MailerLite Review 2024: Pros and Cons, User Experiences, Pricing, and Analysis
Since its launch in 2010, MailerLite has solidified its position as a popular Mailchimp alternative for small businesses and solopreneurs.
It’s best known for its user-friendly interface, affordable pricing plans, and reasonable deliverability rates.
With power-packed features, MailerLite usually receives positive reviews from users, especially those new to email marketing. The free plan is a good starting point for beginners and budget-conscious marketers.
However, the email marketing software has its share of downsides — it offers limited advanced features compared to larger platforms.
Is MailerLite the right choice for you?
We’ll explore honest MailerLite reviews to help you decide on the finest option.
An Overview of MailerLite Features — The Modern and Clean Email Platform
The company started as a web design agency and soon scaled to become a sought-after email marketing tool for its ease of use. MailerLite’s team consists of over 130 designers, marketers, and email experts with a common goal: to keep it simple.
The Most Popular MailerLite Features
Here’s an overview of MailerLite’s popular features:
- Email creation: MailerLite believes their new drag-and-drop editor with AI-powered writing assistant will revolutionize email marketing newsletter creation.
- Pre-designed templates for occasions: These pre-designed campaigns can be saved and used to quickly create different types of email campaigns.
- Automation: The platform allows users to create simple automation workflows based on subscriber behavior. Advanced plan users can add several triggers to a single automation workflow.
- Landing pages: Users can build and publish up to 10 landing pages for free. The drag-and-drop builder is intuitive and has many elements, such as countdown timers, events, and surveys.
- List management: The platform offers unlimited lists on all pricing tiers, which is probably why most people prefer MailerLite over Mailchimp.
- Email deliverability: MailerLite consistently scored 90% and above in EmailToolTester’s deliverability test rounds.
To fully grasp their features, check out the table below.
| What to do with it | |
|---|---|
| Email editor | A user-friendly drag-and-drop builder for creating professional emails |
| Pre-designed email templates | Ready-made campaigns for various email marketing needs |
| Subscriber management | Organize and segment your email list effectively |
| Automation | Create automated workflows based on subscriber behavior |
| Audience monetization | Embed custom product blocks and create emails based on customer’s purchase behavior |
| Personalization | Personalize email text, subject line, and preheader text |
| Campaign management | Use sign-up forms and collect email addresses on the go using the app |
| Reporting and analytics | Monitor opens by location; use click maps, surveys, and quizzes |
Even with such solid features, MailerLite lacks spam and design testing, advanced automation, and detailed analytics.
To understand MailerLite’s pros and cons, let’s hear about them from its users.
MailerLite: The Good and Moderate Reviews
We’ve researched plenty of authentic sites to let you in on the user reviews. Here are the good and the toned-down reviews to help you decide.
MailerLite: A Platform Loved by Many
MailerLite has consistently garnered positive reviews from users, especially for its ease of use, affordability, and stellar customer service.
Users also feel valued regardless of their business size and operation model. They feel that the customer service team is kind and patient, which are big factors when choosing an ESP.
The user review below shows MailerLite’s ease of use for small businesses. Clients can connect to the web using API, take advantage of robust deliverability, and continued support for a small price compared to similar platforms.
MailerLite: Features that Fail to Get Love from Users
MailerLite is generally well-received, but certain users have been dissatisfied with the service. Common complaints include impromptu pricing changes, interface quirks, and limited advanced features.
Another user reports mixed up links and images after sending the email, contributing to an unreliable experience.
MailerLite customers also face service issues such as support with account opening and switching to advanced plans. Trying to fix the issues by themselves could lead to MailerLite blacklisting the domain, not allowing users to try the live chat to resolve issues.
For a deeper understanding, let’s compare the positive and the negative reviews side-by-side.
| MailerLite: What people love | MailerLite: User disapprovals |
|---|---|
| Smooth user-interface | Regular and inconsistent pricing changes |
| Fast online support | Broken or mix up of links and images after sending the email |
| Inexpensive compared to other platforms | Unreliable customer support for certain scenarios |
Review Summary: Is MailerLite Really Worth the Try?
According to several user reviews online, MailerLite seems to be an easy-to-use and inexpensive solution for people starting out with email marketing. It offers a free plan for up to 1000 email subscribers and 12,000 monthly emails.
MailerLite users are happy with the platform’s consistent ability to reach the customers’ inboxes. They are pretty pleased with the custom design options and simple navigation tools. The MailerLite team makes this possible by being updated with the latest email marketing trends and constantly changes the features for improved user experience.
Most of all, customers rave about the platform’s support team — the staff are kind and quick to resolve queries.
