Pricing comparison
Kit (formerly ConvertKit) vs Mailchimp: Course Creators
By Marcus Hale · Updated Oct 2026
Kit (formerly ConvertKit) is built around subscribers, tags and sequences for people who sell their own courses and digital products; Mailchimp is built around audiences and campaigns. Kit's Free plan runs to 10,000 subscribers but leaves out Visual Automations, which Creator adds at $33 for 1,000 subscribers, $75 for 5,000 and $116 for 10,000. For a course creator, Kit is the better pick. Mailchimp wins when the list is under 500 and needs an automation, when the same list also mails a shop or events, or when the first-year rate of $50 a month at 2,501-5,000 contacts is the number that decides the budget.
Who should pick which
Pick Kit when the product is yours: a course, a cohort, a template pack, a paid newsletter. Subscribers are one pool of people who carry tags (a lead-magnet tag, a bought-it tag, a cohort tag), and Visual Automations and sequences react to those tags. The Free plan lets you sell digital products and subscriptions and send unlimited broadcasts to as many as 10,000 subscribers, so a first product can launch before you pay anything. Once the welcome series and launch sequence matter, Creator adds unlimited Visual Automations, unlimited sequences, subject-line A/B tests, Kit branding removal and 24/7 email and chat support.
Pick Mailchimp when the list is a mailing list for something else, such as a shop, a studio or an events business. Its pricing page names Shopify, WooCommerce, Square, Wix, WordPress and Canva among its integrations, Standard can send custom-coded email templates, and Standard lists 5 seats. It is also the cheaper choice for the first twelve months once the list passes 2,500 contacts, because the half-price offer shows $50, $67.50 or $155 a month at the bands compared below.
Decision snapshot
| Area | ConvertKit | Mailchimp |
|---|---|---|
| Free plan | Free to 10,000 subscribers: unlimited landing pages, forms and broadcasts, tagging and segmentation, digital products and subscriptions; no Visual Automations or sequences | 1 audience, 250 contacts, 500 sends a month (250 a day) |
| Entry price | Creator $33 a month at 1,000 subscribers, billed yearly ($390 a year) | Essentials from $13, Standard from $20 at 500 contacts |
| Price at 5,000 | Creator $75 a month, billed yearly | Standard $100 a month, shown as $50 for the first 12 months |
| Price at 10,000 | Creator $116 a month, billed yearly; Free is still $0 without automations | Standard $135 a month, shown as $67.50 for the first 12 months |
| Price at 25,000 | Creator $166 a month | Standard $310 a month at 20,001-25,000 contacts, shown as $155 for the first 12 months |
| Automation | Unlimited Visual Automations and email sequences from Creator | Marketing automation, with sends capped at 12x contacts on Standard |
| Built around | Subscribers who carry tags, plus forms, landing pages, sequences and digital product sales | Audiences and campaigns, with custom-coded templates and store, site and design integrations |
Monthly price at 1,000, 5,000, 10,000 and 25,000 contacts
Kit prices by subscriber count on a slider and shows its yearly-billing rate; Mailchimp prices by contact band and shows a 12-month half-price offer on each Standard band. The table lines up the nearest bands from Kit's pricing page and Mailchimp's pricing page, read on 2026-10-07. Mailchimp's entry selector is 500 contacts and Kit's opens at 1,000 subscribers, so the first row compares neighbours, not twins.
| Size | Kit Free | Kit Creator, billed yearly | Mailchimp Standard | Mailchimp first-year rate |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Entry (Kit 1,000 subscribers, Mailchimp 500 contacts) | $0, no Visual Automations | $33 | $20 | not shown |
| 5,000 (Mailchimp band 2,501-5,000) | $0 | $75 | $100 | $50 |
| 10,000 (Mailchimp band 5,001-10,000) | $0, the Free ceiling | $116 | $135 | $67.50 |
| 25,000 (Mailchimp band 20,001-25,000) | above the 10,000 limit | $166 | $310 | $155 |
Kit's Pro plan is quoted at $66 a month for 1,000 subscribers, shown as $50 for the first year, then $158 at 10,000 and $233 at 25,000. It adds Subscriber Signals, unlimited users, deliverability reporting and a newsletter referral system. Mailchimp's top plan, Premium, starts at $350 a month at the entry selector and lists unlimited seats.
