Is email marketing worth paying for with a list under 500 contacts?

Usually not. Under 500 contacts a free plan holds your list, and two of them carry a weekly email to all of it: AWeber’s, which stops at 500 contacts, and Kit’s, which goes up to 10,000 contacts. Under 250 contacts you have more choice still. Pay when something you need sits behind the paywall: your own branding instead of the vendor’s, emails that go out on their own, scheduled sends, or a second person. If you do pay, a 500-contact list sent one email a week costs $9 to $39 a month.

Is a free plan enough for your list?

For most lists under 500, yes. Count the people you’d actually import, then how often you send, and read your line below. Here, a weekly email is priced so a month with five sends fits: five sends to every contact.

• Up to 250 contacts, sending weekly: MailerLite’s free plan (2,500 emails a month), Brevo’s (300 emails a day), Kit’s (unlimited broadcasts), and AWeber’s (3,000 emails a month) all carry it.
• Up to 250 contacts, sending once or twice a month: Mailchimp’s free plan fits too. Its 500 emails a month cover two sends to a full list, not a weekly email’s four or five.
• From there up to 500 contacts: AWeber’s and Kit’s free plans fit, at any normal sending rhythm. MailerLite’s and Mailchimp’s have ended at their contact caps. Brevo’s still holds the list, but it sends at most 300 emails a day, so one email can’t reach everyone in a day; Brevo’s help center says the rest get it only when you resend it.

Constant Contact, the sixth tool in this guide, has no free plan; it offers a trial and then a paid plan.

If you’re near a cap, count the list the way the tool will. People who unsubscribed or bounced, or who haven’t heard from you in years, don’t need to come along on import. When a free email marketing plan is enough goes through each free plan cap by cap.

What does paying buy you at this size?

Not more room for your list, in most cases: under 500 the free plans already hold it. What the first paid plan buys is features. These are the ones a small business usually pays for, in the order owners tend to hit them.

• Your own branding. Every free plan here puts the vendor’s name on your emails, and every vendor sells the way off it. MailerLite’s Comfort removes the logo, at $12 a month up to 500 subscribers, and so does Mailchimp’s Essentials ($13 a month). AWeber keeps its branding on Lite and removes it on Plus, its second paid plan, at $30 a month. Kit’s Creator removes it, priced from 1,000 subscribers at $39 a month. Brevo sells logo removal as an add-on to Starter, and its Standard plan leaves the logo off.
• Emails that go out on their own. A welcome email for each new subscriber is the usual one. Some free plans include a little of this: AWeber’s allows 1 workflow automation, MailerLite’s a small number of short automations, and Brevo’s lets a capped number of contacts into its automations. Mailchimp’s has no automation flows, and Kit’s has no email sequences (it only sends a freebie to new sign-ups). Do you need automation, or just a newsletter? helps you decide whether you need this yet.
• Scheduling. Mailchimp’s free plan can’t schedule a send for later. If you write your newsletter on Sunday and want it out on Tuesday morning, that’s a reason to pay there, or to use another free plan.
• A second person. Mailchimp’s, Brevo’s, and Kit’s free plans each have 1 user. MailerLite’s has 2 users.
• Help when something breaks. Mailchimp’s free plan includes email support for the first 30 days only, and MailerLite’s free plan comes with community support; their first paid plans add round-the-clock email support.

If none of these matters to you yet, the honest answer is not to pay.

What does it cost?

Here’s the monthly bill at the two sizes that matter under 500, on each tool’s cheapest plan that fits, at list price, billed monthly. The table assumes one email a week to every contact, the same for every tool; where a free plan fits, the cell says so.

Mailchimp’s free plan isn’t in the 250 column because a weekly email to 250 people is more than its monthly sends. Send twice a month instead and it fits.

Pick by situation:

• A small list, a newsletter once or twice a month, branding fine: any free plan that fits your count. Nothing to pay.
• A weekly email to a list of up to 500 contacts: AWeber’s or Kit’s free plan. Nothing to pay.
• You want a welcome email for new subscribers: AWeber’s free plan includes 1 workflow automation, MailerLite’s includes a few (up to its 250 contacts cap), and Brevo’s lets a capped number of contacts into its automations (for a list it can email in a day).
• Your business sells on its look and the vendor’s logo has to go: you’re paying. At 500 contacts, the paid range is $9 to $39 a month; what email marketing costs at 500, 1,000, 2,500, and 5,000 contacts lays out every tool.

Say you run a one-person pottery studio with about 180 people on your list: past students and people who bought a piece at a market. You send a monthly newsletter with new class dates, and a second email when there’s a studio sale. That’s two emails a month to 180 people, 360 sends. Students who signed up for your newsletter asked to hear from you; for people whose address you only have from a market sale, ask before you add them to the list, and import the ones who say yes.

Every free plan here holds that list and that sending, Mailchimp’s included (250 contacts and 500 emails a month). The honest budget is nothing. The one thing you might pay for is the logo: your pots sell on how they look, and so does your newsletter. If that bothers you, MailerLite’s Comfort is $12 a month at your size and Mailchimp’s Essentials $13 a month. If it doesn’t, stay free, and if you’d like each new student to get a welcome note with your studio rules, start on AWeber’s, MailerLite’s, or Brevo’s free plan: each includes some automation, and each holds your list.

What not to pay for yet

• A paid plan “to be ready”. You’ll have months of bills before you need it. Move when a cap or a missing feature stops you.
• Automation you haven’t written. If the welcome series isn’t drafted, you don’t need the plan that sends it.
• A tool chosen for the list you hope to have. Pick for the list you have now. Under 500, moving the list later is a small job, though rebuilding your sign-up forms and templates needs some planning.
• Yearly billing. Pay monthly until you’ve sent from the tool for a few months.

Your next step

This week, write down three numbers: the contacts you’d import, the emails you send each of them in a typical month, and whether you need anything to go out on its own. Then start the free plan whose caps you’ll hit last. Under 250 contacts, any of five fits a newsletter once or twice a month: Mailchimp’s, MailerLite’s, Brevo’s, Kit’s, or AWeber’s free plan, and all but Mailchimp’s fit a weekly one. Above that, up to 500 contacts, it’s AWeber’s or Kit’s. For a welcome email, it’s AWeber’s, MailerLite’s, or Brevo’s. If you’re still deciding whether you need a tool at all, can you send a newsletter from Gmail or Outlook? answers that first.