ActiveCampaign Pricing (2026): Every Plan Explained Honestly

Last Updated: 11 Jul 2026

Let me save you the frustration of reading ActiveCampaign’s pricing page three times and still not being sure what you will actually pay.

Because here is the honest thing about ActiveCampaign pricing: the headline numbers are not the real numbers.

The Starter plan says $15 a month. But the Starter plan is barely usable for real marketing. The Plus plan says $49 a month. But Plus at 10,000 contacts is $189 a month. Add the CRM. Add SMS. Add custom reporting. Suddenly you are paying $300 to $400 a month and wondering what happened.

I am going to break down every plan, every contact tier, every add-on, and every cost that does not show up on the main pricing page. By the end of this guide you will know exactly what ActiveCampaign costs for your specific situation — and whether it is worth it.

How ActiveCampaign Pricing Works

Before looking at the plan prices, you need to understand the pricing model. Because this is where most people get confused.

ActiveCampaign charges you based on three things:

The plan tier you choose — Starter, Plus, Professional, or Enterprise. Each unlocks more features. Moving up costs significantly more.

How many contacts you have — the more contacts, the higher the price on every plan. This is the number that catches people off guard the most. Going from 1,000 to 2,500 contacts does not add a small amount — it often doubles or triples your cost depending on the tier.

Whether you pay monthly or annually — annual billing saves you 20% compared to paying month to month. Most prices you see advertised are the annual billing price.

There is no free plan. There is a 14-day free trial based on the Professional plan with no credit card required. Once the trial ends, you choose a paid plan or lose access.

The November 2025 Billing Change — Read This First

Before we get into plan prices, there is something important that happened in November 2025 that affects every new ActiveCampaign account.

Before November 2025, ActiveCampaign only charged for active subscribers — people who are actually on your list and can receive emails.

After November 2025, new accounts are charged for all contacts — including unsubscribed contacts, bounced contacts, and unconfirmed contacts.

That means if someone unsubscribes from your list, they still count toward your billable contact limit until you manually archive them. Archiving has monthly limits based on your plan. This is the same billing practice that Mailchimp has been widely criticised for — and it is a real cost that can push your actual bill 10 to 20 percent higher than what your emailable contact count suggests.

If you signed up before November 2025 — you are on the old active-contact-only billing and it stays that way as long as you do not change plans.

If you are signing up today — factor this into your budget. Keep your list clean from day one. Archive unsubscribed contacts regularly. Otherwise you are paying for people you can no longer email.

ActiveCampaign Starter Plan

Price: $15 a month for 1,000 contacts (annual billing)

The Starter plan is ActiveCampaign’s entry point. It is also the plan that disappoints the most people.

Not because it is broken. Because it is intentionally restricted in ways that make real marketing automation almost impossible.

What you get on Starter:

Email campaigns and newsletters with the full drag-and-drop editor. Access to 150+ email templates. Basic automation workflows. A/B testing on campaigns. Site tracking to see which pages contacts visit. A basic marketing CRM. 900+ integrations. One user seat. Email sends capped at 10 times your contact count per month — so at 1,000 contacts you can send 10,000 emails a month.

The five-action automation cap — the biggest limitation:

Every automation on the Starter plan is limited to five actions. Five.

A basic welcome sequence that sends an email, waits two days, sends a follow-up, waits three days, and sends a final email is already five actions. If you want to add any conditional logic — “if they clicked, do this; if they did not, do that” — you are over the limit before you have built anything meaningful.

This is the most common complaint from new ActiveCampaign users. They sign up for Starter expecting to build real sequences and hit the ceiling within days.

What else Starter does not include:

No landing pages. No site messages. No AI writing tools. No advanced segmentation. No lead scoring. No CRM deal pipelines. No conditional content in emails. No advanced reporting. No revenue attribution.

Who Starter is actually right for:

Honestly — almost nobody running a real business. The Starter plan exists to get you in the door at a low price point. It is fine for learning the platform during the first few weeks. It is not a viable long-term option for any business that needs email automation to do actual work.

The only genuine use case for staying on Starter long-term is if you run a very small newsletter where you just send broadcast emails with no automation — and even then, MailerLite at $10 a month gives you more for less.

Starter plan pricing by contact count:

ActiveCampaign Plus Plan

Price: $49 a month for 1,000 contacts (annual billing)

Plus is where ActiveCampaign actually starts delivering on its reputation. This is the plan most serious users should start on — and the one the platform is really built around.

The jump from Starter to Plus is $34 a month at 1,000 contacts. At 10,000 contacts it is a $40 jump. That difference is worth it if you are going to use what Plus unlocks.

