MailScouter

Research-led software review

Brevo review: strong multichannel value, with a pricing model buyers must read carefully.

A capable small-business platform for email campaigns, transactional messaging, basic CRM and multichannel automation—especially when you want several customer-communication tools under one login.

By Brian LarsenLast verified August 1, 2026Official sources checked: 10No paid placement
Visit BrevoRead the verdict

Link disclosure: MailScouter has no active affiliate relationship with this vendor. This button opens the official website.

Quick verdict

Brevo is compelling when one platform must cover more than newsletters.

Brevo's clearest advantage is breadth. A small business can run marketing campaigns, trigger transactional messages through SMTP or API, manage contacts and deals, build automations and add channels such as SMS without immediately stitching together several vendors.

The buying decision is less simple than the low starting prices suggest. Brevo's current paid tiers combine monthly email volume with a contact-storage ceiling. The lowest Starter and Standard tiers store 500 contacts, while higher send tiers unlock larger databases. That is materially different from the older idea that Brevo pricing is based only on email sends.

For many small businesses, Standard is the plan where Brevo becomes a more complete marketing system because it adds unlimited-contact automation, A/B testing, a landing page, send-time optimization and advanced reporting. Starter is cheaper, but several features remain limited or require add-ons.

Best for

  • Small businesses combining marketing and transactional email
  • Teams wanting email, SMS, CRM and automation in one platform
  • WooCommerce and BigCommerce merchants with moderate complexity
  • Businesses that value send-volume flexibility more than a creator-first workflow

Look elsewhere when

  • Newsletter publishers prioritizing audience monetization
  • Businesses expecting unlimited automation on the cheapest paid plan
  • Teams needing many landing pages or phone support at a low price
  • Buyers who assume the paid plans store unlimited contacts at every email tier
Our bottom line

Choose Brevo when you need practical email marketing plus transactional delivery, CRM and additional messaging channels in one system. Model both monthly sends and stored contacts before choosing a tier, and compare a simpler platform if campaigns and basic automations are all you need.

Brevo pricing checked August 2026

Brevo pricing: low entry prices, but two limits shape the bill.

Brevo publishes five marketing plans: Free, Starter, Standard, Professional and Enterprise. Paid pricing is influenced by the monthly email allowance you select, and that tier also determines the maximum number of contacts you can store. Add-ons for branding removal, sales tools, SMS, WhatsApp, dedicated IPs and additional capabilities can change the final cost.

Free

$0

Best fit: Testing Brevo, transactional sending and very small campaign programs

Limits: 300 email sends/day; up to 100,000 stored contacts; 1 user; automation entry capped at 2,000 unique contacts

Includes: Email and SMS campaigns, transactional email and SMS, drag-and-drop editor, basic analytics, outbound webhooks and limited sales features

Watch for: Unused daily sends do not roll over, campaigns above 300 recipients require manual requeueing, and Brevo branding remains on emails.

Starter

From $9/mo

Best fit: Small senders that need to remove the daily send cap

Limits: Starts with 5,000 monthly emails and storage for up to 500 contacts; higher email tiers raise the contact ceiling

Includes: No daily sending limit, web push for up to 1,000 targeted subscribers per campaign, global data feeds and one conversion metric

Watch for: Removing Brevo branding and Sales Essentials are paid add-ons, and Standard is the first plan officially listing unlimited-contact marketing automation.

Standard

From $18/mo

Best fit: Growing small businesses that need complete automation and reporting

Limits: Starts with 5,000 monthly emails and up to 500 stored contacts; scales to 500,000 monthly emails and larger contact tiers

Includes: Unlimited-contact marketing automation, one landing page, A/B testing, AI send-time optimization, advanced analytics and priority email support

Watch for: Extra user seats are add-ons, and the selected email tier still controls how many contacts the account can store.

Professional

From $499/mo

Best fit: High-volume multichannel teams with advanced data and support needs

Limits: 150,000 to 10 million monthly emails; up to 2 million stored contacts depending on tier

Includes: 10 seats, WhatsApp, web and mobile push, AI segmentation, contact scoring, 10 landing pages, analytics dashboards and phone support

Watch for: The jump from Standard is substantial, and several enterprise-style capabilities still require separate add-ons.

