How much does Mailchimp cost?

On 2026-10-15, Mailchimp's own pricing page listed Free for up to 250 contacts and 500 sends a month, then Essentials from $13/mo, Standard from $20/mo and Premium from $350/mo, all rising with your contact count. A 10,000-contact audience was $110/mo on Essentials; 100,000 was $800/mo on Standard. New customers with 10,000+ contacts get 15% off for the first 12 months. Above 200,000 contacts it's priced by sales.

Is day3 cheaper than Mailchimp?

For almost every list past Mailchimp's free plan, yes, and usually by several times. A 25,000-contact audience mailed weekly is $229.50/mo on Mailchimp Essentials even with the first-year discount; the same 100,000 emails are $25/mo on day3. Mailchimp is cheaper only while you fit its Free plan.

Why does Mailchimp cap my sends as well as my contacts?

Every Mailchimp plan pairs a contact tier with a monthly send allowance: 10 times the tier on Essentials, 12 times on Standard, 15 times on Premium, and 500 a month on Free. Go past it and overages apply. day3 has one meter, emails sent, and subscribers are unlimited on every plan.

What does Mailchimp do that day3 doesn't?

Plenty. Customer journeys with A/B splits and behavioural triggers, a drag-and-drop designer, landing pages and websites, ads, a CRM, SMS, e-commerce integrations, and reporting built for a marketing team. day3 is a narrow tool for product emails, with automations as an early preview.

Are these Mailchimp's real prices?

Yes. Every Mailchimp figure was read off Mailchimp's own pricing page on 2026-10-15, in US dollars, at every step of its contact dropdown. The calculator uses the cheapest plan whose send allowance covers your sends, and the first-year discount unless you switch to list price.

Can I move my Mailchimp audience to day3?

Yes. Paste your Mailchimp API key into day3's importer and your subscribers and unsubscribes come over. Nobody who unsubscribed on Mailchimp is re-subscribed by the move.

Pricing calculator

What your audience costs on Mailchimp, and on day3.

Mailchimp bills by how many contacts you keep, and caps how many emails you send. day3 bills by how many emails you send, and keeps contacts unlimited. Here is the same list priced both ways.

Subscribers

10,000

Everyone on the list, mailed or not.

Sends

4 a month

Emails to the whole list each month.

Mailchimp price

Year one is 15% off from 10,000 contacts.

That's 40,000 emails a month. Mailchimp bills the 10,000 subscribers; day3 bills the emails.

day3Cheaper

$14/mo

Plan50k plan, 50,000 / mo

SubscribersUnlimited, always free

Billed by emails sent. The list can grow and the bill only moves if you send more.

Mailchimp

$93.50/mo

Cheapest plan that fitsEssentials, up to 10,000 contacts

SendsCapped at 10x to 15x the contact tier

Billed by contacts, with a monthly send cap on every plan.

day3 is $79.50/mo cheaper ($954 a year).

day3 never charges for a subscriber, so the list can grow without the bill following it.

Start free on day3

Mailchimp's figures were read off their pricing page on 2026-10-15. day3's come straight from our own ladder.

Two meters, pointed at different things

Mailchimp bills the contacts

Every contact counts toward your tier, mailed this month or not, and each plan caps your monthly sends at a multiple of that tier.

day3 bills the sends

Subscribers are free and unlimited. Only the emails you send move the price, so a big list mailed weekly stays cheap.

Where that flips

Under 250 contacts and 500 sends a month, Mailchimp Free costs nothing. Past that, the calculator shows the gap for your list.

Six worked examples

The same arithmetic as the calculator, on Mailchimp's first-year prices, the cheaper ones. One goes Mailchimp's way.

Setup	Emails / mo	Mailchimp	day3	Cheaper
A tiny list, mailed twice a month250 subscribers, 2 sends a month	500	$0Free	$1	Mailchimpby $1/mo
A first list, mailed weekly2,500 subscribers, 4 sends a month	10,000	$45Essentials	$5	day3by $40/mo
A SaaS changelog, mailed monthly10,000 subscribers, 1 send a month	10,000	$93.50Essentials	$5	day3by $88.50/mo
A founder newsletter, mailed weekly25,000 subscribers, 4 sends a month	100,000	$229.50Essentials	$25	day3by $204.50/mo
A big list, mailed twice a month100,000 subscribers, 2 sends a month	200,000	$680Standard	$60	day3by $620/mo
A small daily newsletter2,500 subscribers, mailed daily	75,000	from $45Essentials	$25	day3by at least $20/mo

Where Mailchimp wins

When the list is tiny. Mailchimp Free holds 250 contacts and 500 sends a month for nothing. day3's free tier only sends to your own team, so the first real email costs $1. If you fit inside Mailchimp Free, stay there.