What Plus adds over Starter:

Unlimited automation actions — no five-step cap. This is the single most important upgrade. You can now build real multi-step sequences with conditional branching, goal steps, and complex logic.

Landing pages. You can build opt-in pages and sales pages directly inside ActiveCampaign without paying for a separate tool.

Lead scoring. Assign points to contacts based on what they do — open emails, click links, visit pages — and trigger automations when they hit certain scores.

Advanced segmentation. Build segments using more conditions and more data types than Starter allows.

Site messages. Show targeted pop-up messages to contacts when they visit specific pages on your website.

Generative AI tools. The AI email builder, AI writing assistant, and AI automation builder are all available from Plus.

Retargeting ads. Sync contact lists with Facebook and Google for retargeting campaigns.

Revenue reporting. See how much money your email campaigns are generating.

One user seat still. This becomes a real constraint for teams. If you need multiple people managing campaigns, Plus is already limiting.

Who Plus is right for:

Small to mid-size businesses running email automation seriously. Service businesses, SaaS companies, coaches, and agencies that need welcome sequences, nurture flows, lead scoring, and landing pages all working together. Solo operators and small teams with one or two people managing the email marketing.

If you have decided ActiveCampaign is the right platform — start here, not on Starter.

Plus plan pricing by contact count:

ActiveCampaign Professional Plan

Price: $79 a month for 1,000 contacts (annual billing)

Professional is where ActiveCampaign becomes a serious marketing platform for teams who want to optimise, not just run.

The jump from Plus to Professional at 1,000 contacts is $30 a month. At higher contact counts, the gap widens. At 10,000 contacts, Professional is $375 a month compared to Plus at $189. That is almost double.

What Professional adds over Plus:

Predictive sending. Instead of sending to everyone at the same scheduled time, Professional sends each individual contact’s email at the time they are statistically most likely to open it based on their past behaviour. On large lists, this alone can produce meaningfully better open rates without changing a single word of your email.

Conditional content in emails. Show different content blocks to different subscribers inside the same email based on their tags, data, or behaviour. One email that reads differently to a new lead versus a long-term customer.

A/B testing inside automations. Test different workflow paths against each other — not just email subject lines, but entire branches of your automation — to see which converts better. This is how you stop guessing and start knowing what works.

Advanced segmentation and reporting. More conditions, more data, more ways to cut your list.

Conversion tracking and attribution. See which specific emails and automations are driving purchases and revenue, not just opens.

Split automations. Send contacts down different automation paths automatically and measure which path performs better.

Priority support. Faster response times from the support team.

Three user seats. The first meaningful increase from one seat. Better for small teams.

Email send limit increases to 12 times your contact count per month.

Who Professional is right for:

Growing businesses that have been on Plus for a while and are ready to start optimising rather than just running. Teams where multiple people manage campaigns. Businesses where a 10 to 15 percent improvement in open rates from predictive sending would add meaningful revenue. Any business using automation for sales sequences where A/B testing automation paths would help identify what is converting.

If you find yourself asking “which version of this sequence actually works better” — that question is your signal to upgrade to Professional.

Professional plan pricing by contact count:

ActiveCampaign Enterprise Plan

Price: $145 a month for 1,000 contacts (annual billing)

Enterprise is for large organisations with complex needs. It is not a plan most small or mid-size businesses should be evaluating seriously unless they have a specific requirement that only Enterprise unlocks.

What Enterprise adds over Professional:

Salesforce and Microsoft Dynamics CRM integrations. If your organisation runs on Salesforce, this is the plan that connects ActiveCampaign to it natively.

Custom objects. Extend the ActiveCampaign data model to track custom entity types — product tiers, contract values, industry verticals — natively inside the platform rather than managing them in spreadsheets or external tools.

HIPAA compliance. For healthcare businesses and any organisation that handles protected health information — this is the plan that provides the Business Associate Agreement and compliance infrastructure you need.

Dedicated account team. A named account manager who knows your business.

Five user seats included.

Custom mail server domain. Send from your own dedicated email infrastructure rather than shared ActiveCampaign servers.

Email send limit increases to 15 times your contact count per month.

Custom reporting. Build dashboards around the specific metrics your business tracks rather than using pre-built reports.

Who Enterprise is right for:

Large organisations with Salesforce or Dynamics already embedded in their operations. Healthcare and regulated industry businesses that need HIPAA compliance. Organisations with five or more people managing campaigns. Any business that has outgrown Professional and needs the custom data model or dedicated infrastructure.

For contact lists under 50,000, Enterprise is available at fixed pricing. Above 50,000, it moves to custom pricing negotiated with the sales team.

