Klaviyo Alternatives for SaaS Teams in 2026

Prices checked 7 October 2026; each price links to the vendor page it came from.

Why SaaS teams leave Klaviyo

The email plan on Klaviyo's pricing page is sized by active profiles: $20 a month at 500, $30 at 1,000, $60 at 2,500, $100 at 5,000, $150 at 10,000 and $400 at 25,000. Each step allows ten times as many email sends as profiles, so 10,000 profiles can send 100,000 emails a month. The calculator did not show a combined Email and SMS price on the day it was checked, so SMS is not priced here. The free plan is 250 active profiles and 500 email sends a month, plus $5 of mobile messages.

That free allowance ends faster than it sounds. A three-email welcome series uses up the 500 monthly sends after roughly 167 new signups, so any product with real signup volume is on a paid tier within the first month. Between 5,000 and 25,000 profiles the bill multiplies by four for five times the people, and the final step from 10,000 to 25,000 adds $250 on its own.

What counts as a profile is the second surprise. According to Klaviyo's billing help, any profile that can be emailed is active regardless of consent status, which includes people who were added without ever opting in. Suppressed profiles drop out of the billable count once processed, and the count can take up to 72 hours to refresh. If you go over your tier, Klaviyo moves you up at the next billing cycle without blocking sends, and cleaning the list does not move you back down until you pick the lower tier yourself. A SaaS list full of unconfirmed trial signups is exactly where this bites.

The data model is the third. Klaviyo's custom objects let you attach multi-property records to profiles, with subscriptions and appointments as the documented examples. They arrive through the API, need a paid email plan, and plans with 250 to 400,000 profiles and no Advanced KDP get one object with 15 properties. A profile that owns many records fits a customer with several subscriptions. A company that owns many users is the reverse, so account fields tend to get copied onto every user's profile and kept in sync by your own code.

If you also run a store, none of this is a reason to leave. It is a reason to look elsewhere only when most of your messages are about trials, seats, usage and renewals.

The alternatives, one by one

1. Customer.io: the nearest match for product events

Customer.io has the same job description as Klaviyo's flows but takes product events as its first-class input. Essentials on its pricing page is $100 a month at 5,000 profiles and $145 at 10,000, billed monthly, which is level with Klaviyo's $100 and $150. It includes a visual workflow builder, one million emails a month, two object types and transactional email. Profiles count people and objects together, so company records add to your total as well.

The comparison changes at 25,000: Customer.io shows $235 at 20,000 and $325 at 30,000, so a list of that size sits well under Klaviyo's $400. Our Klaviyo vs Customer.io comparison goes deeper. Customer.io also lists a Startup Program offering a year free to companies that raised under $10M.

2. Userlist: account-level lifecycle for B2B

Userlist is the answer to the company-versus-user problem described above. Users and companies are separate records, and segments can be built for either. Basic is $149 a month for up to 10,000 users and Professional is $349, with $10 and $12 per extra 1,000 users; Professional adds A/B split testing, conversion goals and advanced workflow features, per its pricing page.

At 5,000 people the $149 entry price is $49 above Klaviyo, and at 10,000 it is roughly level. At 25,000 users the stated rate gives $149 + 15 × $10 = $299, which undercuts Klaviyo's $400 by $101. The invoice follows the previous cycle's peak tracked-user count according to Userlist's billing docs, so a one-off import raises the next bill.

3. Loops: well under Klaviyo's price, with much less machinery

On the slider at loops.so/pricing, $48 at 4,788 subscribers and $198 at 24,339 are about half of Klaviyo's $100 and $400 at the nearest stops, and $99 at 9,998 is two-thirds of its $150. Only subscribed contacts count, sends are unlimited, there is no seat fee and transactional email is included. The free plan allows 4,000 sends in a rolling 30 days to the 1,000 newest contacts, which is eight times Klaviyo's 500.

The price of that simplicity is breadth. The Loops pricing page mentions no SMS or mobile-message allowance, which Klaviyo's free plan includes in small amounts, and its contact model is individual users rather than accounts. It suits a founder-run SaaS that sends onboarding and product updates. See the Loops alternatives page for when teams outgrow it.

4. Encharge: visual flows aimed at SaaS

Encharge reads like a SaaS-specific counterpart to Klaviyo's flow builder, with Stripe, Chargebee and Zapier connectors on Growth. Per its pricing page, Growth is $179 at 5,000 subscribers, $249 at 10,000 and $389 at 25,000, so it costs more than Klaviyo at the first two sizes and $11 less at 25,000. Premium, at $269, $399 and $649, is where API events, event-based segmentation and transactional email live.

Choose it for the connectors and the readable canvas, not for savings. There is no free plan; the page offers a 14-day trial. More detail is on our Encharge alternatives page.

5. ActiveCampaign: lead scoring beside the email

ActiveCampaign suits the Klaviyo user whose trials end in a sales call. With annual billing, its pricing page reads Plus at $145 for 5,000 contacts, $189 for 10,000 and $389 for 25,000, with Pro at $205, $375 and $629. Sends are capped at ten times the contact limit on Starter and Plus. Starter is cheaper at $79 for 5,000 contacts but lists five actions per automation, which rules it out for a serious onboarding flow.

Transactional email and SMS are sold as add-ons, so budget for them if Klaviyo currently covers both. Read our ActiveCampaign alternatives page for the other direction.

6. Drip: the like-for-like choice if you also sell online

Drip is the one alternative that keeps the ecommerce shape. Its pricing page reads $89 for 4,501 to 5,000 people, $154 for 9,001 to 10,000 and $369 for 22,501 to 25,000, with a 14-day trial and no permanent free plan. Cost is based on active people and monthly email volume, and the lower tiers list unlimited sends and up to 50 workflows.