What the same sizes cost over one and two years
| Size | Kit Creator, one year | Mailchimp, year one | Mailchimp, year two | Kit, two years | Mailchimp, two years |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 5,000 | $75 x 12 = $900 | $50 x 12 = $600 | $100 x 12 = $1,200 | $1,800 | $1,800 |
| 10,000 | $116 x 12 = $1,392 | $67.50 x 12 = $810 | $135 x 12 = $1,620 | $2,784 | $2,430 |
| 25,000 | $166 x 12 = $1,992 | $155 x 12 = $1,860 | $310 x 12 = $3,720 | $3,984 | $5,580 |
Three things stand out. At 5,000 subscribers Mailchimp is $300 cheaper in the first year and Kit is $300 cheaper in the second, so across two years the bills are identical. At 10,000 Mailchimp stays ahead for two years, by $354, and Kit pulls ahead from year three at $228 a year. At 25,000 Kit costs $132 more in year one and $1,728 less in year two. The half-price offer is a first-year price, so any plan longer than twelve months should be built on the year-two column. Kit's figures are its yearly-billing rates, which means $390 paid up front for the year at 1,000 subscribers, whereas Mailchimp's are monthly prices.
What each free plan and each paid rung includes
Kit has three rungs. Free covers up to 10,000 subscribers with unlimited landing pages and forms, unlimited email broadcasts, audience tagging and segmentation, and the ability to sell digital products and subscriptions. Creator adds unlimited Visual Automations, unlimited email sequences, A/B-tested subject lines, removal of Kit branding, and 24/7 email and chat support; its feature list also names SMS marketing. Pro adds Subscriber Signals, unlimited users, deliverability reporting and the newsletter referral system. The line that matters for a course creator is between Free and Creator: Free can run a launch as a series of broadcasts you schedule by hand, and Creator is where a purchase tag can stop the sales emails automatically.
Mailchimp's rungs are narrower at the bottom and wider at the top. Free is one seat, one audience, 250 contacts and 500 sends a month with no more than 250 in a day, which is two emails to a full list. Essentials from $13 allows 3 seats and sends of 10x your contact count, and can create custom-coded templates but not send them. Standard from $20 at 500 contacts allows 5 seats, 12x sends, and sending custom-coded templates. Premium from $350 allows unlimited seats and 15x sends.
Send allowances in a launch month
Kit's pricing page lists unlimited email broadcasts and unlimited sequences, with no send multiple attached to the subscriber count. Mailchimp's allowance is a multiple: 12x contacts on Standard, which is 60,000 sends at 5,000 contacts. A launch month for a 5,000-person list with four weekly newsletters (4 x 5,000 = 20,000 sends) and one email a day for 14 days to everyone (14 x 5,000 = 70,000) comes to 90,000 sends, which is 18 emails per person. That is above the 60,000 on Mailchimp Standard at 2,501-5,000 contacts. To stay inside it you either move to the 5,001-10,000 band at $135 for 120,000 sends or you mail only the people who have not bought, which drops the number as buyers leave the sequence. On Kit Creator at $75, the same month has no send ceiling to plan around. Most creators never come near these totals, but anyone running a long daily launch to a segmented list should do this multiplication before picking a plan.
Tags and subscribers against audiences
Kit keeps one record per subscriber and attaches tags as they sign up through a form, buy a product or click a link; sequences and Visual Automations then branch on those tags. Mailchimp's Free plan lists one audience, and on paid plans the price follows the contact count, so keep prospects and buyers as tags inside a single audience rather than as separate audiences, or the same person can be counted twice. The practical difference for a course seller is the buyer: Kit sells digital products and subscriptions on the same platform that holds the subscriber, so the sale and the sequence share one record. With Mailchimp the sale happens in a separate checkout, and the buyer tag reaches Mailchimp only through the integration you connect, so test that a purchase really removes someone from the sales emails before launch day.
Which subscriber list suits which tool
400 subscribers and a newsletter only: Kit Free
If all you send is a weekly note and you have no automation to build, Kit Free costs nothing and carries the list to 10,000 subscribers. Mailchimp Free would carry 250 of the 400 and send two emails a month in total.
400 subscribers who need a welcome series: Mailchimp
Automations and sequences are a Creator feature on Kit, and its page quotes Creator from 1,000 subscribers at $33. Mailchimp Essentials at $13 or Standard at $20 for 500 contacts undercuts that by $13 to $20 a month, which is $156 to $240 a year, until the list passes 500. The gap closes as you grow, so choose by where the list will be in a year, not where it is today.