When you send rarely, through Pay As You Go. Mailchimp also sells email credits instead of a monthly plan, which it pitches at infrequent senders. It doesn't publish those prices on the plans page, so the calculator can't compare them. If you mail a few times a year, ask them.

When marketing runs on Mailchimp's suite. Journeys with A/B splits and behavioural triggers, the drag-and-drop designer, landing pages, ads, the CRM, SMS, and store integrations. day3 has none of the suite and its automations are an early preview. If a marketing team lives in those tools, the cheaper bill is not the whole story.

day3 is built for a different job: a software team telling its users what shipped, plus the transactional email from the same domain. The longer comparison goes through the rest of it.

Moving from Mailchimp

Import from Mailchimp: paste your API key, subscribers and unsubscribes come over.

No export, no spreadsheet. Anyone who unsubscribed on Mailchimp arrives unsubscribed, so the move never mails someone who left.

Journeys, landing pages, ad audiences and the CRM don't come across. Drag-and-drop designs are rebuilt in day3's composer, which is a writing tool rather than a layout canvas. Saved segments are rebuilt on top of your imported fields.

The day3 side of the move, from domain records to a test send, is shown screen by screen.

How this is calculated

Mailchimp's prices were read off their pricing page on 2026-10-15, in US dollars, at every step of its contact dropdown. Prices change; check the source before you quote this anywhere that matters.
Mailchimp's side is the cheapest plan that holds the contacts and whose send allowance covers the sends: Essentials (10x the tier, up to 50,000 contacts), Standard (12x, up to 100,000), then Premium (15x, up to 200,000). Past every allowance, Mailchimp charges overages it doesn't publish, so the price is shown as "from" and any saving as "at least".
The first-year price by default: 15% off for new customers, which the page shows from the 5,001 to 10,000 contact tier up. Switch to list price to see what year two costs, and what an existing customer already pays.
day3's number is the cheapest tier on our published ladder that covers subscribers times sends. The page reads it live, so it cannot go stale. day3's free tier sends only to your own team, so the first real email costs $1.

Questions

How much does Mailchimp cost?: On 2026-10-15, Mailchimp's own pricing page listed Free for up to 250 contacts and 500 sends a month, then Essentials from $13/mo, Standard from $20/mo and Premium from $350/mo, all rising with your contact count. A 10,000-contact audience was $110/mo on Essentials; 100,000 was $800/mo on Standard. New customers with 10,000+ contacts get 15% off for the first 12 months. Above 200,000 contacts it's priced by sales.
Is day3 cheaper than Mailchimp?: For almost every list past Mailchimp's free plan, yes, and usually by several times. A 25,000-contact audience mailed weekly is $229.50/mo on Mailchimp Essentials even with the first-year discount; the same 100,000 emails are $25/mo on day3. Mailchimp is cheaper only while you fit its Free plan.
Why does Mailchimp cap my sends as well as my contacts?: Every Mailchimp plan pairs a contact tier with a monthly send allowance: 10 times the tier on Essentials, 12 times on Standard, 15 times on Premium, and 500 a month on Free. Go past it and overages apply. day3 has one meter, emails sent, and subscribers are unlimited on every plan.
What does Mailchimp do that day3 doesn't?: Plenty. Customer journeys with A/B splits and behavioural triggers, a drag-and-drop designer, landing pages and websites, ads, a CRM, SMS, e-commerce integrations, and reporting built for a marketing team. day3 is a narrow tool for product emails, with automations as an early preview.
Are these Mailchimp's real prices?: Yes. Every Mailchimp figure was read off Mailchimp's own pricing page on 2026-10-15, in US dollars, at every step of its contact dropdown. The calculator uses the cheapest plan whose send allowance covers your sends, and the first-year discount unless you switch to list price.
Can I move my Mailchimp audience to day3?: Yes. Paste your Mailchimp API key into day3's importer and your subscribers and unsubscribes come over. Nobody who unsubscribed on Mailchimp is re-subscribed by the move.

Unlimited subscribers. Pay for the sends.

Get started day3 vs Mailchimp, in full