Brevo vs Mailchimp: Budget-Friendly Pick

Brevo (formerly Sendinblue) and Mailchimp are two of the most well-known email marketing platforms for small businesses. Both offer free plans, both handle email campaigns and automation, and both can serve as all-in-one marketing tools. But their pricing models differ fundamentally, and that difference matters more than most comparisons acknowledge.

Mailchimp charges based on the number of contacts in your account. Brevo charges based on the number of emails you send. This distinction is the key to understanding which platform will cost you less as your business grows. In this comparison, we break down pricing, features, automation, ease of use, and integrations to help you make the right choice for your budget.

Pricing Comparison

The pricing model difference between these two platforms is the most important factor for budget-conscious teams. Let us look at the details.

Mailchimp Pricing

Mailchimp’s free plan supports 500 contacts and 1,000 monthly sends. The Essentials plan starts at $13/month for 500 contacts, Standard at $20/month, and Premium at $350/month. As your list grows, costs increase with every additional contact.

A common pain point with Mailchimp is that unsubscribed contacts and contacts who never open your emails still count toward your plan limit. You have to manually archive or delete them to keep costs down. At 10,000 contacts, the Standard plan costs around $135/month. At 50,000 contacts, expect $350/month or more. For full details, visit our Mailchimp pricing guide.

Brevo Pricing

Brevo’s free plan is remarkably generous: unlimited contacts with up to 300 emails per day (roughly 9,000 per month). The Starter plan begins at $9/month for 5,000 emails per month with no contact limit. The Business plan starts at $18/month and adds marketing automation, A/B testing, and advanced statistics.

Because Brevo does not charge per contact, you can have 100,000 contacts in your account and still pay based only on how many emails you send. This fundamentally changes the cost equation for businesses with large lists and moderate send frequency. Check the full breakdown in our Brevo pricing guide.

Real-World Cost Comparison

Here is how costs compare at common list sizes assuming 4 campaigns per month:

5,000 contacts: Mailchimp Standard costs approximately $75/month. Brevo Starter with 20,000 monthly emails costs approximately $19/month.

25,000 contacts: Mailchimp Standard costs approximately $270/month. Brevo Business with 60,000 monthly emails costs approximately $49/month.

50,000 contacts: Mailchimp Standard costs approximately $385/month. Brevo Business with 100,000 monthly emails costs approximately $65/month.

The savings are dramatic. For many businesses, the Brevo vs Mailchimp pricing difference alone is enough to make the decision.

Ease of Use

Mailchimp’s Interface

Mailchimp’s interface is polished and approachable. The email builder is drag-and-drop with a wide selection of templates. Campaign creation follows a clear step-by-step process: select audience, choose template, design email, schedule send. For first-time email marketers, the guided experience is welcoming.

Mailchimp’s navigation has become more complex as the platform has added features beyond email — websites, social ads, postcards, and more. Finding specific settings or features sometimes requires clicking through multiple menus. But overall, the core email marketing workflow is well-designed.

Brevo’s Interface

Brevo’s interface is functional if less polished than Mailchimp’s. The dashboard is organized by channel: email, SMS, chat, and CRM. Navigation is straightforward, and the campaign creation flow is logical. The email editor supports drag-and-drop design with a reasonable template library.

Where Brevo differs is in its all-in-one approach. From the same dashboard, you can manage email campaigns, transactional emails, SMS messages, WhatsApp campaigns, and live chat. This consolidation is convenient for teams that want one platform for all customer communication, though it means the interface has more sections to learn.

Email Automation

Mailchimp Automation

Mailchimp’s automation feature, “Customer Journeys,” provides a visual builder for multi-step email sequences. You can trigger automations based on signups, tags, purchase activity, dates, and subscriber behavior. Pre-built automation templates cover welcome series, abandoned carts, re-engagement campaigns, and more.

However, multi-step automations with branching logic are only available on Standard and Premium plans. Free and Essentials users get single-step automations only. This limits the usefulness of Mailchimp’s automation for budget-conscious users on lower tiers.

Brevo Automation

Brevo includes marketing automation on its Business plan starting at $18/month. The automation builder is visual and supports multi-step workflows with conditions, delays, and branching. Triggers include form submissions, email opens, link clicks, website visits (with tracking enabled), and contact attribute changes.

Brevo’s automation also extends to SMS and WhatsApp within the same workflow. You can create a flow that sends an email, waits for engagement, and follows up with an SMS — all in one automation. This multi-channel automation capability is unusual at Brevo’s price point.

For more complex automation needs, Brevo supports webhook triggers, API-based events, and custom conditions that give technical teams flexibility to build sophisticated flows.

Features Breakdown

Email Campaigns

Both platforms handle broadcast email campaigns well. Mailchimp offers a larger template library with more design flexibility. Brevo’s template selection is smaller but covers the major categories. Both support A/B testing for subject lines, content, and send times.

Mailchimp’s content optimizer uses AI to suggest improvements to your email copy. Brevo does not offer a comparable feature but provides send-time optimization on the Business plan.

Transactional Email

This is an area where Brevo has a clear advantage. Brevo includes a transactional email service (SMTP relay) that handles order confirmations, password resets, shipping notifications, and other triggered emails. Transactional emails use a separate sending infrastructure from marketing emails, which protects your marketing deliverability.