1,000 to 5,000 subscribers selling a course: Kit Creator
This is the range Kit is priced for: $33 at 1,000 subscribers and $75 at 5,000. A lead magnet form tags subscribers, the welcome sequence runs on its own, the launch sequence reads the tags, and the product is sold on the same platform. At 5,000 the first-year Mailchimp offer is $25 a month lower, but the same two-year total shows there is no lasting saving, and you would be buying a checkout elsewhere.
10,000 subscribers, mostly broadcasts: Kit Free
A creator who emails 10,000 people a newsletter and sells through links in it pays $0 on Kit Free, against $135 a month ($1,620 a year) on Mailchimp Standard. Free is a hard ceiling at 10,000 subscribers, and on a paid plan the next point quoted is $166 a month at 25,000, so plan the upgrade before a launch pushes you over.
A shop, studio or events business: Mailchimp
When the list buys tickets, workbooks or branded items, Mailchimp's named connections to Shopify, WooCommerce, Square, Wix and WordPress, plus Canva for design, are the reason to stay. Kit's pricing page lists subscriber tagging and digital products among its plan features, not store integrations, so a business whose sales happen in a shop should start from Mailchimp's list.
A creator with an assistant and a designer: check seats
Mailchimp Standard lists 5 seats and Essentials 3. Kit lists unlimited users as a Pro feature, and Pro is $158 a month at 10,000 subscribers. A solo creator can ignore all of this; a three-person team should price Mailchimp Standard against Kit Pro before deciding.
Moving between Mailchimp and Kit
| Piece | Mailchimp to Kit | Kit to Mailchimp |
|---|---|---|
| Subscribers and tags | Export the audience as a CSV, with tags included, and import into Kit; decide tag names before importing so they read the way you want them in Kit | Export subscribers with their tags and import into one Mailchimp audience, not several |
| Segments | Mailchimp segments are saved rules, so they are rebuilt in Kit as segments over tags | Kit segments become Mailchimp segments over tags and fields |
| Automations | Journeys are rebuilt as Visual Automations and sequences, which need the Creator plan | Visual Automations and sequences are rebuilt as journeys; every branch is re-created by hand |
| Forms and landing pages | Rebuilt in Kit, where both are unlimited on Free; embed code on your site changes | Rebuilt in Mailchimp; embed code on your site changes |
| Products you sell | Needs a new checkout for anything sold outside Kit | Products sold through Kit stay tied to it, so move after the last open cohort has finished paying |
| Opt-outs | Unsubscribed and cleaned contacts need their own export. Bring them into the new account as unsubscribed before the first broadcast, or a list built from active subscribers alone will email people who opted out. | |
Kit's pricing page lists free migrations with its 14-day trial and says no credit card is required, so a trial is a cheap way to rebuild the welcome series and test one purchase end to end before cancelling Mailchimp. Cancel Mailchimp only after the last subscriber has left its final sequence.
Where Kit-to-Mailchimp comparisons go wrong
- Reading Kit Free as including automation. Visual Automations and sequences start on Creator, so a welcome series on the free plan does not exist; the free plan sends broadcasts, hosts forms and landing pages, and sells products.
- Putting Kit's $33 next to Mailchimp's $20 as if they were the same list. Kit's Creator is quoted at 1,000 subscribers and Mailchimp's $20 is at 500 contacts, so the real gap depends on your size.
- Forgetting that Kit's Creator prices are yearly-billing rates. $33 a month at 1,000 subscribers is $390 charged for the year, which is a cash-flow event, not a monthly debit.
- Calling Mailchimp the cheaper tool because of year one. At 5,000 subscribers its half-price year sits $300 below Kit Creator, and its second year sits $300 above it.
- Treating Kit Pro's $50 as its price. Pro is quoted at $66 for 1,000 subscribers, and $50 is the first-year offer shown on the page.
- Sending branded emails from the free plan by accident. Creator lists removal of Kit branding as a feature, so the free plan's emails carry it.
- Splitting buyers and prospects into separate Mailchimp audiences. Keep them as tags in one audience so a person is one contact on the bill.
Three questions that settle it
- Do you sell your own product to this list? A course, a cohort, a template pack or a paid newsletter points to Kit, which lists digital products and subscriptions on its Free plan and keeps the buyer in the same subscriber record. If what you mail about is sold somewhere else, in a shop, at an event or through a booking system, Mailchimp's integrations list is the better starting point.
- Do you need an automation, and how large is the list? No automation and a list up to 10,000 means Kit Free at $0. An automation on a list under 500 means Mailchimp from $13 or $20. An automation on a list from 1,000 to 25,000 means Kit Creator at $33 to $166 against Mailchimp Standard at $20 to $310, where the first-year offer decides the first twelve months and the second-year column decides the rest.