Even so, MailerLite gets less love from users because of its lack of advanced features and technical glitches from time to time. The platform provides basic reporting and limited advanced features, pushing clients with specific and large-scale needs to switch to other services.
Several comments mentioned the platform was filled with bugs and users reportedly faced threat attacks. The platform takes a long time to process payments, so, whatever design and content users create meanwhile is likely to be lost.
To give you a fair idea, we’ll cover these points in detail in the next section.
MailerLite Pros
MailerLite gets much love for its user-friendly interface, helping non-technical users easily create various types of email marketing campaigns.
Here’s what customers like the most about MailerLite.
Intuitive Interface
Using MailerLite is less challenging for first-time users compared to other email marketing platforms. The user interface is clean and organized, making it easy to navigate through the menus.
The drag-and-drop builder allows users to create professional-looking emails without coding knowledge. Users can also design templates and save them for future use.
Customers praise the ability to create customizable templates that are fully accessible from all email clients. In addition, users seem to be satisfied with the increase in their deliverability and engagement rates.
Affordability for Beginners
MailerLite offers competitive pricing, including a free plan with essential features. Clients get access to single trigger automation workflows, a landing page builder, and a survey. That may be a top reason for this ESP being a valued Mailchimp alternative.
Good Email Deliverability Rate
MailerLite has steadily secured the first spot in inbox placement rates with 96.5%. The platform also provides a knowledge base on different areas of email marketing, including email deliverability.
Tests by EmailToolTester show that MailerLite achieves high deliverability rates to Gmail hosted inboxes. Emails consistently reached Gmail’s primary tab, with a few rocky phases in between.
First-rate Customer Support
MailerLite’s support team receives praise for their responsive and kind attitude. Users love that they can reach out anytime to clarify their concerns. With staff scattered around the globe, customer support might be available in other local languages, too.
Landing Pages and Form Builders
The landing pages can be built with the help of an AI generator in a few seconds. Users can choose from 70+ pre-built sections to customize hero sections or call-to-action buttons.
MailerLite’s integration capability lets clients sell right from the landing page, especially with Stripe. Every landing page offers a branded URL to each page, helping clients boost their brand recognition.
MailerLite Cons
Even though MailerLite comes with certain great features, it falls short in pro areas, such as full reporting, advanced automation, CRM features, and spam/design testing (this feature shows what your emails will look like on various email clients before you send them).
Customers feel the features could be more impactful, such as the ones below.
Lengthy Account Approval Process
MailerLite does not allow users to start sending emails without domain authentication, which only happens after the account approval process. Without this, you cannot access their email editor or test other features.
Although the platform seems to have a rigid approval system to keep its deliverability rates up, it’s overkill for people wanting to start quickly.
Lack of Advanced Features
While MailerLite covers basic email marketing needs, it lacks specific advanced features found in comprehensive email service platforms, such as advanced automation or detailed segmentation.
Plus, to set up several triggers, you need to upgrade to the advanced plan, which can be overwhelming for small businesses. The ESP also does not offer native SMS marketing tools or a complex contact management system.
Confusing Customer Support
MailerLite’s customer team is generally reliable, but certain limitations can make users reconsider their choices. For example, live chat support is only available on the advanced plan, leaving users access only to the knowledge base and email support.
Free plan users can expect support for the first 30 days, which means you’re on your own after that. Additionally, clients on the Enterprise plan do not have a phone chat support option, making it inconvenient for high-volume users with specific queries.
Lack of Spam and Design Testing
Some users find the lack of spam and design testing features to be bothersome. Regardless of how well your email campaigns are, you cannot preview or improve them before they reach your subscribers’ inboxes.
You cannot run it through a spam check or preview to adjust email elements. However, you can save and share the preview link with your team.
MailerLite Pros and Cons Overview
Here’s what the reviews say about MailerLite.
| MailerLite Pros | MailerLite Cons |
|---|---|
| User-friendly interface and navigation | A cumbersome account approval process |
| Affordable pricing plans, including a free tier, are helpful for people new to email marketing | Lack of advanced features such as advanced automation and segmentation |
| Robust landing pages and form builders for easy gathering of subscribers | Customer support limitations for users on the free plan |
| Good email deliverability rates | Lack of spam and design testing |
If you’re wondering if MailerLite is worth the money, let’s dissect the reviews of pricing tiers and the features included.
MailerLite Pricing Reviews: Value for Money or Hidden Costs?
MailerLite offers a free plan, and the paid ones start at $15 a month for 1000 subscribers. The highest pricing tier is the ‘Advanced’ plan, which starts at $30 per month. The pricing tiers are pretty straightforward and include essential features in all plans.