Enterprise

Custom

Best fit: Large organizations needing governance, security and custom data infrastructure

Limits: Custom send volume and unlimited contact storage

Includes: Sub-organizations, unlimited seats, custom objects, data warehouse and SFTP options, SAML SSO, SLA and customer success support

Watch for: Requires sales scoping and a custom commercial agreement.

The contact-storage catch

Do not budget from monthly email volume alone. On the first Starter and Standard tiers, 5,000 monthly emails allow storage for up to 500 contacts; 10,000 emails allow up to 1,500 contacts; and 15,000 emails allow up to 2,500 contacts. Brevo says you cannot downgrade to a lower email tier while your stored-contact count exceeds that tier's ceiling. Check both numbers before migrating a large database.

Capability assessment

Brevo's value comes from combining marketing, transactional and sales workflows.

Email campaigns

8/10

Brevo includes a drag-and-drop editor, reusable sections, templates, scheduling and campaign reporting. Standard adds A/B testing and AI send-time optimization, making it the more complete campaign tier for a growing business.

Marketing automation

8/10

Automations can react to subscriptions, page visits, ecommerce behavior, completed orders and other events, then send messages, update contact data, create tasks or branch by conditions. Free is capped at 2,000 unique contacts entering active automations; Standard removes the contact limit.

CRM and contact management

7/10

Brevo combines contact profiles, lists, dynamically updated segments, deals and basic sales tools. The Free plan limits open deals, pipelines and connected inboxes, while fuller sales functionality is sold through separate Essentials or Advanced add-ons.

Transactional email

9/10

Transactional email is a genuine differentiator. Brevo supports SMTP relay, API delivery and webhooks for password resets, receipts, order confirmations and other triggered messages. Marketing and transactional sends draw from the account's email credits.

Multichannel messaging

8/10

Email, SMS, chat, push and—on higher plans—WhatsApp can sit in the same customer platform. The benefit is operational consolidation; the trade-off is that message credits, plan access and regional pricing vary by channel.

Ecommerce

7/10

Official WooCommerce and BigCommerce integrations sync contacts, orders and product data and can support store-aware segmentation and abandoned-cart workflows. Ecommerce specialists such as Omnisend and Klaviyo still offer a more focused lifecycle-marketing experience.

Landing pages and lead capture

6/10

Brevo supports signup forms and a landing-page builder, but landing pages are absent from Free and Starter. Standard includes one landing page, while Professional includes ten, so high-volume lead-generation teams should model this limit carefully.

Support and value

7/10

Email support is available broadly, Standard receives priority email support, and phone support is restricted to Professional and Enterprise. Entry pricing is attractive, but add-ons and the coupled send/contact tiers can make the real cost less obvious than the headline price.

Trade-offs

Brevo pros and cons

Pros

  • Marketing email, transactional email, CRM and multiple messaging channels are available within one platform.
  • The Free plan stores up to 100,000 contacts and includes 300 daily email sends.
  • SMTP and API support make Brevo useful for websites and applications as well as newsletters.
  • Standard adds meaningful growth features at a relatively low published starting price.
  • Segments can update automatically from contact attributes, engagement and ecommerce events.
  • Official integrations support WooCommerce, BigCommerce and several other commerce systems.
  • Prepaid email and message credits offer flexibility for occasional or seasonal sends.

Cons

  • Paid email tiers also impose contact-storage ceilings, which can surprise buyers migrating a large database.
  • The Free plan's 300-send daily cap is awkward for newsletters with more than 300 recipients.
  • Starter keeps Brevo branding unless you buy an add-on and does not unlock Standard's full automation feature set.
  • Landing-page allowances are limited until the expensive Professional plan.
  • Sales functionality becomes more complex and costly once the free limits are exceeded.
  • Phone support is reserved for Professional and Enterprise customers.
  • The broad product range can feel less focused than a specialist creator, publisher or ecommerce platform.

What we have not tested

This is a documentation-led Brevo review—not a claim of long-term account use.

