12 Best Email Newsletter Platforms for 2026 (Pros, Cons and Pricing)

Mailchimp is the default recommendation for a reason: it is the easiest newsletter tool to start with, the templates look good out of the box, and it connects to almost everything a small business already uses. Essentials costs $13 a month for 500 contacts and adds A/B testing and simple automation flows, while Standard costs $20 and adds multi-step automation and predictive segments. The free plan covers 250 contacts and 500 emails a month.

The catch is the contact counting. Unsubscribed contacts count toward the tier until you archive them, and the price jumps to $75 a month at 5,000 contacts. There is also no annual discount on the marketing plans, so the monthly price is the price. Pick Mailchimp when you want the familiar, well-connected option and your list is still small.

Brevo wins on the pricing model. Because you pay for emails sent rather than contacts stored, a business with a big list and a monthly newsletter pays $9 a month for 5,000 emails while contact-based rivals charge for every subscriber. The free plan allows 300 emails a day and stores up to 100,000 contacts, which covers many small newsletters entirely. Starter removes the daily cap and adds email support.

The trap is the contact cap hidden inside the send tiers. The $9 tier stores only 500 contacts, so a 1,000-subscriber list needs the 10,000-email tier at $17 a month, and a 5,000-subscriber list needs the 20,000-email tier at $32. Automation and A/B testing also wait for Standard at $18. Pick Brevo when your list is large and your sending is light.

MailerLite is the value pick because its pricing is the most honest: it counts active subscribers only, so dead addresses never push the bill up. Comfort costs $12 a month for up to 500 subscribers, or $10.80 billed yearly, and includes 50 automations, the AI writing assistant, logo removal and 3 seats. The editor is clean and setup is fast, and the free plan covers 250 subscribers and 2,500 emails a month.

Watch the send cap and the automation ceiling. Comfort allows 10 times the subscriber tier in monthly sends, so the entry tier tops out at 5,000 emails a month, and complex journeys with several triggers need Power at $25. The price also rises with the list: $19 a month at 1,000 subscribers. Pick MailerLite for a low, predictable bill and a tool that stays out of the way.

Kit, formerly ConvertKit, is built for people whose business is their audience: writers, coaches, podcasters and course sellers. Subscribers are organized by tags rather than lists, so one person can sit in several segments without being counted twice. Creator costs $39 a month for up to 1,000 subscribers, or $390 a year, and adds unlimited visual automations, unlimited email sequences and Kit Commerce for selling digital products.

The free Newsletter plan is the most generous here, covering up to 10,000 subscribers, but it has no automations — sequences and visual automations need the paid plan. Creator is also the dearest entry for a general newsletter at this size, and every sale carries a 3.5% plus 30-cent fee. Pick Kit when the newsletter is the business, not a side channel.

beehiiv is the only tool here built around the newsletter itself rather than around marketing email. It gives you a website, a newsletter, paid subscriptions, an ad network and a recommendation network in one account, and it takes 0% of paid subscription revenue — only Stripe's processing fee applies. Lite costs $59 a month for up to 1,000 subscribers, or $49 billed yearly, and the price stays flat up to 100,000 subscribers.

The free plan is genuinely usable, covering 2,500 subscribers with unlimited sends, but paid subscriptions, automations and the ad network need Lite. The October 2026 reprice raised Lite from $43 to $49 a month billed yearly, and branding removal still waits for Pro at $109. Pick beehiiv when the newsletter is a publication you plan to monetize, not just a mailing list.

Constant Contact is the simplest tool here, and that is the point. Lite costs $12 a month for 500 contacts and covers the drag-and-drop editor, templates, list import and scheduling — a broadcast newsletter, nothing more. There is no free plan since June 2025, only a 30-day trial with no credit card, and the trial allows just 100 sends in total. Prepaying 12 months cuts Lite to $10.20 a month.

The trade-off is scope and scale. Lite has no automation, segmentation or A/B testing — those need Standard at $35 a month — and the price climbs steeply as the list grows, reaching about $80 a month at 5,000 contacts. Pick Constant Contact when you want a human on the phone and a newsletter you can send in an afternoon.

