If you are a new creator picking between Kit and MailerLite in 2026, the decision is simpler than most comparison articles make it. It comes down to one number and one question.
The number: Kit lets you keep up to 10,000 subscribers for free. MailerLite, after a mid-2026 change, now caps its free plan at 250 subscribers and 2,500 emails a month. If "free for as long as possible" is your priority, that gap is not close.
The question: what happens when you start paying? Here MailerLite flips the table. Its paid plans start around $10/month, while Kit's cheapest paid tier jumped to $39/month in late 2025. So the honest bottom line looks like this:
- Pick Kit if you want to build a large list without paying for a long time, or if you are a creator who plans to sell paid newsletters, digital products, or subscriptions.
- Pick MailerLite if you have a small list, want the lowest monthly bill once you outgrow free, and care about polished landing pages, websites, and design.
Both are genuinely good tools. Neither is a trap. Below is the detail so you can match the tool to your actual situation.
Quick comparison
| Kit (ConvertKit) | MailerLite | |
|---|---|---|
| Free tier | Up to 10,000 subscribers, unlimited emails | 250 subscribers, 2,500 emails/month |
| Free tier limits | 1 automation, 1 email sequence, Kit branding, limited integrations | 3 automations, 1 landing page, 1 website, MailerLite branding |
| Entry paid price | Creator: $39/mo (~$33/mo annual) at 1,000 subs | Growing Business: ~$15/mo at 1,000 subs (unlimited emails) |
| Top consumer plan | Creator Pro: $79/mo (~$66/mo annual) at 1,000 subs | Advanced: ~$18/mo at 1,000 subs |
| Paid newsletters | Yes, built in (3.5% + $0.30 fee; waived on Creator Pro) | No native paid-subscription product |
| Key strength | Huge free list cap; creator monetization | Low price; landing pages, websites, design |
| Best for | Creators growing an audience and selling to it | Small businesses and budget-conscious list owners |
Prices scale with subscriber count on both platforms. The figures above are the entry points; expect them to rise as your list grows.
Kit (formerly ConvertKit)
Kit rebranded from ConvertKit and has doubled down on serving creators — writers, YouTubers, podcasters, course sellers — rather than generic small businesses. That focus shows up in what it does well.
The free tier is the headline. You can hold up to 10,000 subscribers and send unlimited emails without paying a cent. You also get unlimited forms and landing pages. For someone building an audience from zero, this is the most generous runway in the mainstream market. You can grow to a serious list size before money ever changes hands.
Monetization is built in. Kit lets you run paid newsletters and sell digital products directly, with checkout handled through the platform. That is a real structural advantage over MailerLite, which has no equivalent native paid-subscription product. If your plan is to eventually charge readers, starting on Kit means you will not have to migrate or bolt on a separate tool later.
Deliverability and creator tooling are strong. Kit has a good reputation for landing in inboxes, and its automation and tagging model (subscribers are tagged rather than stuffed into rigid lists) is flexible once you learn it. Creator Pro adds advanced deliverability reporting, subscriber engagement scoring, a newsletter referral system, and unlimited team users.
The honest weaknesses:
- The free plan is deliberately thin on features. You get only one automation and one email sequence, integrations are limited, and Kit branding sits on every email. The 10,000-subscriber cap is real, but the free plan is built to make you feel the ceiling on functionality well before you hit the subscriber ceiling.
- Paid plans are expensive and got more so. In late 2025 Kit raised prices: the Creator plan moved from $29 to $39/month and Creator Pro from $59 to $79/month (at the 1,000-subscriber tier; annual billing trims these to roughly $33 and $66). For a 1,000-subscriber creator, Kit's entry paid plan costs more than double MailerLite's.
- Transaction fees on sales. Paid newsletters and products carry a 3.5% + $0.30 fee (Kit's cut plus Stripe processing). Creator Pro waives Kit's portion, but you are then paying $79/month for the privilege — only worth it at real sales volume.
Kit makes sense if you value the huge free list cap and expect to monetize your audience. It is a worse deal if you just want cheap, functional email for a small list.
MailerLite
MailerLite has long been the value pick in email marketing, and on price it still is. It is aimed more broadly at small businesses, bloggers, and creators who want clean design without a steep learning curve.
It is cheap once you pay. The Growing Business plan starts around $10/month (for 500 subscribers) and runs roughly $15/month at 1,000 subscribers, with unlimited emails on all paid plans. The Advanced plan (around $18/month at 1,000 subs) adds AI writing assistance, multi-trigger automations, and other power features. Annual billing lowers these further. Compared with Kit's $39 entry, MailerLite is dramatically easier on a tight budget.
The builders are excellent. MailerLite's drag-and-drop email editor, landing pages, and free website/blog builder are consistently praised as some of the most pleasant to use in the category. If you care about how your emails and pages look and want to avoid fiddly design work, this is where MailerLite pulls ahead of Kit.
The free plan still includes real tools. Even at the reduced subscriber cap you get up to 3 automations, a landing page, a website, a custom HTML editor, and promotional pop-ups — more free functionality than Kit's single-automation free tier, even though you get far fewer free subscribers.
The honest weaknesses:
- The free tier got much smaller. As of July 1, 2026, MailerLite cut its free plan to 250 subscribers and 2,500 emails per month, down from 500 subscribers (and, before that, 1,000). This is the single biggest strike against it for new creators. If your list grows even modestly, you will hit the wall fast and be pushed to pay — which, at ~$10–15/month, is affordable, but it is not the long free runway Kit offers.
- No native paid-newsletter product. If monetizing subscribers directly is part of your plan, MailerLite does not have a built-in answer the way Kit does.
- Free plan branding and gated features. The MailerLite logo appears on free-plan emails, and newsletter templates, branding removal, the AI assistant, multi-trigger automations, and priority support are all reserved for paid tiers.
MailerLite is the better buy the moment you accept you will pay a little. For a small business emailing a few hundred to a few thousand people, it is hard to beat on cost-to-value.
The honest verdict
There is no single winner — it depends on your list size and your intent.
Pick [Kit](https://kit.com) if:
- You are starting from zero and want to grow a large list before paying anything — the 10,000 free subscribers are unmatched.
- You are a creator who plans to sell paid newsletters, courses, or digital products and wants monetization built into the same tool.
- Deliverability and audience segmentation matter more to you than design polish or price.
Pick [MailerLite](https://www.mailerlite.com) if:
- Your list is small (or you send infrequently) and you want the lowest possible monthly bill — paid plans start around $10.
- You value beautiful email design, landing pages, and a free website builder.
- You do not need native paid subscriptions and would rather pay $15/month for full features than $39 for Kit's entry tier.
A useful middle path: because Kit's free tier is so generous, a new creator can genuinely start on Kit for free, grow the list, and only reassess once the numbers justify a paid plan. If you get there and Kit's $39/month stings, MailerLite (or a flat-rate option like Beehiiv for pure newsletter publishing) is a reasonable place to land. Migrating email lists is annoying but routine, so starting free on Kit does not lock you in.
One caveat worth stating plainly: both companies have tightened their free plans and raised prices recently (MailerLite cut free subscribers in July 2026; Kit raised paid prices in late 2025). Confirm the current numbers on each provider's own pricing page before you commit — the direction of travel across the whole industry is less free, not more.
For most new creators focused on audience growth and eventual monetization, Kit's free tier is the stronger starting point. For small businesses and anyone optimizing for monthly cost, MailerLite wins. Match the tool to which of those you actually are.