MailScouter verified Brevo's published plans, limits, product documentation, support access, automation model and official integration material. We have not yet operated a long-term Brevo account, measured independent inbox placement, timed support responses or compared editor performance through a repeatable hands-on benchmark.

We therefore do not publish a deliverability percentage or claim that Brevo is objectively easy based only on vendor copy. Deliverability also depends on authentication, list quality, consent, content, sending behavior and reputation. The verdict focuses on documented capability, pricing structure and buyer fit.

Before you choose

The most relevant Brevo alternatives

MailerLite

Best when: Small businesses prioritizing simplicity and an approachable campaign workflow

A more focused email-marketing product with forms, landing pages and automation, but less CRM and transactional depth.

Read the MailerLite review

ActiveCampaign

Best when: Teams prioritizing advanced automation and sales journeys

A deeper automation-first option, usually with a steeper learning curve and more complex pricing.

Mailchimp

Best when: Established teams relying on a mature integration ecosystem and advanced Standard-plan data tools

A broad marketing benchmark with stronger ecosystem recognition, but a contact-counting model that also requires careful cost control.

Read the Mailchimp review

Omnisend

Best when: Ecommerce stores that want store-native lifecycle campaigns

A more focused ecommerce experience with prebuilt commerce workflows and revenue-oriented reporting.

Read the Omnisend review

Methodology

How this review was produced

  1. Search intent: We structured the review around the questions buyers search before choosing Brevo: pricing, free-plan limits, automation, CRM, transactional email, strengths, weaknesses and alternatives.
  2. Primary-source verification: Plans, contact limits, send limits, automation access, support and integrations were checked against current Brevo pricing and Help Center documentation.
  3. Buyer-fit analysis: We compared Brevo's product structure with the needs of small businesses, creators, publishers and ecommerce teams rather than scoring features in isolation.
  4. Uncertainty disclosure: Hands-on performance, deliverability and support-speed claims are excluded until MailScouter completes a repeatable account-based test.

Common questions

Brevo FAQ

Is Brevo free in 2026?

Yes. Brevo's Free plan has no time limit. It allows up to 300 email sends per day, stores up to 100,000 contacts and lets up to 2,000 unique contacts enter active automations. It includes Brevo branding and only one user seat.

How much does Brevo cost?

Brevo currently lists Starter from $9 per month, Standard from $18, Professional from $499 and Enterprise at custom pricing. The final price depends on monthly email volume, the associated contact-storage tier, billing choice and any add-ons.

Does Brevo charge by contacts or emails?

Both matter on the current paid structure. You choose a monthly email tier, and that tier also sets the maximum number of contacts the account can store. The Free plan is unusual because it stores up to 100,000 contacts while keeping a 300-send daily limit.

Is Brevo the same as Sendinblue?

Brevo is the current brand name of the platform previously known as Sendinblue. Existing comparisons and older guides may still use the former name.

Does Brevo include a CRM?

Yes. Brevo includes contact and company records, deals, pipelines, tasks, meetings and basic sales tools. The Free plan has limits, and broader sales capabilities are available through paid Sales Essentials and Sales Advanced add-ons.

Can Brevo send transactional emails?

Yes. Brevo supports transactional email through its API, SMTP relay and webhooks. Typical use cases include password resets, order confirmations, receipts and shipping notifications. Marketing and transactional emails use the account's email credits.

Who is Brevo best for?

Brevo is best suited to small and midsize businesses that want campaigns, automation, transactional email, contact management and additional channels in one platform. It is less naturally suited to newsletter-media businesses or stores requiring the deepest ecommerce lifecycle tooling.

What is the biggest drawback of Brevo?

The most important drawback is pricing clarity. The low starting price can hide contact-storage ceilings, branding or sales add-ons and plan-level feature limits. Buyers should model stored contacts, monthly sends, automation volume and required channels together.

Primary sources

Sources checked for this review

Pricing and product details can change. These are the official pages used for the current version.

Ready to compare the fit?

Brevo is worth shortlisting when one system must cover marketing and transactional communication.

Check the live Brevo pricing page with your expected monthly sends, stored contacts, automation volume and required add-ons before choosing a plan.

Visit Brevo