ActiveCampaign Email Marketing Software Review: Plans, Send Limits and 12-Month Cost

ActiveCampaign email marketing software costs $180 a year on Starter at 1,000 contacts, per ActiveCampaign’s pricing page. Plus costs $2,268 a year at 10,000 contacts and $7,308 at 50,000.

Each price comes with a monthly send cap. PCMag puts it at 10 times your list size on Starter and Plus. Past the cap, each email costs $0.005, and once the overage passes 3 times the cap, sending locks until the next month.

ActiveCampaign Fits Stores That Will Build and Test Automations

Verdict: ActiveCampaign is an email platform built around automation. It suits stores that plan to build multi-step email sequences and test them against each other.

The flaw, with its fix: Since 3 November 2025, new accounts also pay for unsubscribed, bounced and unconfirmed contacts, according to Emailtooltester and Venture Harbour. In Venture Harbour’s worked example, counting all 11,500 contacts moves Plus from $189 to $389 a month. That adds $2,400 a year.

The fix, per Venture Harbour: strip unsubscribes, bounces and anyone who hasn’t engaged in a year before you import, and keep archiving dead contacts after that. Keep your own copy of the unsubscribe list, so those people never get re-imported and emailed.

Strengths: The builder can split-test whole sequences, not just single emails. Plus has unlimited actions per automation, while Starter stops at 5, per Emailtooltester. Moving your account over is free. At 50,000 contacts, Plus costs less than Klaviyo Email.

Skip it if the lowest price at 10,000 contacts is your main test. Buy Omnisend Standard or MailerLite Comfort instead (prices below).

How we evaluated: Prices are 12-month totals taken from each vendor’s pricing page as recorded in MarketingRating’s pricing dataset on 2026-10-20. Send rules come from PCMag, and feature claims from Venture Harbour, Emailtooltester and Experte. The overage and lock figures are our own arithmetic from those inputs.

Its Builder Can Split-Test Whole Email Sequences, Not Just Subject Lines

The automation builder is the reason to pay ActiveCampaign’s higher price. Venture Harbour counts more than 135 triggers and more than 1,000 pre-built recipes. A trigger is the event that starts an automation, such as a new sign-up. A recipe is a ready-made automation you copy and edit instead of starting from scratch.

The builder can also test whole paths. You can run two complete versions of a sequence against each other, say a short welcome series against a longer one, and keep the winner. Venture Harbour calls ActiveCampaign the only platform it has used that split-tests entire automation paths.

Store data sits behind a plan gate. Emailtooltester reports that purchase tracking for Shopify, BigCommerce and WooCommerce is only on higher plans. If you want emails that react to what a customer bought, price a tier above Starter before you commit.

If you also want those contact records to drive sales follow-up in a customer relationship management (CRM) system, see CRM marketing platforms: 7 checks before you pay.

Starter Through Pro Costs $180 to $11,628 a Year Before Overage

Every plan sets your monthly email cap as a multiple of your list size. PCMag puts that cap at 10 times your list on Starter and Plus. ActiveCampaign’s pricing page lists Pro at 120,000 emails a month for 10,000 contacts, which is the 12x multiplier PCMag gives for that plan. Enterprise, not in the table, runs from $1,740 a year at 1,000 contacts to $14,028 at 50,000, per the same page.

Plan and list size	12 months, billed yearly	Monthly email cap	One extra full-list send	Overage at 3x the cap
Starter, 1,000	$180.00	10,000	$5.00	$150.00
Starter, 10,000	$1,788.00	100,000	$50.00	$1,500.00
Starter, 50,000	Not offered	—	—	—
Plus, 1,000	$588.00	10,000	$5.00	$150.00
Plus, 10,000	$2,268.00	100,000	$50.00	$1,500.00
Plus, 50,000	$7,308.00	500,000	$250.00	$7,500.00
Pro, 1,000	$948.00	12,000	$5.00	$180.00
Pro, 10,000	$4,500.00	120,000	$50.00	$1,800.00
Pro, 50,000	$11,628.00	600,000	$250.00	$9,000.00

One extra campaign to 10,000 contacts = 10,000 x $0.005 = $50, on top of Plus at $2,268 a year (PCMag’s overage rate, ActiveCampaign’s pricing page).

Starter has no 50,000 row because ActiveCampaign sells it only on plans of 25,000 contacts or fewer, per its pricing page. At 1,000 contacts, Plus costs more than 3 times as much as Starter, $408 a year more. Plus unlocks SMS (text message marketing), per Experte, and the texts cost extra as an add-on, per Venture Harbour.

