Mailchimp #5 vs Substack #8 of 9 on /best/email-marketing
Mailchimp vs Substack
Side-by-side plans, pricing, and feature gates for Mailchimp and Substack, verified . Both are primarily email marketing tools.
Plans side by side
Every published plan from each vendor, with the headline monthly anchor price. Some prices scale with subscriber count or seats; full detail lives on each tool's page.
Mailchimp
- Free
Up to 250 contacts, 500 sends/month
Free - Essentials
Entry paid tier with A/B testing
$13/mo - Standard
Most popular paid tier
$20/mo - Premium
For high-volume senders and bigger teams
$350/mo
Substack
- Standard
Free to publish; 10% of paid subscription revenue
Free
When Mailchimp wins
- Small businesses that want one tool with a real onboarding flow and a huge integration list
- Teams already living in Intuit (QuickBooks) products
- Operators who want a brand-name vendor for stakeholder approval
Where Mailchimp is the wrong fit
- Creators with growing newsletters; the per-contact tax compounds (Kit, beehiiv, or MailerLite tend to be cheaper at 10k+ subscribers)
- B2B sales teams; the CRM is light versus HubSpot or ActiveCampaign
- Teams needing predictive AI on a budget; you have to jump to the $350 Premium plan
When Substack wins
- New writers with no list yet who want platform-driven discovery
- Writers who would rather give 10% of revenue than pay a flat $20-100/month with no readers
Where Substack is the wrong fit
- Established creators with a paid list above ~5,000 subscribers; the 10% share exceeds what Kit, Ghost, or beehiiv would charge in flat fees at that scale
- Operators who want full control over deliverability, subscriber data, and migration optionality
- Brands needing automations, segmentation, or marketing tooling
Compare across the category
This page is Mailchimp vs Substack. To put both side by side with every other email marketing tool we track on a single price-only table, see the email marketing pricing comparison . Free tiers, entry paid plans, and mid-tier plans for the full email marketing cohort.
Common questions
- Is Mailchimp cheaper than Substack?
- Both Mailchimp and Substack have free or custom entry pricing, so a direct entry-tier price comparison is not meaningful.
- Does Mailchimp or Substack have a free plan?
- Both have free plans. Mailchimp: Up to 250 contacts, 500 sends/month. Substack: Free to publish; 10% of paid subscription revenue.
- Are Mailchimp and Substack in the same category?
- Yes. Both are primarily email marketing tools, which is why this is a natural head-to-head comparison.
- Which has more plans, Mailchimp or Substack?
- Mailchimp ships 4 plans; Substack ships 1. Mailchimp's longer ladder gives more granular upgrade steps, which can mean smoother price escalation as your team scales.
- Where can I see alternatives to Mailchimp or Substack?
- Each tool has a dedicated alternatives page on TierGauge with ranked options and verified pricing: /alternatives/mailchimp for Mailchimp and /alternatives/substack for Substack. Alternatives are derived from each tool's editor-flagged competitors plus same-category tools we track.
Mailchimp: https://mailchimp.com/pricing/marketing/ · Substack: https://substack.com/going-paid
Last verified . Pricing changes between refreshes; confirm at the vendor before purchasing.