GetResponse is the all-in-one of this list: newsletters, autoresponders, landing pages and webinars in a single account. Starter costs $19 a month for 1,000 contacts, or $15.58 billed yearly, and includes unlimited monthly sends, an AI email generator, landing pages and signup forms. The free plan covers 500 contacts and 2,500 newsletters a month, which is enough to run a small newsletter for free.

The limit to watch is automation. Starter allows exactly one custom automation workflow, so anything beyond a welcome series needs Marketer at $59 a month. Annual billing saves 18%, but annual plans are non-refundable, so pay monthly until you are sure. Pick GetResponse when webinars or landing pages matter as much as the newsletter itself.

AWeber is the veteran of this list, in business since 1998, and it still sells the same promise: dependable delivery and a support team that answers. Lite costs $15 a month for up to 500 subscribers, or $150 a year, and includes 3 team seats, 3 landing pages, 3 automations and a custom segment. Paid subscriptions carry a low fee of 1% on Lite and 0.6% on Plus.

The pricing page shows no free plan, only a 14-day trial — though AWeber's own help pages still describe a Free plan, so the entry path is confusing. Lite is also tightly capped, with one list and no branding removal, and the price rises with every subscriber band: $25 a month at 1,000 subscribers. Pick AWeber when reliability and support matter more than the newest features.

ActiveCampaign is the automation heavyweight of this list. Starter costs $19 a month for 1,000 contacts, or $15 billed yearly, and includes 10,000 sends a month, segmentation and business goals, with automations of up to 5 actions each. It is rated 4.4 out of 5 on G2 from 14,840 reviews — the largest review base here — and the 14-day trial needs no credit card.

The catch is that Starter is a stripped-down version of a much bigger platform. Landing pages wait for Plus at $59 a month, only one seat is included, and accounts created after November 3, 2025 are billed for all contacts, including unsubscribed ones. Pick ActiveCampaign when the newsletter is one step in a longer automated journey, not the whole job.

Ghost is a publishing platform, not just an email tool: a website, a blog, a newsletter and a member list in one open-source codebase. The hosted version, Ghost(Pro), starts at $18 a month for up to 1,000 members, or $15 billed yearly, and takes 0% of subscription revenue on every plan. The software itself is free to self-host — you pay only for the server.

The entry plan has one hard limit: Starter cannot take payments at all. Paid subscriptions need Publisher at $35 a month billed monthly, which also adds custom themes and three staff users. Starter allows one staff user and official themes only, and Ghost(Pro) gives no refunds. Pick Ghost when you want to own the publication, the list and the design.

Substack is the simplest deal in this list: publishing is free at any list size, with no subscriber cap and no send limit, and paid subscriptions work out of the box. There is no plan to buy, no tier to unlock and no monthly bill until readers pay. Discovery through Notes and recommendations helps new readers find the publication without any marketing setup.

The cost is the 10% cut. Substack keeps 10% of every paid subscription forever, and Stripe adds 2.9% plus 30 cents per payment and a 0.7% billing fee — so on an $8 monthly subscription you keep about $6.61. At $500 a month in paid revenue the fee alone is $50 a month. Pick Substack to start free and pay only when readers pay you.

Moosend is the budget pick that refuses to feel budget: a single paid plan, Pro, includes automation workflows, landing pages, A/B testing and an AI Writer from the first tier. It costs $9 a month for 500 contacts, or $7 billed annually, with unlimited sends at every tier — so a weekly newsletter never hits a send cap. The 30-day trial needs no credit card and gives full access.

The weakness is the entry path and the ecosystem. There is no free plan, only the 30-day trial capped at 1,000 contacts, and the integration list is shorter than Mailchimp's or ActiveCampaign's. Moosend is also now part of Constant Contact, so its long-term direction is less certain. Pick Moosend when the budget is tight and the newsletter goes out every week.