- How long will you stay? At 5,000 subscribers the two cost the same over 24 months. At 25,000 Kit is cheaper by $1,596 over two years ($5,580 against $3,984). If you will change tools again inside a year, the first-year column is the real comparison; if not, use the second.
If the answer to the first is yes and the list is above 1,000, start on Kit's 14-day trial and rebuild only the welcome series and the launch sequence. If it is no, compare Mailchimp Standard with the size and schedule you actually have.
Verdict: Kit for course creators, Mailchimp for shops and tiny lists
For the course creators, coaches and consultants this site is written for, Kit is the better platform. Its Free plan carries a list to 10,000 subscribers and sells digital products; Creator at $33 for 1,000 subscribers, $75 for 5,000 and $116 for 10,000 adds the Visual Automations and sequences that a welcome series and a launch need; and the subscriber, the tags and the sale sit in one place. Over two years at 5,000 subscribers it costs $1,800, the same as Mailchimp's $600 first year and $1,200 second year, and from year three it is cheaper at every size compared above.
Mailchimp is the right call when the list is under 500 and needs one automation (from $13 or $20 a month), when the same list also mails a shop or events through Shopify, WooCommerce, Square, Wix or WordPress, when three to five people need seats, or when the first-year offer of $50 at 2,501-5,000 contacts and $67.50 at 5,001-10,000 suits a short project. Prices are from kit.com/pricing and mailchimp.com/pricing.
Related comparisons
If you are building a course business, the online-course automation list and the creator automation guide go further than this pair; the alternatives hub covers other options.
- Brevo vs Mailchimp: Mailchimp against a tool with a 300-a-day free plan and send-based pricing, for big lists that are mailed lightly.
- GetResponse vs Mailchimp: Mailchimp against a plan ladder whose Creator tier includes webinars and a course builder.
- Mailchimp vs ActiveCampaign: Mailchimp priced against a tag-and-deal platform, for consultants who track inquiries to booked calls.
- Kit alternatives: Where to look if Kit (formerly ConvertKit) stops fitting.
- Mailchimp alternatives: Where to look if Mailchimp stops fitting.
Frequently asked questions
Is Kit's free plan really free up to 10,000 subscribers?
Kit's pricing page says Free covers up to 10,000 subscribers, with unlimited landing pages, forms and email broadcasts, audience tagging and segmentation, and the ability to sell digital products and subscriptions. Visual Automations and email sequences begin on the Creator plan, so on Free you can send a newsletter to all 10,000 people but cannot run an automated welcome series. Mailchimp's Free plan stops at 250 contacts and 500 sends a month.
What does Kit cost at 5,000 and 10,000 subscribers?
Kit's pricing page quotes Creator at $75 a month for 5,000 subscribers and $116 a month for 10,000, both billed yearly. Pro is $158 a month at 10,000. Over a year Creator comes to $900 at 5,000 subscribers (75 x 12) and $1,392 at 10,000 (116 x 12).
Is Mailchimp cheaper than Kit in the first year?
At the sizes where Mailchimp shows its half-price offer, yes. Mailchimp Standard reads $50 a month at 2,501-5,000 contacts, against $75 for Kit Creator at 5,000 subscribers, which saves $300 over 12 months. From month 13 Mailchimp Standard reads $100 and Kit is $300 a year cheaper, so over 24 months the two cost the same at 5,000: $1,800 each.
Can I sell a course or digital product from Kit?
Kit lists "sell digital products & subscriptions" on its Free plan. Mailchimp's pricing page lists store integrations such as Shopify, WooCommerce, Square and Wix, but not digital-product or subscription selling as a feature of its own, so a course creator on Mailchimp normally adds a separate checkout or course platform.
When is Mailchimp the better choice?
In three cases: a list under 500 that needs one basic automation (Standard from $20, while Kit quotes Creator from 1,000 subscribers at $33), a business that also mails a shop or events and wants Shopify, WooCommerce, Square or WordPress connections, and a team that needs seats, since Mailchimp Standard lists 5 and Kit lists unlimited users only on Pro.
Will Kit move my list from Mailchimp for me?
Kit's pricing page lists free migrations alongside its 14-day free trial, which needs no credit card. The page does not spell out what the service covers, so plan on rebuilding automations by hand either way; subscribers and tags travel as a CSV export from Mailchimp.