a band-aid — the real fix is improving your email strategy.