HEAD TO HEAD
MailerLite vs Brevo: billed by contacts or by emails sent
vs
The billing splits them. MailerLite prices by subscribers, so a steady newsletter pays a flat, predictable bill no matter how often you send. Brevo prices by emails sent with unlimited contacts, which rewards a big list you mail infrequently and climbs when you send daily. Regular cadence to a defined list favours MailerLite; a large list mailed lightly, or a need for transactional email, favours Brevo.
Our pick for most readersMailerLite
The steadier default for a regular newsletter: priced by subscribers, so a predictable list on a weekly or monthly cadence pays a flat, foreseeable bill with clean tooling to send it.
Free plan, paid from $12/mo · Free up to 250 subscribers, 2,500 emails/moTry MailerLitePick it ifBrevo
Better when your list is large but you mail it lightly: unlimited contacts and a bill driven by emails sent, plus transactional email in the same account. High-frequency senders should model the volume.
Free plan, paid from $9/mo · Free plan: 300 emails a day, unlimited contactsTry BrevoPer subscriber or per email, matched to cadence
| At a glance | MailerLite | Brevo |
|---|---|---|
| Positioning | Newsletter-first platform with clean tooling and automations, priced by active subscribers. | Unlimited contacts with pricing by emails sent, plus transactional email in the same account. |
| Billing unit | per contact | per email sent |
| Free plan | Free up to 250 subscribers, 2,500 emails/mo | Free plan: 300 emails a day, unlimited contacts |
| Plans | Comfort: $49/mo at 5,000 contacts Power: $69/mo at 5,000 contacts | Starter: $9/mo at 5,000 emails/mo Standard: $18/mo at 5,000 emails/mo Professional: $499/mo at 150,000 emails/mo |
| Entry price | free plan, paid from $12/mo | free plan, paid from $9/mo |
| Billing notes | Priced by active subscribers; annual billing saves 10%. EUR prices are also published. | Priced by monthly email volume with unlimited contacts; annual billing saves 10%. Pay-as-you-go credits exist as an alternative. |
Amounts come from each provider's official pricing page and can change: the official MailerLite pricing page · the official Brevo pricing page.
Cadence is the deciding variable. MailerLite charges for the subscribers you hold, so sending weekly or three times a week costs the same as sending monthly; the bill tracks list size, not effort. Brevo charges for emails leaving the building and lets contacts be unlimited, so a large but lightly mailed list stays cheap while a high-frequency schedule runs the meter up. MailerLite's Comfort plan also caps monthly emails at ten times the tier ceiling, another reason very frequent senders should look closely. Both offer a free entry point on different terms. Put your list size and real weekly cadence through the cost calculator to see where the lines cross.
The cadence break-even
There is a crossover point, and it moves with how often you send. A modest list mailed frequently sends a lot of emails, so MailerLite's flat per-subscriber price beats Brevo's rising meter. A large list mailed occasionally sends comparatively few emails, so Brevo's per-email model, with unlimited contacts, comes out ahead. The guide on pay per email versus pay per contact walks the trade-off in detail. Automations and resends count as sends too, so a heavy automation program nudges the math toward MailerLite even on a mid-size list. Estimate your true monthly email volume, not just your subscriber count.
Beyond price: tooling and transactional
Away from the bill, the products differ in emphasis. MailerLite is newsletter-first, with polished editors, tidy signup forms and automations that are quick to ship, which is why steady publishers like living in it. Brevo adds transactional email (receipts, resets, confirmations) in the same account, so marketing and product mail share one sending setup, valuable if you currently run a separate transactional provider. Both handle a welcome sequence and standard segmentation without trouble; neither is a deep automation specialist, which stays with ActiveCampaign. Choose on which side of the billing line you sit, then let tooling and transactional needs break a close tie.
Who should pick which
- Regular newsletter to a defined list: MailerLite, for a flat, predictable per-subscriber bill.
- Large list mailed lightly: Brevo, where unlimited contacts and per-email billing keep costs down.
- Also need transactional email: Brevo, to unify marketing and product mail.
- Heavy automations and resends: count them as sends and check both in the calculator.
The same newsletter and the same welcome sequence
| The same brief | MailerLite | Brevo |
|---|---|---|
| What the bill follows | contacts stored | monthly emails sent |
| Cheapest plan that covers the brief | Comfort at 5,000 contacts $49/mo | Starter at 40,000 emails/mo $46/mo |
| Monthly sends included | 50,000 emails | 40,000 emails |
| Headroom after the brief | 27,750 sends left | 17,750 sends left |
The brief, identical on every comparison here: a list of 5,000 contacts, one newsletter to everyone each week (21,650 sends a month) and the same three email welcome sequence for 200 new subscribers (600 sends), so 22,250 sends in all. Prices and allowances are read from each provider's published ladder. Where an allowance is not published we say so rather than estimate it.
What the two products actually look like
What we checked, and where it comes from
MailerLite
- Current plan names are Comfort and Power; the old Growing Business and Advanced names are gone. Source: the official MailerLite pricing page
- Comfort caps monthly emails at 10x the subscriber tier ceiling; Power is unlimited under fair use. Source: the official MailerLite pricing page
- Exceeding a paid tier triggers an automatic, notified upgrade to the next tier; free accounts over 250 subscribers have sending locked. Source: the official MailerLite pricing page
Brevo
- Contacts are free regardless of volume; billing follows monthly email volume in stair-step tiers. Source: the official Brevo pricing page
- The free plan is capped at 300 emails a day across campaigns and transactional. Source: the official Brevo pricing page
- No automatic overage: you move up a volume tier or buy pay-as-you-go credits. Source: the official Brevo pricing page
- Current marketing plan names are Free, Starter, Standard, Professional and Enterprise. Source: the official Brevo pricing page
- Starter starts from 5,000 emails per month and Professional from 150,000 emails per month. Source: the official Brevo pricing page
- Annual billing is published as a yearly total about a tenth below twelve monthly payments on Starter, Standard and Professional. Source: the official Brevo pricing page
How to read this: every capability above is taken from the provider's own published pages, and each line names where it came from. We have not run a paid side by side test of these two platforms, so nothing on this page is presented as a test result. The hands on protocols we do publish, and their limits, are on the tests page. Where a provider does not publish something, we say so instead of estimating it.
Questions people also ask
Which is cheaper, MailerLite or Brevo?
It turns on cadence against list size. Frequent sends to a moderate list favour MailerLite's flat per-subscriber price; infrequent sends to a large list favour Brevo's per-email model. The calculator finds the crossover for your numbers.
Do automations count against Brevo's email limit?
Yes. Every automated message and resend is an email sent, so a heavy automation program raises Brevo's volume just as campaigns do. If automations drive most of your sending, MailerLite's per-subscriber billing often ends up steadier.
Does MailerLite's sending cap matter here?
Only at high frequency. Comfort allows ten times the tier ceiling per month, ample for a weekly send but tight if you add daily campaigns and busy automations. At that point compare MailerLite Power against Brevo's metered volume directly.