At 5,000 people it is $11 below Klaviyo, at 10,000 $4 above, and at 25,000 $31 below. That is a lateral move on price, so pick it only when its product model suits a business that sells both software and goods.

7. Mailchimp: familiar, with stepped contact bands

Mailchimp's pricing page shows Standard at $100 a month for 2,501 to 5,000 contacts, $135 for 5,001 to 10,000, $230 for 10,001 to 15,000 and $310 for 20,001 to 25,000, billed monthly, with a free plan of 250 contacts and 500 sends a month. Standard allows twelve times the contact count in monthly sends. At 10,000 contacts that is $15 under Klaviyo, and at 25,000 it is $90 under.

Those are list prices; the page also advertises 50% off for the first 12 months, which is not counted here. Mailchimp fits a team that wants familiar campaign tools and basic automation, not event-first onboarding.

8. Resend: lowest list price, most developer work

Resend's marketing tab is free at 1,000 contacts, then $40 at 5,000, $80 at 10,000 and $180 at 25,000, with unlimited broadcasts and segments on paid plans. Transactional sending sits on its own tab at $20 for 50,000 emails. Even with that $20 added, you pay $100 at 10,000 contacts against Klaviyo's $150.

The cost shifts to engineering: contacts, properties and segments are managed through the dashboard, API and SDKs, and automations are billed at $0.0015 per run. Compare it against the lighter lifecycle option on the Loops vs Resend page before you decide.

What each option costs at 5,000, 10,000 and 25,000 people

Vendors count different things, so these are profiles, subscribers, users or contacts. Where no exact stop was read, the cell names the nearest one.

Klaviyo is mid-pack at 5,000 and 10,000 and the most expensive row at 25,000, where $400 compares with $180 to $389 everywhere else a price exists. That pattern is why price complaints about Klaviyo come from larger SaaS lists, while the model complaints come from everyone.

Three caveats keep the table honest. Customer.io's profile count includes objects such as companies. ActiveCampaign's prices assume annual billing, and Mailchimp's are monthly list prices before first-year discounts. And Klaviyo's Email-only column leaves out SMS, which it prices separately and which the calculator did not show.

The same 10,000 profiles for a year

Annual totals show the real size of each gap. At 10,000 people Klaviyo costs $150 a month, which is $1,800 over twelve months, and the right-hand column shows what each option does to that figure.

Customer.io and Userlist land within $60 of Klaviyo over a year, so a move to either is a decision about fit and not about saving money. Only Loops, Resend and Mailchimp save more than $150 at this size, and each of them gives something up: Loops and Resend have narrower tooling, and Mailchimp is not event-first.

One more check before you trust any of these totals. Klaviyo's 10,000 includes everyone it can email, consent or not, while Loops bills only subscribed contacts and Customer.io bills profiles including objects. Run your real list through each tool's definition, because a clean subscribed-only export may be well below 10,000 and move you down a pricing stop before you have changed anything else.

Which one for which situation

• Trials, plan changes and usage events drive your emails: Customer.io, which costs about the same as Klaviyo at 10,000 profiles but treats those events as its core input.
• Customers are teams and you message by role: Userlist, since companies and users are separate records.
• The bill is the only complaint: Loops or Resend, both well under Klaviyo's price at every size in the table.
• You sell software and physical products: stay on Klaviyo or move to Drip.
• Sales qualifies trials in a CRM: ActiveCampaign Plus.
• You want the least change from a campaign tool: Mailchimp Standard, accepting weaker event-driven flows.

Migrating off Klaviyo

Klaviyo documents its own exit process, and the steps below follow it. The general migration guide covers what every platform has in common.

1. Decide which channel you are leaving. Klaviyo's migration guide says to follow the exit steps only for the channel you are dropping. If SMS or a store stays on Klaviyo, move product email alone.
2. Turn derived data into properties first. The list and segment export carries email, phone, standard and custom properties, date added and consent details, but not event data, list or segment membership, or messages received. Write plan, trial end date and last-active values onto profiles before you export, and export each segment you need as its own file.
3. Export with the right role. Only Owner, Admin or Analyst users can export. Use Audience, then Lists and segments, then Manage and Export to CSV. The cap is 700 columns, and files stay available for 30 days under Settings, Other, Downloads. To export everyone, build a segment that includes all profiles, and never email that segment.
4. Export suppressions separately. Klaviyo's guide gives a path for it: Audience, Profiles, Suppressed Profiles, Export CSV. Import those as unsubscribed in the new tool so nobody who opted out is mailed again.
5. Save templates as HTML. Email templates can be exported from Content, Templates. Flows cannot be exported, and Klaviyo warns that deleted flows and their data cannot be recovered, so put them into draft mode and rebuild them by hand, trial and billing flows first.
6. Swap the event calls. Every track call from your app to Klaviyo, and any onsite tracking snippet you added manually, needs a replacement. The guide says manual snippets must be removed yourself or they may slow your site.
7. Run both and cut by cohort. Send new signups through the new tool, let people already in Klaviyo flows finish there, and authenticate the new domain with its own DKIM before the first send.
8. Lower the plan on purpose. After cutover, Klaviyo will not move you down on its own. Choose the smaller tier yourself, allow up to 72 hours for the profile count to refresh, and bring the count down at least 24 hours before renewal, as Klaviyo's billing help advises.

Our pick

For a SaaS team whose emails follow product and billing events, Customer.io is the first to price: similar money at 5,000 and 10,000 profiles, a model built for events, and a lower bill than Klaviyo above 20,000. Loops is the runner-up when you want the same job at roughly half to two-thirds of the cost and with fewer controls. If your customers are workspaces, price Userlist. Related pages: email for B2B SaaS and Customer.io vs Loops.