Email marketing Recommended

Brevo

The budget pick when you need email plus a real CRM under one bill.

Brevo wins on two structural advantages. First, it bills by emails sent, so a large but dormant list does not bleed money. Second, the CRM is genuinely free with unlimited contacts, which closes the gap most solopreneurs paper over with a spreadsheet. The trade is polish: the interface and automation builder are functional but lag behind MailerLite and ActiveCampaign.

4.0 / 5

Get Started →

Starting price: Free / $25+/mo
Free trial: Free plan
Category: Email marketing
Used by: 500K+ accounts

Reviewed by Sara Mitchell , Marketing Analyst · April 2026

On this page

Scored breakdown

Tested over April 2026. Methodology →

Dimension Score Verdict

Features 4.1 Email, SMS, free CRM, transactional API, basic landing pages.

Usability 3.9 Functional. Some friction in the workflow builder.

Pricing 4.6 $25/mo for 20K emails. CRM is free. Pay by sends, not list size.

Deliverability 3.7 Acceptable. Mixed reviews on cold lists. Hygiene matters.

Automation depth 3.7 Basic visual builder. Workflows are linear with limited branching.

Support 3.6 Chat on paid plans. Quality varies.

Who should use Brevo?

Best for

Solopreneurs sitting on a large dormant list who are getting punished by per-contact pricing on Mailchimp
Service businesses (coaches, consultants, freelancers) who need email plus a real CRM but cannot justify HubSpot
Anyone needing transactional email API alongside marketing email under one vendor (replaces SendGrid + Mailchimp)
Solo operators who want to send SMS campaigns without adding a second tool

Skip if

You run a Shopify ecommerce store. Klaviyo or Omnisend are built for that workflow.
You need top-tier deliverability and your list is cold or unengaged. Use GetResponse or ActiveCampaign.
You want a beautiful editor and modern templates. Use MailerLite.
You need deep multi-branch automation or lead scoring. Use ActiveCampaign.

Brevo pricing

Free

$0/mo

Unlimited contacts, 300 emails/day

Drag-and-drop editor
Free CRM (unlimited contacts)
Transactional email API
Brevo branding on emails
Basic templates

Service businesses validating a CRM workflow

Get Started →

Most popular

Starter

$25/mo

20,000 emails per month

No daily sending cap
Brevo branding removed
Email support
Basic automation
20K emails/month

Solopreneurs with a 5K-25K list and moderate send frequency

Get Started →

Business

$65/mo

Visual workflow + A/B testing

Visual automation builder
A/B testing
Predictive sending
Multi-user (3 seats)
Phone support

Small teams with real automation requirements

Get Started →

On top of plan price

SMS credits:SMS is pay-as-you-go. US SMS runs roughly $0.013 per message as of May 2026, billed separately from email plan.
Daily send cap on Free:300 emails/day cap is a hard ceiling. A 1,000-subscriber send blows through it instantly. Plan accordingly.

Pros & cons at a glance

What works

Pay-by-sends pricing is uniquely friendly to solopreneurs with large dormant lists
Free CRM is genuine, unlimited contacts, no upgrade gate
Email + SMS + transactional API consolidates 3 vendors into 1 bill
Free plan supports unlimited contacts (rare in the category)

What doesn't

Editor and workflow builder feel dated next to MailerLite or ActiveCampaign
Deliverability on cold lists is weaker than GetResponse
Automation depth is limited; complex flows hit the ceiling fast
Support quality is inconsistent compared to GetResponse 24/7 chat

Frequently asked questions

How is Brevo's pricing actually different from Mailchimp's?: Mailchimp charges by total contacts in your audience. Brevo charges by emails sent per month with unlimited contacts. If your list is large but you send infrequently, or if you have many cold contacts you cannot bring yourself to delete, Brevo is dramatically cheaper.
Is Brevo's free CRM actually usable, or a teaser?: It is genuine and unlimited on contacts. Pipeline view, deal tracking, contact notes, and email-to-deal logging are all there. The limits are on advanced features like reporting dashboards and multi-pipeline support, which require paid CRM tiers.
Can I use Brevo just for transactional email and skip SendGrid?: Yes. The SMTP relay and API support transactional sending. Free tier covers 300 transactional emails per day. Paid plans scale to millions per month. Pricing is competitive with SendGrid for high volume.
Should I migrate from Mailchimp to Brevo?: Migrate if your monthly Mailchimp bill is climbing primarily because of contact count rather than active senders. Run the comparison: total contacts vs monthly sends. If sends are less than 4x your contact count, Brevo will be cheaper. Otherwise, MailerLite or GetResponse may be a better fit.
Is Brevo good for ecommerce?: Marginal. Basic abandoned-cart and order-confirmation flows work, but Klaviyo and Omnisend have product-feed-driven flows, predictive segments, and Shopify-native data syncs that Brevo lacks. Use Brevo only if budget forces the choice.

The bottom line

Brevo is the answer when the structural pricing of competitors is what is hurting you. A solopreneur with 30,000 mostly-cold subscribers pays Mailchimp $250+/mo and Brevo about $35/mo for the same volume of monthly sends. Add the free CRM and that solopreneur replaces a $30/mo Pipedrive subscription too. For the $50/mo stack tier, Brevo is the choice when CRM matters more than editor polish. For pure newsletter writing, MailerLite is friendlier.

4.0 / 5 our rating for Brevo

Get Started →