MailerLite vs Kit: which one actually costs less?
Kit is free to 10,000 subscribers; MailerLite charges from 251 and hits $80/mo by 10,000. But once you need real automations, MailerLite is half the price.
MailerLite vs Kit looks like a close call until you line up the free plans. Kit is free up to 10,000 subscribers. MailerLite is free up to 250. That is a 40× difference on the same axis, and it decides the comparison for most people starting out.
Then you start paying, and it inverts. At 1,000 subscribers MailerLite’s Comfort plan is $17.10/mo on annual billing. Kit’s Creator plan is $390/yr — about $33/mo. Suddenly the tool that was free for 10,000 subscribers is the expensive one.
So the real question isn’t which is cheaper. It’s which side of the automation line you’re on — because one automation is what Kit’s free plan actually meters. All pricing below comes from each platform’s listed plans, checked in August 2026; both scale with list size, so verify at your own subscriber count before you commit.
The short answer
- Pick Kit if you send a newsletter — broadcasts to a list, no branching logic. You’ll pay nothing up to 10,000 subscribers, which is further than most creators ever get, and MailerLite would charge about $80/mo at that size.
- Pick MailerLite if you need more than one automation. At 1,000 subscribers it’s $17.10/mo annual against Kit’s ~$33 — roughly half — with unlimited automations from the entry tier.
Both are genuinely good tools with 0% transaction fees on email plans. This is a pricing-model argument, not a quality one.
Pricing at a glance
| MailerLite | Kit | |
|---|---|---|
| Free plan | 250 subscribers, 2,500 emails/mo | 10,000 subscribers, 1 automation, unlimited broadcasts |
| Entry paid plan | Comfort — $17.10/mo annual ($19 monthly) | Creator — $390/yr, ~$33/mo ($39 monthly) |
| Next tier up | Power — $35.10/mo annual ($39 monthly) | Pro — $790/yr, ~$66/mo ($79 monthly) |
| Priced at | 1,000 subscribers | 1,000 subscribers |
| Free trial | None — the free plan is the trial | 14 days |
| Transaction fees | 0% | 0% on email plans; Kit Commerce ~3.5% + $0.30 on product sales |
| G2 rating | 4.6 | 4.4 |
Both platforms price by subscriber count, so those paid figures are an anchor at 1,000 subscribers, not a flat rate. MailerLite’s annual billing saves 10%; Kit’s saves $78/yr on Creator and $158/yr on Pro.
The most important row is the first one, and it’s the one most comparisons skim past. Kit’s free Newsletter plan includes unlimited broadcasts, unlimited landing pages and forms, tagging and segmentation, and the ability to sell digital products — to as many as 10,000 subscribers. It is not a trial and it is not crippled. The catch is exactly one automation.
What MailerLite actually costs as you grow
This is where the comparison usually goes wrong, including in most articles about it. MailerLite is not a $17/mo tool — that’s its price at 1,000 subscribers. Its Comfort plan on annual billing runs:
| Subscribers | MailerLite Comfort | Kit Newsletter (free) |
|---|---|---|
| 500 | $10.80/mo | $0 |
| 1,000 | $17.10/mo | $0 |
| 2,500 | $29.70/mo | $0 |
| 5,000 | $44.10/mo | $0 |
| 10,000 | $80.10/mo | $0 |
Annual-billing figures read from MailerLite’s own pricing slider.
Read the two columns together and the free-plan gap stops being a footnote. At 10,000 subscribers, a creator who only sends broadcasts pays $961/yr on MailerLite and $0 on Kit for substantially the same job. Kit’s free plan is the single best deal in this category, and it isn’t close.
The automation line is the whole decision
“One automation” sounds like a minor limit until you map it to what you actually do.
One automation covers a welcome sequence. That’s it. The moment you want a welcome sequence and a separate sequence for people who bought something, you’re on Kit’s Creator plan at $390/yr.
MailerLite gives you unlimited automations on Comfort — $205.20/yr at 1,000 subscribers. That’s $184.80/yr less for the same capability at that list size.
| At 1,000 subscribers | MailerLite | Kit | Cheaper |
|---|---|---|---|
| Broadcasts only | $205.20/yr (Comfort) | $0 (Newsletter) | Kit, by $205.20/yr |
| Several automations | $205.20/yr (Comfort) | $390/yr (Creator) | MailerLite, by $184.80/yr |
Read that as one rule: broadcasts are free on Kit, logic is cheap on MailerLite.
The caveat that keeps this honest — Kit’s Creator plan also scales with list size, so the $184.80 gap is specific to 1,000 subscribers rather than a constant. What doesn’t change is the shape: if you need branching automation you will pay on either platform, and MailerLite starts cheaper.
Where Kit earns the higher price
Kit isn’t more expensive by accident — Creator buys things MailerLite doesn’t sell.
- Selling products to your list. Kit Commerce lets you sell digital products and subscriptions from inside the email tool, and it’s available even on the free Newsletter plan. It carries roughly 3.5% + $0.30 per sale — the same convenience-versus-cut tradeoff we worked through in our creator platform transaction fees breakdown.
- The Creator Network and recommendations. Other creators can recommend your newsletter, which is a genuine growth channel rather than a feature checkbox. Nothing in MailerLite’s lineup does this.
- Automation depth for creators. Kit’s visual sequences and tagging were built around creator workflows — launches, evergreen funnels, segment-by-behaviour.
If your email list is your business, that bundle can justify the difference. If email is one channel among several, it usually can’t.
Where MailerLite earns the lower price
MailerLite’s pitch is the boring essentials without creator-platform prices.
- Unlimited emails on every paid plan, so a small list you mail often never costs extra.
- Landing pages, popups and signup forms included, with a genuinely pleasant drag-and-drop editor.
- A/B and multivariate testing on paid plans, which is unusual at this price.
The tradeoffs are real: the free tier is only 250 subscribers, new accounts go through an approval process that can take a day or two, and reporting is lighter than rivals’. If you want deep per-subscriber analytics, neither of these is your tool.
Which one to actually pick
Choose Kit if:
- You publish a newsletter and one welcome sequence is genuinely all the automation you need
- You’re under 10,000 subscribers — this is worth up to about $961/yr against MailerLite
- You plan to sell digital products to your list and want it built in
- Discovery through the Creator Network matters to you
Choose MailerLite if:
- You need more than one automation — the single clearest signal
- You want the cheaper tool for branching logic and don’t need creator-specific extras
- You care about landing pages and testing more than about commerce
- You’re past 10,000 subscribers, where Kit’s free plan stops and the comparison becomes paid-versus-paid
The honest summary: start on Kit’s free plan unless you already know you need branching automations, because $0 up to 10,000 subscribers beats anything MailerLite offers below that line. Move to MailerLite the day one automation stops being enough — that’s when Kit’s pricing stops making sense and MailerLite’s starts.
If you’d rather not guess, our advisor matches you on list size, automation needs and budget, and the pricing calculator will run your own subscriber count against both. For the wider category, our best email marketing for creators guide covers where these two sit against ActiveCampaign, beehiiv and the rest.