Is Klaviyo worth the price?
7/10
Klaviyo offers a genuinely useful free tier (250 contacts, 500 emails/mo) but costs escalate rapidly with list growth — from $30/mo at 1,000 contacts to $150/mo at 10,000 and $1,380/mo at 100,000.
Since February 2025, billing is based on total active profiles (not just emailed contacts), which effectively raised prices for most users.
Pricing Plans
Free
Free
- 250 active profiles
- 500 email sends/month
- 150 SMS credits/month
$20/month
- 500+ profiles
- 10x email sends per profile
- 150 free SMS credits
Email + SMS
From $35
- All Email features
- SMS messaging
- Automation workflows
Hidden Costs & Gotchas
Since Feb 2025, you pay for ALL active profiles — not just contacts you email. Imported but unengaged contacts still count toward billing
SMS credits are separate and do not roll over month-to-month — unused credits are lost
International SMS costs 5-12 credits per message vs 1 credit for US, dramatically increasing costs for global audiences
Spending over $10,000/mo forces you into Klaviyo One enterprise tier with a mandatory 20% premium
Advanced add-ons are expensive
Marketing Analytics ($100/mo), Customer Agent AI ($140/mo), Helpdesk ($185/mo)
How Klaviyo Compares
E-commerce store with 10,000 email contacts, email-only plan
Klaviyo$150/mo
Mailchimp$100/mo
Brevo$25/mo
Omnisend$115/mo
Which Plan Do You Need?
Early-stage e-commerce stores→ Free (up to 250 contacts)
Includes segmentation, automation, AI tools, and 150 SMS credits — more generous feature set than most competitors free tiers
Growing Shopify stores with 1K-10K contacts→ Email plan ($30-$150/mo)
Best-in-class Shopify integration, predictive analytics, and 10x contact email sending limits make it the default choice for Shopify merchants
Omnichannel e-commerce brands→ Email + SMS ($45-$165/mo at 1K-10K contacts)
Unified email + SMS + push in one platform avoids managing separate SMS providers — the $15/mo SMS add-on is reasonable at lower tiers
Our Recommendation
Worth it if...
You run a Shopify store and rely on advanced segmentation, abandoned cart flows, and predictive analytics — Klaviyo ROI typically justifies the premium for e-commerce
Skip if...
Your list exceeds 25,000 contacts and you primarily send newsletters — Brevo or Mailchimp offer far better value for high-volume, low-complexity email marketing
Negotiation tips
Annual contracts can yield 10-15% discounts at higher tiers. Clean your list aggressively before each billing cycle since all active profiles count — suppressing unengaged contacts directly reduces your bill.
