Free MailerLite alternatives
MailerLite's free plan is 250 subscribers, 2,500 emails a month and three active automations. The product is excellent; the free tier is one of the smaller ones here.
Free plans below, ranked by what you can actually ship on, with the limit that stops you first named in every row.
The limit that bites first
MailerLite's row is here for reference. Note how few free plans include automation at all.
| Provider | Free tier | What stops you first | Type |
|---|---|---|---|
| Kit (formerly ConvertKit) | Up to 10,000 subscribers with one basic visual automation | One basic visual automation — sequences are the paid product | Permanent |
| Sender | 2,500 subscribers and 15,000 emails a month, with automation included | Volume, eventually. Automation, landing pages and forms are all included | Permanent |
| Email Bump | 5,000 contacts and 5,000 emails a month | A 'Powered by Email Bump' badge on marketing footers. No daily cap; domains and seats unlimited | Permanent |
| EmailOctopus | 2,500 subscribers and 10,000 emails a month, with EmailOctopus branding | EmailOctopus branding on every send, 30-day reports, 1 user, 1 form | Permanent |
| beehiiv | Up to 2,500 subscribers with unlimited email sends | No ad network, no paid subscriptions and no Send API on the free plan | Permanent |
| Brevo | 300 emails a day, forever, with contact storage into the tens of thousands | 300 a day is a hard daily wall that doesn't roll over | Permanent |
| Zoho Campaigns | 2,000 contacts, 6,000 emails a month and 5 users | Volume — but 5 users, where most free plans allow one | Permanent |
| MailerLite | 250 subscribers and 2,500 emails a month, 2 seats, 3 automations | 250 subscribers and 3 active automations | Permanent |
| Mailchimp | 250 contacts and 500 sends a month, capped at 250 a day, 1 seat | 250 a day, which bites before the 500-a-month limit does | Permanent |
| Benchmark Email | 500 contacts and 2,500 sends a month, 1 user, 1 domain | 500 contacts, 1 user and 1 sending domain | Permanent |
| CleverReach | 250 recipients and 1,000 emails a month, permanently | 250 recipients and 1,000 emails a month | Permanent |
| Buttondown | Up to 100 subscribers | 100 subscribers, and automations are a $29/mo add-on | Permanent |
| Flodesk | A free plan with forms, landing pages and segmentation | Forms and landing pages, but sending needs a paid plan | Permanent |
| Omnisend | 250 contacts, 500 emails a month and 500 web push notifications | 250 contacts — an evaluation allowance, not a plan | Permanent |
| listmonk, Mautic, Keila, Sendy | Free or one-time licence | The software costs nothing; your sending provider and your time still do | Self-hosted |
From each vendor's own pricing page. Free tiers change more often than paid ones — check before you commit a launch to one.
How to read these, after three automations
Automation count is your constraint, so start there. MailerLite gives three on free and 50 on Comfort. Sender and Email Bump don't cap it at all; Kit gives one. That single number will decide this more than subscriber counts will.
Send multipliers. MailerLite Comfort caps sending at 10× your tier ceiling, and Power removes it. Check whether the free plans below carry a multiplier too — Mailchimp and Benchmark do, most of the others don't.
Branding, which MailerLite doesn't add. You're used to clean free-plan email. EmailOctopus, Loops, Kit and Email Bump all brand theirs, so that's a step down rather than a like-for-like.
Three automations is the constraint, not 250 subscribers
Most people evaluating MailerLite's free plan look at the subscriber count and stop there. The number that actually decides it is three active automations — a welcome sequence and two ideas.
Free plans that don't ration automation: Sender includes workflows with 2,500 subscribers and 15,000 monthly emails, and Email Bump includes unlimited flows and live segments with 5,000 contacts. Kit gives forty times MailerLite's subscribers and exactly one automation, which is the opposite trade.
If you're on MailerLite free and the automations are what you've run out of, Comfort at $12/mo raises it to 50 — which is often cheaper than moving.
MailerLite alternatives, asked and answered
What is the best free MailerLite alternative?
Sender, if automation is the constraint — 2,500 subscribers and 15,000 monthly emails with workflows included, and also EU-based. Kit, if it's a newsletter and you want subscriber headroom: 10,000 free.
Email Bump gives 5,000 contacts and 5,000 emails with unlimited flows, live segments and a transactional API on the same key.
How many automations does MailerLite's free plan allow?
Three active automations, alongside 250 subscribers, 2,500 monthly emails and two seats. Comfort at $12/mo raises that to 50, and Power removes the limit along with the send cap.
Is MailerLite's free plan worth staying on?
If you're under 250 subscribers and running a welcome sequence, yes — the editor and templates are among the best in this comparison and there's no branding on free-plan email.
Past that, Comfort at $12/mo is one of the cheapest real paid plans anywhere here, so moving up is often better value than moving away.
Unlimited flows on the free plan
5,000 contacts, 5,000 emails, unlimited flows and live segments — plus campaigns, SMTP and a transactional API on the same key.