Migration guide
Kit → MailerLite
Inverse of iteration 116's mailerlite-to-kit path; closes the kit-mailerlite bidirectional pair. Kit is the creator-OS at $33/mo Creator (1k subscriber anchor, scales) plus built-in commerce; MailerLite is the friendly cheaper-at-low-volume ESP at $10/500 subs Growing Business plus a bundled website builder. Move from Kit to MailerLite when (a) you're paying Kit Creator and not using the commerce features, (b) your subscriber list sits comfortably in MailerLite's pricing band (under 5,000) where the cost gap is meaningful, or (c) you've outgrown the creator-segment editorial framing and you're closer to a small-business operator than a creator-business one. Most creators on Kit are there for the tag-based subscriber model + commerce + creator-tooling integrations; the bad-fit section is intentionally substantive because most teams should stay on Kit.
Published · By the TierGauge editorial team
When this migration makes sense
- You're paying Kit Creator at $33/mo (or higher as your list scales) and you're not using Kit Commerce. If your last 6 months on Kit have been weekly broadcasts plus an occasional welcome sequence and zero digital-product sales, the commerce features that justify Kit Creator's price are dormant. MailerLite Growing Business at $10/500 subs covers the broadcast-and-sequence use case at a third the cost.
- Your subscriber list is below 5,000 and stays there. Kit Creator scales by subscriber count past 1,000 ($33/mo at 1k anchor); MailerLite scales by 500-subscriber bands ($10 at 500). At the 1k-5k subscriber range MailerLite is meaningfully cheaper. At higher volumes the gap narrows.
- You want a bundled website + blog + landing-page builder included in the ESP fee. MailerLite ships these on every paid tier; Kit has landing pages but doesn't host websites or blogs. If you'd otherwise pay for a separate site host (Webflow, Wordpress, Squarespace), MailerLite's bundling is real cost saved.
- You're a nonprofit. MailerLite ships a self-serve 30% nonprofit discount on paid plans; Kit doesn't have a comparable program at the time of this guide.
- You're a small-business operator (consultant, coach, local business, B2B service provider) rather than a creator-business operator (course-seller, paid newsletter, digital-product seller). Kit's editorial framing is creator-economy-first; MailerLite's is small-business-first. The fit-to-product matters more than the feature checklist.
- Multivariate testing matters. MailerLite Advanced ($20/500 subs) ships multivariate testing; Kit's testing is limited to A/B subject lines on Creator and 5-variant on Pro. If you're running statistically meaningful tests, MailerLite's primitive is closer.
When it doesn't
- You sell digital products via Kit Commerce (digital downloads, paid subscriptions, sales pages). Kit Creator at $33/mo includes Commerce; replacing it with MailerLite plus a separate cart vendor (Stripe payment links, Lemon Squeezy, Gumroad) re-fragments the workflow. Stay on Kit if Commerce is load-bearing.
- Your tag-based segmentation is genuinely deep. Kit's tag-based subscriber model is more flexible than MailerLite's group-based model. If you have 50+ tags driving complex segmentation logic, MailerLite's groups + tags hybrid model will feel like a step backward.
- You depend on Kit's Visual Automation builder for multi-step branching flows (purchase events, link clicks, custom date triggers, conditional waits). MailerLite's automation builder is functionally similar but the depth and trigger taxonomy differ. The migration would be a capability downgrade for sophisticated automation users.
- You use Kit's creator-tool integration ecosystem (Teachable, Podia, Thinkific, Memberful, ConvertBox, Deadline Funnel). MailerLite's integration ecosystem is broader but less calibrated for creator-specific tools.
- You depend on the Kit subscriber-engagement-scoring feature (gated to Pro tier). MailerLite has segmentation by engagement but the scoring primitive isn't first-class.
- Your business is creator-economy-shaped and the editorial alignment matters. Kit IS the canonical creator-economy ESP; switching to MailerLite means switching to a tool whose product positioning is small-business-first.