Overage Can Add $1,500 in One Month at 10k Before Sending Locks

You can send past the cap, but you pay for it. PCMag puts the fee at $0.005 for each extra email. If your overage goes past three times your cap, ActiveCampaign blocks sending until the next month, PCMag reports.

Here is what that means on Plus at 10,000 contacts. The 100,000-email cap covers 10 campaigns to your full list. Campaigns 11 through 40 cost $50 each. Those 30 extra sends add $1,500.

A 41st would push the overage past three times the cap and set off the lock.

The ceiling grows with the list. At 50,000 contacts on Plus, overage at the lock line = 1,500,000 x $0.005 = $7,500. That is more than the plan’s whole yearly price.

If you send to 10,000 contacts on Plus, keep full-list campaigns to 10 a month. Send the rest to segments, meaning smaller groups picked by what they did, so each email reaches fewer people.

Plus Costs $468 to $684 More Than Three Rivals at 10k, but Beats Klaviyo at 50k

At 10,000 contacts, Plus costs $2,268 a year, per ActiveCampaign’s pricing page. That makes it the most expensive plan in this table.

Plan at 10,000 contacts	12-month cost	Per contact per year	Plus costs more by
ActiveCampaign Plus	$2,268.00	$0.2268	—
ActiveCampaign Starter	$1,788.00	$0.1788	$480.00
Klaviyo Email	$1,800.00	$0.1800	$468.00
Mailchimp Standard	$1,620.00	$0.1620	$648.00
Omnisend Standard	$1,584.00	$0.1584	$684.00
MailerLite Comfort	$961.20	$0.09612	$1,306.80

The prices come from the Klaviyo, Mailchimp, Omnisend and MailerLite pricing pages, read 2026-10-20. The Klaviyo and Mailchimp figures are 12 months of monthly billing; the ActiveCampaign and MailerLite figures are billed yearly.

Omnisend’s price includes 120,000 emails a month, per its pricing page. That is 20,000 more than Plus allows at the same list size. Omnisend also says “Unsubscribed contacts aren’t billed,” so on a new ActiveCampaign account the gap widens as unsubscribes pile up.

MailerLite Comfort includes 100,000 a month, per MailerLite’s pricing page. So it matches Plus’s cap for less than half the price.

Starter at 10,000 contacts comes in $12 under Klaviyo Email, but it caps each automation at 5 actions, per Emailtooltester.

At 50,000 contacts the order changes. Plus costs $7,308, which is $1,332 a year less than Klaviyo Email at $8,640, per Klaviyo’s pricing page. Mailchimp Standard stays cheaper at $5,400 (Mailchimp’s pricing page). That leaves Plus $1,908 a year behind it.

Free Migration Helps; Contact Billing and Plan Gates Raise the Bill

ActiveCampaign will move your account over from another email platform for free, Emailtooltester reports.

Where it falls short, each with its fix:

1. Contact billing. On new accounts, dead contacts count toward your price. Clean the list before you import it.
2. The 10k price gap. If you won’t use path testing, MailerLite Comfort costs the least of the four rivals priced above: $961.20 a year for the same 100,000-email cap.
3. The lock. Plan your campaign calendar against the monthly cap, not just the yearly price.

If $180 a year is more than a 1,000-contact store wants to spend, compare it with a small business marketing platform built from a $0 five-tool stack.

Next step: Strip unsubscribes and bounces, count what’s left, and find that list size in the cost table above. Then compare that cost with other email tools in MarketingRating’s reviews.

Next step: read more in Reviews on MarketingRating, or check the figures in Email marketing pricing: the true 12-month cost at 1,000, 10,000 and 50,000 contacts.

FAQ: ActiveCampaign for Shopify, BigCommerce and WooCommerce Stores

Does ActiveCampaign track Shopify, BigCommerce and WooCommerce purchases?

Yes, but only on higher plans, per Emailtooltester. Confirm the tier before you buy Starter for store data.

Which plan does a store need for text messages?

Plus or above, per Experte. Plus unlocks SMS, and the texts themselves cost extra.

Which tool costs least at 10,000 contacts?

Of the plans priced here, MailerLite Comfort is cheapest at $961.20 a year, per MailerLite’s pricing page. Among Klaviyo, Mailchimp and Omnisend, Omnisend Standard is lowest.