Email marketing has splintered. Mailchimp went from beloved indie tool to Intuit-owned platform trying to be everything. ConvertKit (now Kit) became the creator economy's go-to. Beehiiv exploded onto the scene as the newsletter-first platform built by ex-Morning Brew team. They're all "email marketing" but they serve very different people.
The Short Answer
Running a newsletter and want growth tools built in? Beehiiv. Creator selling digital products with email sequences? ConvertKit. Small business needing marketing automation with landing pages, ads, and CRM? Mailchimp.
Pricing
Mailchimp
- Free: 500 contacts, 1,000 sends/mo
- Essentials: from $13/month
- Standard: from $20/month
- Premium: from $350/month
- Prices scale steeply with contacts
ConvertKit (Kit)
- Newsletter: free up to 10K subs
- Creator: from $25/month
- Creator Pro: from $50/month
- Pricing based on subscriber count
- Free tier is genuinely generous
Beehiiv
- Launch: free up to 2,500 subs
- Scale: $39/month (was $49)
- Max: $99/month
- Enterprise: custom pricing
- Best value for newsletter growth
Value Assessment
- At 5K subs: Mailchimp ~$75, Kit ~$66, Beehiiv $39
- At 25K subs: Mailchimp ~$260, Kit ~$166, Beehiiv $99
- Mailchimp gets expensive fast
- Beehiiv is cheapest at scale
- Kit is mid-range but includes commerce
Newsletter & Writing Experience
Beehiiv was built for newsletters and it shows. The editor is clean, fast, and designed for long-form writing. Built-in web hosting means every email is also a blog post with its own URL. SEO optimization, custom domains, and a reading experience that rivals Substack. If writing newsletters is your primary use case, Beehiiv's editor is the best of the three.
ConvertKit takes a minimalist approach to email design. Plain-text-looking emails that feel personal — because that's what converts for creators. The editor is simple and intentionally limited. If you want beautiful HTML templates, look elsewhere. If you want emails that feel like they're from a person, not a brand, ConvertKit nails it.
Mailchimp has the most robust email builder with drag-and-drop templates, HTML editing, and a template library. Great for brand-heavy emails with images, buttons, and complex layouts. But the editor has gotten bloated, and the UI is cluttered compared to the competition.
Growth & Audience Building
Beehiiv is the clear winner for newsletter growth. Built-in referral program (like Morning Brew's), recommendation network (newsletters recommend each other), boosts (paid subscriber acquisition), and ad network (monetize through ads). No other platform offers this suite of growth tools natively.
ConvertKit has a creator network for cross-promotion and solid landing page/form builders. The recommendation feature helps newsletters grow each other's audiences. Commerce features (sell digital products directly) add a monetization angle.
Mailchimp focuses on traditional marketing growth — landing pages, social ads integration, postcards, and audience segmentation. Better for businesses running multi-channel marketing than for pure newsletter growth.
Automation & Sequences
ConvertKit has the best visual automation builder for creators. Sequences (drip emails), conditional logic, tagging, and subscriber scoring. You can build sophisticated funnels that trigger based on purchases, link clicks, or custom events. For selling digital products through email, it's unmatched.
Mailchimp has powerful automation with customer journeys, A/B testing, send-time optimization, and behavioral triggers. It's more marketing-automation-platform than email-tool at this point. Powerful, but complex.
Beehiiv has basic automations — welcome sequences, drip campaigns, and segment-based sends. It's improving but can't match ConvertKit or Mailchimp for complex automation workflows. This is its biggest gap.
Monetization
Beehiiv offers the most monetization options for newsletter creators: built-in ad network (sell sponsorship space), premium subscriptions (paywalled content), and boosts (get paid when other newsletters recommend you). You can genuinely build a business on Beehiiv's monetization tools alone.
ConvertKit lets you sell digital products (courses, ebooks, templates) and paid newsletter subscriptions directly. The commerce features are well-integrated with the email experience. Creator-focused monetization done right.
Mailchimp has a basic online store and integrations with Shopify, WooCommerce, etc. Less about direct monetization and more about supporting existing e-commerce businesses.
Deliverability
All three have solid deliverability, but ConvertKit and Beehiiv tend to edge out Mailchimp in inbox placement rates. Mailchimp's massive user base (including some spammy senders) can affect shared IP reputation. ConvertKit's focus on engaged, opted-in audiences helps their deliverability. Beehiiv's newer infrastructure and focus on quality newsletters also contributes to strong inbox rates.
Our Verdict
For newsletter creators focused on growth: Beehiiv. The built-in growth tools (referrals, recommendations, boosts) and monetization options make it the best platform for building a newsletter business. The free tier gets you started, and the pricing stays reasonable as you scale.
For creators selling digital products: ConvertKit. The automation sequences and commerce features make it perfect for building funnels that sell courses, coaching, and digital downloads.
For small businesses needing marketing automation: Mailchimp. If you need landing pages, social ads, postcards, and CRM alongside email, Mailchimp's breadth still justifies its price for businesses (not creators).