- You're using Kit's free migration assistance from competing platforms (or recently used it on the way in). MailerLite has migration support but the white-glove handholding is less generous.
What you lose by leaving Kit
- Built-in commerce on Kit Creator: digital downloads, paid subscriptions, sales pages, customer billing. Replacing with Stripe payment links + a separate cart is real friction.
- Tag-based subscriber model that scales past simple group structures. MailerLite's groups + tags hybrid is less flexible at scale.
- Kit's Visual Automation builder depth (purchase-event triggers, conditional waits, multi-variant branching).
- Creator-tool integration ecosystem (Teachable, Podia, Thinkific, Memberful, ConvertBox, Deadline Funnel).
- Subscriber engagement scoring on Pro tier.
- Editorial credibility with the digital-product creator audience (canonical creator-economy ESP positioning).
- Free migration assistance from Kit's onboarding team (white-glove handholding for 1-2 weeks during cutover).
What you gain with MailerLite
- Cost reduction at low subscriber counts. Kit Creator $33/mo at 1k anchor vs MailerLite Growing Business $10/500 subs. At 1k subs MailerLite is roughly $20/mo (per-500-subscriber scaling). Real cost gap up to ~5k subs.
- Bundled website + blog + landing-page builder included in every paid tier. Kit has landing pages only.
- 30% self-serve nonprofit discount on paid plans. Kit doesn't ship comparable nonprofit pricing.
- Multivariate testing on Advanced ($20/500 subs). Kit's testing tops out at 5-variant subject-line testing on Pro.
- 10% honest annual-billing discount applied across every paid tier (Kit's annual discount is also ~17% but the framing differs).
- Cleaner editor UX for non-technical users. MailerLite's drag-drop editor is one of the more polished in the category; Kit's broadcast composer is text-first and lighter.
- Small-business operator editorial alignment. If your business isn't creator-shaped, MailerLite's product framing fits better than Kit's creator-OS positioning.
Plan mapping at the entry paid tier
The lowest non-free, non-custom tier on each side. Use this for the "if I'm on $X with Kit, what's the equivalent on MailerLite?" gut check.
| Limit | Kit (Creator) | MailerLite (Growing Business) |
|---|---|---|
| Contacts | 1,000 subscribers (anchor; scales up) | 500 subscribers (anchor; scales up) |
| Emails / month | · | Unlimited |
| Team seats | 2 | 3 |
| Automations | Unlimited | · |
Step-by-step migration
- 01
Export your list from Kit
Pull a fresh CSV of every active subscriber. Capture the fields you actually use downstream: email is required, name is standard, signup date and tier (free/paid) are useful when Kit provides them.
- 02
Provision MailerLite
Sign up, set sender identity, and verify your sending domain (DKIM, SPF, DMARC). Do this before importing the list; sending from an unverified domain is the single fastest way to land in spam at the moment of cutover.
- 03
Import the list and map fields
Upload the CSV. Map email + name + any custom fields. Decide whether to import as one list or split into segments/tags. Kit-style organization rarely maps 1:1, so plan the split before the upload, not after.
- 04
Rebuild automations and templates
MailerLite's automation builder is structurally similar but won't import Kit's flows directly. Rebuild only what you actively use; the move is a chance to delete the unused ones rather than lift-and-shift dead infrastructure.
- 05
Send a test broadcast
Pick a small segment and send a real broadcast (not just a preview). Verify deliverability, link clicks, and unsubscribe flow. If anything's off, you find it before the announcement, not after.
- 06
Announce the move and cut over
Send your last broadcast from Kit announcing the new sender domain and what to expect. Cut over DNS and sending from MailerLite on the same day, not staggered. A dual-send week creates more confusion than it prevents.
Kit-to-MailerLite specific gotchas
Universal steps cover most of the work. These are the failure modes unique to this exact pair.