Mailchimp offers transactional email through its Mandrill add-on, which costs extra and requires a paid Mailchimp plan. For businesses that need both marketing and transactional email, Brevo consolidates them into one platform at a lower total cost. If transactional email is a priority, also consider specialized tools in our best transactional email guide.

SMS and Multi-Channel

Brevo was built as a multi-channel platform from the beginning. Email, SMS, WhatsApp, and live chat are all native features. SMS marketing is available on all plans with pay-as-you-go credit purchasing. WhatsApp campaigns are also available, making Brevo one of the few mid-market platforms to support this channel.

Mailchimp added SMS more recently. SMS is available on Standard and Premium plans in select countries. It works but feels like an addition rather than a core feature. There is no WhatsApp support and no live chat feature.

CRM

Both platforms include basic CRM features. Brevo’s CRM includes contact management, deal pipelines, task tracking, and company-level records — all included for free. It is not as powerful as a dedicated CRM like HubSpot or Salesforce, but for small teams that need basic deal tracking alongside email marketing, it covers the essentials without an additional subscription.

Mailchimp does not include a CRM. You can manage contacts and segments, but there is no deal pipeline or sales management feature. For CRM functionality with Mailchimp, you need a third-party integration.

Landing Pages and Forms

Mailchimp includes a landing page builder and form builder on all plans. The landing pages are customizable with a drag-and-drop editor and connect directly to your email audiences. Forms support embedded, pop-up, and inline formats.

Brevo also includes landing pages (on the Business plan) and forms on all plans. The landing page builder is functional but less flexible than Mailchimp’s. Forms support various formats including inline, pop-up, and floating widgets.

Integrations

Mailchimp leads in integrations with 300+ available connections. Its market dominance means virtually every marketing tool, CRM, e-commerce platform, and content management system offers a Mailchimp integration. Popular connections include Shopify, WooCommerce, WordPress, Salesforce, and Google Analytics.

Brevo offers 60+ native integrations plus Zapier connectivity for thousands more. Key integrations include Shopify, WooCommerce, WordPress, Prestashop, and various CRM platforms. The integration library is smaller than Mailchimp’s, but covers the most essential tools that small businesses use.

For teams that rely on specific niche tools, check whether Brevo offers a native integration before committing. Zapier can bridge most gaps, but native integrations generally work more reliably.

Deliverability

Both platforms maintain solid deliverability reputations. Brevo uses a shared IP infrastructure for smaller senders and offers dedicated IP addresses on the Business plan and above. The platform enforces list quality standards and provides deliverability statistics in the dashboard.

Mailchimp also delivers well, with dedicated IP options on Premium plans. Shared IP reputation can be an issue on lower tiers, as it depends on the sending behavior of other users on the same IP.

Both platforms support DKIM, SPF, and DMARC authentication. For most small to medium businesses, deliverability differences between the two platforms will be negligible with proper list management practices.

Who Should Choose Mailchimp?

Mailchimp is the better choice if you:

• Want the most polished email design experience with the widest template selection
• Need the broadest integration ecosystem for niche third-party tools
• Prefer a well-known platform with extensive documentation and community resources
• Have a small list (under 500 contacts) and want to start completely free
• Value content optimization tools and AI-powered suggestions

Who Should Choose Brevo?

Brevo is the stronger pick if you:

• Have a large contact list and want to pay based on emails sent, not contacts stored
• Need transactional email alongside marketing email in one platform
• Want SMS, WhatsApp, and live chat integrated with your email marketing
• Need a built-in CRM without paying for a separate subscription
• Are budget-conscious and want the most features for the lowest price

Further Reading

Still weighing your options? Our guide on how to choose an email marketing tool covers the criteria that matter most when picking a platform for your business.

Our Verdict

For budget-conscious teams and growing businesses, Brevo offers substantially more value than Mailchimp. The pricing model alone saves most businesses 40-70% compared to Mailchimp at the same list size. Add in free CRM, transactional email, SMS, WhatsApp, and live chat, and Brevo provides a multi-channel marketing platform at a fraction of Mailchimp’s cost.

Mailchimp wins on polish, template variety, and integration breadth. If your primary need is beautifully designed email newsletters and you have a small list, Mailchimp’s free plan is a fine starting point. But as your list and needs grow, Brevo’s economics and feature depth make it the smarter long-term choice for cost-conscious teams. Read our full Brevo review and Mailchimp review for more details.

Conclusion

The Brevo vs Mailchimp comparison reveals a fundamental truth about email marketing pricing: paying per contact penalizes growth, while paying per email rewards it. For businesses that plan to grow their subscriber base aggressively, Brevo’s pricing model is friendlier from day one.

Beyond pricing, Brevo’s multi-channel capabilities (email, SMS, WhatsApp, chat, CRM) make it one of the most versatile platforms at its price point. Mailchimp remains a strong platform with superior design tools and a broader ecosystem, but the cost difference is hard to ignore.

Visit our full Brevo vs Mailchimp comparison for a feature-by-feature breakdown. You can also explore Brevo alternatives and Mailchimp alternatives to see how these platforms compare against the wider market.

For more options, browse our guides to the best email marketing tools for small business and the cheapest email marketing tools.