Klaviyo's pricing page leads with a free plan and a calculator rather than a fixed grid. The free tier holds up to 250 active profiles, 500 emails a month, $5 of mobile messages, $5 of Composer usage, built-in reporting and the standard integration library, and it can stay free indefinitely while the list remains under those limits — though the page notes that sending is restricted once the limits are passed. Past that, the published entry point is the email tier at $20 per month for 251 to 500 active profiles, and the email-plus-SMS tier at $35 per month for the same band. Email support runs for the first 60 days on the free plan, after which the community, academy and help centre remain.
TL;DR
Both platforms start free with the same ceiling — 250 people and a few hundred sends — then price by audience size. Klaviyo's email tier begins at $20 per month for 251 to 500 active profiles, and the email-plus-SMS tier at $35 for the same profile band, with $5 of mobile messages included on the free plan and email support limited to the first 60 days. Mailchimp's free plan caps at 250 contacts and 500 sends a month, and its paid ladder is Essentials at $13/mo, Standard at $20/mo and Premium at $350/mo on a twelve-month term, with sends at 10x, 12x and 15x your list. Klaviyo is built for stores that want behaviour-driven flows and SMS in one account; Mailchimp is cheaper at the small end and broader for general marketing.
Mailchimp keeps a conventional ladder. Free accepts up to 250 contacts, one seat, one audience and a maximum of 500 sends a month with no automation flows. Essentials is $13 per month on a twelve-month term, opens three seats and three audiences, and sends at ten times your contact count with up to four automation flow steps. Standard is $20 per month with five seats, five audiences, sends at twelve times contacts and up to 200 automation flows, and carries the 14-day trial. Premium is $350 per month with unlimited seats and audiences, sends at fifteen times contacts and priority support. Contact or send limits that are passed trigger overage charges, and sending pauses when a limit is exceeded on the free tier.
For a store deciding between them, the question is what triggers the email. Klaviyo's centre of gravity is event data: browse and cart events feed segments and flows directly, and SMS sits in the same account as email, which is why its entry paid tier is $20 rather than $13. Mailchimp's centre of gravity is the campaign: templates, testing, reporting and a wide integration catalogue at a lower entry price, with SMS available as an add-on on Essentials and above. Both stop free at 250 people, so the first paid invoice is where the difference becomes real.
| Feature | Klaviyo | Mailchimp |
|---|---|---|
| Free tier | 250 active profiles, 500 emails/month, $5 of SMS | 250 contacts, 1 seat, 500 sends/month, no flows |
| Entry paid plan | Email from $20/mo for 251-500 active profiles | Essentials $13/mo on a twelve-month term |
| Second tier | Email + SMS from $35/mo for 251-500 profiles | Standard $20/mo: 5 seats, 200 automation flows |
| Top tier | Priced by profile band and channel mix | Premium $350/mo: unlimited seats and audiences |
| Send allowance | 500 emails/month free; paid tiers scale with profiles | 500/month free, then 10x, 12x, 15x contacts by plan |
| SMS | $5 of mobile messages included monthly, email + SMS tier at $35 | Add-on on paid tiers; SMS and MMS add-on on Standard and Premium |
| Support | Email support for the first 60 days on free | Help centre and email support; priority support on Premium |
| Pricing driver | Active profiles in the account | Contact count and plan tier |
Pick Klaviyo if
When abandoned carts, browse signals and post-purchase flows are the reason the tool exists, Klaviyo's event model does the work that Mailchimp asks you to build with rules. Expect to start at $20/mo for the 251-500 profile band and $35 if SMS rides in the same account — more than Mailchimp, but that is the feature you are paying for.
Pick Mailchimp if
For a general audience newsletter, announcements and straightforward automations, Mailchimp's $13 entry and $20 Standard undercut Klaviyo while adding seats and audiences. It is also the safer home for a list that is not a store: the contact ladder is simple, and nothing about the price assumes an integration with commerce data.
No independent reviews, ratings or user quotes were collected for this page, so none appear above. Every figure and claim comes from the vendors' own pricing and product pages as retrieved for this article.
Klaviyo's $20 entry tier prices behavioural data and SMS alongside email, while Mailchimp's $13 Essentials covers campaign sending with automation limited to four flow steps. The gap buys event-driven segmentation rather than a larger send allowance.
Both platforms stop their free tier at 250 people. Klaviyo counts active profiles and allows 500 emails a month; Mailchimp counts contacts and allows 500 sends a month with one seat and one audience.
It can run indefinitely while the account stays under 250 active profiles and 500 monthly emails, with $5 of mobile messages included. Once the limits are passed, sending is restricted until you upgrade.
The listed prices — $13, $20 and $350 — are shown on a twelve-month term. Contact count is the other lever: each plan carries a send multiplier of 10x, 12x or 15x your contacts, and overage applies when a limit is passed.
Yes. Each accepts a CSV import and offers platform integrations for the common stores. Automations and segments have to be rebuilt in the new tool's editor in both cases, which is usually the longer part of the move.
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