Mailchimp

Mailchimp is an email marketing and automation platform aimed at small and medium-sized businesses. It helps users build audiences, design emails and campaigns, automate customer journeys and measure results, and it is one of the best-known names in email marketing. Mailchimp is owned by Intuit. Its reputation was built on accessibility. Mailchimp made professional email marketing approachable for small businesses with a friendly brand, drag-and-drop email builder and templates, and for many years a generous free plan that introduced millions of businesses to email marketing. Its mascot, Freddie, and playful tone became part of internet culture. The platform has expanded well beyond newsletters. Customer Journey Builder automates sequences such as welcome series, abandoned cart reminders, post-purchase follow-ups and re-engagement campaigns. Audience management includes segmentation, tags and predicted demographics and customer lifetime value. E-commerce integrations with Shopify, WooCommerce and others enable product recommendations and revenue tracking, and Mailchimp also offers SMS marketing, landing pages, sign-up forms, a website builder and social ads. AI features generate copy and subject lines, recommend send times and suggest content improvements, and reporting benchmarks performance against similar businesses. Over time, pricing changes have been a frequent source of criticism. The free plan has become more limited, and paid plans priced by contact count can become expensive as audiences grow, particularly since unsubscribed or inactive contacts can count toward limits unless archived. Some advanced features sit in the highest tiers. Alternatives include MailerLite for affordable, easy email marketing; Kit for creator-focused email; Klaviyo for data-rich e-commerce marketing; Brevo for email plus SMS and transactional messages at lower prices; ActiveCampaign for advanced automation and CRM; HubSpot Marketing Hub for an all-in-one marketing suite; and beehiiv for newsletters. Choose Mailchimp when you want a familiar, all-round marketing tool with many integrations. Compare pricing carefully as your list grows.