EmailOctopus vs MailerLite — which should you choose?

These two are the most straightforward pair in the email comparison: both bill by list size, both store the data in the EU, both have a free plan. Same job, same model, different price. So the question is not which is cheaper — that is clear — but what the price difference buys.

The short answer

Choose EmailOctopus if you send a newsletter and want to pay as little as possible for it. It is cheaper at every list size, and free under 2,500 subscribers.

Choose MailerLite if you want to clean out inactive subscribers inside the app from a single view, or if you need a connector to something other than WordPress or Zapier. Those are the things you pay extra for in this comparison — and both are read from the help pages, not guessed.

Comparison table

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Prices exclude VAT, billed monthly unless stated otherwise.(ad) = ad link

• The price is the monthly price of the cheapest paid plan at that list size. The Free plan column shows when you do not have to pay.
• EmailOctopus: the price list only shows the monthly price on annual billing. Monthly billing costs more.

Prices side by side

Both price by subscriber count, so the figures are directly comparable. The gap grows with the list and never flips.

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Cheapest paid plans (EmailOctopus Pro, MailerLite Comfort) read from the price lists (EmailOctopus, MailerLite) on 3 September 2026, excluding VAT. EmailOctopus’s price list states the monthly price on annual billing, MailerLite’s on monthly billing — the effect of the billing period is opened up in the next paragraph.

The billing period is the only point that could flip the table, so it is the one worth unpacking. MailerLite’s annual billing is 10 per cent cheaper, which narrows the gap but does not remove it: at 2,500 subscribers about €26 instead of €29, while EmailOctopus asks €16. The other way round: EmailOctopus’s monthly billing costs more by the price list’s own saving figure, €12 a year at 500 subscribers and €48 at 10,000. On neither period does the order change.

The third list size, which is not in the table, is the most important: under 2,500 subscribers EmailOctopus is free. That means at 2,500 subscribers the comparison is not €16 against €29 but €0 against €29, if you accept the free plan’s limits.

Free plans: a tenfold difference

This is the pair’s other big difference. EmailOctopus gives 2,500 subscribers and 10,000 emails a month, MailerLite 250 subscribers and 2,500 emails. Both mark free plan emails with their own branding, which goes away only on a paid plan.

In practice EmailOctopus’s free plan is a real tool and MailerLite’s a trial. The 250-name limit comes up within a few months for anyone building a list, while 2,500 names is enough for most small businesses for years. Five free plans side by side and who lacks one entirely: free email marketing.

How contacts are counted — two different traps

When the price follows list size, what matters is not only the price but what counts as a contact. At neither do the unsubscribed count toward the limit, which is unusually straightforward in this price class. The traps are still in different places.

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The rules are read from the providers’ own help pages. “Not read” means the rule could not be opened in the original source — we do not guess it in either direction.

• EmailOctopus. Unsubscribed contacts do not count toward the limit, nor do hard bounces and spam complaints, which are marked as unsubscribed automatically. Contacts awaiting double opt-in do not count either. One trap: the same address is counted separately for every list — an address on six lists is six contacts.
• MailerLite. The limit counts subscribers in Active status; unsubscribed and bounced do not count. One trap in the billing period: the period is counted cumulatively, so an address that was active at any point in the period counts toward the limit until the end of the period, even if you delete it immediately. Cleaning the list shows on the bill only in the next period.

The practical conclusions differ. At EmailOctopus you watch the structure of the list: because the same address is counted separately for every list, the 2,500-subscriber free plan fills up at about 420 people if each is on six lists. So keep one list and separate readers with tags. At MailerLite you watch the calendar: cleaning affects the bill only in the next period, so the list is cleaned before the billing date, not after the limit has already been exceeded. The rules for all seven services: how contacts are counted.

Deliverability: this is where the price difference shows

We do not test deliverability ourselves. Below are two things: Tooltester’s 2017–2024 series as history — it ended in January 2024, and the source no longer stands behind its method — and eight points from the services’ own help pages, which are the current basis of this comparison.

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Tooltester ended the series with the January 2024 round and explained why in August 2026: seed lists proved unreliable and providers started optimising for them. The figures are therefore history, not a measurement of current deliverability.

Source: Tooltester deliverability test, 12 rounds 8/2017–1/2024. About 80 seed addresses, 28 providers, shared IP addresses. Average across all platforms in the latest round 83.1%. Average and range calculated from the published rounds.

Deliverability features from the help docs

Eight points read from each provider’s own help pages on 13 September 2026. This replaces percentages as a buying basis: a feature can be checked and dated, a seed-list result no longer can. Every cell links to the article it was read from.

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Yes = the help page describes the feature. No = the help page says it is absent or points to an external tool. — = not found in the help pages; that does not mean the feature is absent.

As history: in Tooltester’s series MailerLite’s average of 90.9% was the highest of the five we compare; EmailOctopus was not in the series. The series ended in January 2024.

Read from the help pages, MailerLite offers three things EmailOctopus does not. The “Clean up inactive” view picks out by default those inactive for six months and removes them with one click. A dedicated IP and a deliverability team open up when you send at least 50,000 emails a week. EmailOctopus’s help page tells you to go through the list by hand and warm up the domain yourself. One point goes the other way: EmailOctopus gives a ready-made DMARC record, MailerLite shows an example and points to a consultant.

Most of deliverability is still the sender’s own responsibility — authentication, list quality and sending pace: what Gmail and Yahoo require of senders.

What the price difference buys

• Connectors. MailerLite states over 130 connectors. At EmailOctopus the direct connectors are a WordPress plugin and Zapier, and Shopify, for example, works only through Zapier — i.e. through one extra fee and one point of failure. Checked on the services’ own pages on 4–5 September 2026.
• Landing pages. Included in MailerLite’s price. EmailOctopus is a form and a mailing list, not a page tool.
• Automation. Both handle scheduled email sequences. EmailOctopus’s automations lack conditional branches, and MailerLite falls behind ActiveCampaign in multi-step automation and scoring. So neither is an automation choice.
• Neither has a CRM.

If none of these is a need for you, at MailerLite you pay for features that go unopened — and at a 10,000-subscriber list that is €516 a year.

Data location: both in the EU

MailerLite’s contracting party for EEA customers is Irish MailerLite Limited, and according to the privacy policy the data centre is in the EU (ISO 27001). EmailOctopus is operated by London-based Three Hearts Digital Ltd, but the lists are stored in AWS’s Irish data centre inside the EEA. Both read from the services’ own privacy policies on 3 September 2026.

The data location is therefore the same; the difference is in the contracting party: at MailerLite an EEA company, at EmailOctopus a United Kingdom company with data located in the EU. Both can be recorded briefly in your own documentation. What to require from the processor: email marketing and GDPR.

A third option for a large list

If the list is over 5,000 names and the newsletter goes out rarely, neither is the cheapest. Brevo bills for emails sent, so a 10,000-name list costs €28 a month at two newsletters a month — less than EmailOctopus’s €36 and under half of MailerLite’s €79. The turning point and its conditions: Brevo vs EmailOctopus.

And if, on the other hand, you sell a course or coaching, neither of these includes funnels or a course platform — Systeme.io does, and its free plan holds 2,000 contacts.

Which one for you