You can find more features and pricing explanations for 1000 subscribers in the table below.
| MailerLite Plans | Pricing | Features Included |
|---|---|---|
| Free | $0 | ‣ 12,000 monthly emails ‣ 1 user ‣ Email and chat support for the 30 days ‣ Drag and drop editor ‣ Email automation builder ‣ Websites ‣ 10 landing pages ‣ Comparative reporting ‣ Sign-up forms and pop-ups |
| Growing business | $15 | ‣ Unlimited monthly emails ‣ 3 users ‣ 24/7 email and chat support ‣ All in free, plus ‣ Unlimited templates ‣ Sell digital products ‣ Dynamic emails ‣ Auto resend campaign ‣ Unlimited websites and blogs ‣ Unsubscribe page builder ‣ Multivariate testing |
| Advanced | $30 | ‣ Unlimited monthly emails ‣ Unlimited users ‣ All in the Growing business, plus ‣ Facebook integration ‣ Custom HTML editor ‣ Promotion pop-ups ‣ Multiple triggers in automations ‣ AI writing assistant ‣ Preference center ‣ Smart sending Partner discounts |
| Enterprise | Custom pricing | ‣ Unlimited monthly emails ‣ Unlimited users ‣ 24/7 email and chat support ‣ All in the Advanced, plus ‣ Dedicated success manager ‣ Dedicated IP and deliverability consultation ‣ Onboarding consultation and training ‣ Account audit and performance improvements |
MailerLite offers good value for the price, especially for small businesses. As their business scales, users can upgrade to higher plans (which are not too expensive).
Even with many fine attributes, MailerLite may not be the best fit for all businesses. If you’re looking for MailerLite alternatives, here are three of the strongest contenders.
MailerLite Alternatives
The main aspects to consider before moving to an ESP are their email deliverability and customer support. Although MailerLite is pretty good with both, there are other platforms doing better.
Here are three similar yet different MailerLite alternatives to consider based on your business needs.
1. Mailchimp
Mailchimp shares attributes similar to MailerLite, such as intuitive email creation and subscriber management. The only big difference is Mailchimp caters to a broader audience, including small businesses, non-profits, and individuals.
It also offers a wider range of integrations and advanced features, such as pre-built automation journeys and detailed email campaign metrics reporting.
In addition to providing advanced tools, Mailchimp is also strong in email deliverability, with an average 95.5% rate.
Note that Mailchimp also offers a free plan but has limitations on the number of contacts, email sends, and features. It also charges you based on the number of subscribers on your list, regardless of their active or inactive status.
2. Brevo
Brevo, formerly SendInBlue, is another simple and straightforward email marketing tool. It’s best suited for businesses with a heavy focus on SMS and Whatsapp marketing campaigns.
Users can choose from Brevo’s flexible pricing plans based on their subscriber list and business needs. The platform also has a reputation for maintaining consistent inbox placement rates, making it a powerful MailerLite alternative.
Choose Brevo if your business requires a multi-channel approach, including email, SMS, CRM, and landing pages.
However, Brevo might lack certain features of MailerLite. For example, it provides a smaller selection of pre-built campaign templates and comes with a steeper learning curve for automation and segmentation features.
3. Campaign Refinery
Campaign Refinery is a comprehensive email marketing platform and the finest MailerLite alternative — it offers advanced features, the highest email deliverability rate, and powerful automation functionality.
The integrated email list cleaning tool picks out all the harmful and inactive email addresses leaving your email list clean and healthy.
Other unique features are:
- Highest email deliverability rate on the market,
- Engagement rewards,
- Evergreen flash sale,
- Audience Groups (Latest exclusive feature for segmentation),
- Credit system.
These features aim to promote urgency, improve engagement, and increase the open and click-through rates.
The best part is, all of these features are available in every pricing tier with 24/7 customer support. Users can start at $99 per month for unlimited contacts. Our credit system allows clients to purchase an ‘X’ number of credits to clean email lists, send emails, or perform other actions.
Sign Up for Campaign Refinery and Enjoy Exclusive Benefits
Email deliverability determines the overall success rate of your email marketing. Are the emails landing in your subscribers’ primary inboxes for them to take action?
Answering this critical question will determine whether your business will achieve its full potential or lose marketing results to spam traps.
We understand the importance of achieving consistent inbox placement rates — our strict authentication protocols and mandatory domain authentication help us accomplish the highest deliverability rate on the market. Our clients immediately notice a 6x increase in inbox placement rates after joining us.
We individually work with every client to understand their goals and provide tailor-made solutions.
Apply to become a user today and scale your email marketing results with premium tools.