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#1
Tag-to-group remapping: Kit uses tags as the primary subscriber-organization primitive (one subscriber, many tags). MailerLite uses groups (subscriber belongs to one or more groups) plus tags as a secondary layer. Audit your Kit tags and decide which become MailerLite groups (the load-bearing 5-10 audience-segmentation tags) vs which become MailerLite tags (everything else). Plan the taxonomy BEFORE importing; rebuilding segmentation post-import is painful.
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#2
Custom-fields rebuild: Kit custom fields don't 1:1 map to MailerLite (text / number / dropdown / datetime / image / boolean). Image fields don't transfer. Audit which custom fields drive automation logic; rebuild only the load-bearing ones in MailerLite before importing subscribers.
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#3
Automation rebuild: Kit's Visual Automations are tag-triggered with branching by tag, purchase event, link click, and date. MailerLite's automation builder is similar in shape but the trigger taxonomy and conditional-logic primitives differ. Plan to rebuild flows from scratch rather than import.
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#4
Commerce migration (if you sell on Kit): if you have Kit Commerce products (digital downloads, paid subs, sales pages), those don't transfer. Pick a separate commerce vendor BEFORE deactivating Kit; communicate the change to paying subscribers in a final Kit broadcast. The customer Stripe relationship transfers but the new billing experience is different.
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#5
Sender-domain DNS: Kit issues `cm._domainkey` selector; MailerLite issues `mlsend.com` patterns. Add MailerLite's records alongside Kit's, verify MailerLite, warm the new sender for 7-14 days on a percentage of traffic before flipping the from-address. Don't hard-cut a production sender.
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#6
Editor-style retraining: Kit's broadcast composer is text-first (clean, minimalist editor); MailerLite's drag-drop editor is block-based (Notion-style with image / button / divider blocks). Pick the 3-5 templates you actually use; re-author them in MailerLite's editor. Don't try to port the full template library; the structural HTML differs enough that visual fidelity is lost.
Compare on price across the category
This guide is Kit to MailerLite specifically. To see both side by side with every other email marketing tool we track on a single price-only table, see the email marketing pricing comparison . Useful before committing to the migration, in case a third option fits the cost-and-feature combination better than either side of this guide.
Common questions
- Is MailerLite cheaper than Kit?
- Both start at the same headline price (Free). The reason to migrate is the pricing model and feature scope, not the entry-tier number.
- Will I lose subscribers in the move?
- Email lists transfer as raw addresses; subscriber relationships transfer with you because the addresses haven't changed. What you can lose: re-engagement (some readers won't notice the new sender domain immediately), paid subscriptions if Kit handles billing differently from MailerLite (the gotchas above call out the specific cases), and any "engagement" or warmth signals that Kit's deliverability inferred from your sending history. Plan a clear announcement and a deliverability warm-up week.
- How long does the migration take?
- For a list under 10,000 subscribers, a clean migration is one focused week: domain setup and verification, list import, automation rebuild, test broadcast, announcement, cutover. Larger lists or complex automations can stretch to 2 or 3 weeks. The constraint is rarely the import itself; it's the deliverability warm-up and the time to rebuild flows you actually depend on.
- Are Kit and MailerLite direct competitors?
- Yes. Both are primarily email marketing tools, which is why this is a defensible head-to-head migration rather than a cross-category consolidation.
- Where can I see Kit vs MailerLite side-by-side?
- The /compare/kit-vs-mailerlite page on TierGauge shows side-by-side plans, headline pricing, included features, and limit comparison at the entry paid tier. This migration guide is the long-form decision narrative; the compare page is the data-only dashboard.
Sources
- Kit: https://kit.com/pricing
- MailerLite: https://www.mailerlite.com/pricing
Pricing verified . Migration mechanics are based on the public pricing pages and standard ESP migration patterns; verify destructive steps (DNS cutover, paid subscription transfer) against the vendor's current docs before executing.