Enterprise plan pricing by contact count:

For lists above 50,000 contacts, contact ActiveCampaign’s sales team for custom pricing.

Add-Ons: The Costs That Do Not Show Up on the Plan Page

This is the section most pricing guides skip. It should not be skipped — because the add-ons can easily add 30 to 50 percent to your monthly bill.

CRM Add-Ons

ActiveCampaign’s CRM features — deal pipelines, task management, sales sequences — are not fully included in the base plans. They are available as paid add-ons.

The Pipelines add-on starts at $49 a month. It includes deal pipelines, contact and lead scoring, win probability tracking, and task management. This is the add-on most small sales teams actually need.

The Sales Engagement add-on starts at $85 a month. It adds automated sales sequences, email tracking for individual sales reps, call recording, and deeper CRM functionality. Built for sales teams using ActiveCampaign as an actual CRM rather than just a marketing automation tool.

If you need both: $134 a month in add-ons on top of your base plan price. A Plus plan at 5,000 contacts with both CRM add-ons is $149 + $134 = $283 a month before any other add-ons.

SMS Add-On

SMS marketing is available as an add-on on Plus plans and above. You purchase SMS credits in addition to your base plan.

1,000 SMS credits cost approximately $16.83 a month. The cost per message depends on the destination country — US messages are cheaper than international ones. Budget around $0.015 to $0.045 per message depending on where your subscribers are.

Custom Reporting Add-On

Custom reporting — the ability to build your own dashboards and reports beyond the standard pre-built views — starts at $159 a month. This is not included in any base plan except Enterprise.

For most businesses, the standard reports are enough. If you run a large operation where marketing attribution and custom dashboards matter at a leadership level — this is meaningful but expensive.

Transactional Email Add-On

If you need to send system emails — order confirmations, password resets, account notifications — alongside your marketing emails, ActiveCampaign’s transactional email add-on through Postmark starts at $15 a month for 10,000 emails.

WhatsApp Add-On

WhatsApp marketing and automation is available as an add-on that can be combined with Plus, Professional, or Enterprise plans. Pricing is based on message volume and region. This is a newer addition and pricing varies — check directly with ActiveCampaign sales for current rates.

What Does ActiveCampaign Really Cost? Real Examples

Let me show you what actual businesses end up paying — not the headline plan price.

A small service business: 2,500 contacts, needs real automation and a basic CRM

• Plus plan at 2,500 contacts: $95/month
• Pipelines CRM add-on: $49/month
• Total: $144/month ($1,728/year)

A growing SaaS company: 10,000 contacts, needs automation, CRM, and SMS

• Plus plan at 10,000 contacts: $189/month
• Pipelines CRM add-on: $49/month
• SMS (5,000 credits/month): ~$84/month
• Total: $322/month ($3,864/year)

A marketing team: 25,000 contacts, needs predictive sending, automation testing, and 3 users

• Professional plan at 25,000 contacts: $545/month
• Total: $545/month ($6,540/year)

A larger B2B company: 10,000 contacts, Salesforce integration, 5 users

• Enterprise plan at 10,000 contacts: $589/month
• Total: $589/month ($7,068/year)

These are clean examples without extra SMS, custom reporting, or additional user seats. Real bills tend to be higher.

Monthly vs Annual Billing

Annual billing saves 20% compared to monthly billing across all plans.

That sounds straightforward. But there is something worth knowing before you commit to an annual plan.

First — ActiveCampaign does not offer refunds on annual plans if you decide to cancel mid-year. You pay for the full year whether you use the remaining months or not.

Second — multiple reviewers describe difficulty downgrading between plans on an annual commitment. If you sign up for Plus annually and six months in decide you want Starter — you may be told you need to wait until renewal. One reviewer described wanting to downgrade and being told they could not until the next annual cycle. Know this before you commit.

Third — your price is locked for the year at the contact tier you start on. If your list grows past your contact tier during the year, you move to the higher tier for the next billing cycle.

Recommendation: if you are new to ActiveCampaign and not completely certain it is the right platform — start monthly. Pay the 20% premium for a few months while you confirm it works for your business. Then switch to annual when you are confident. The savings over a full year are real but not worth locking yourself in before you are sure.

ActiveCampaign Discounts

Nonprofit discount: ActiveCampaign offers a 20% discount for registered nonprofits. Contact their sales team with proof of nonprofit status to apply it.

Annual billing discount: 20% off every plan compared to monthly billing.

Trial: 14-day free trial on the Professional plan. No credit card required. This is genuinely useful — you get to test the Professional-level features before deciding which plan to start on.

Startup discounts: Occasionally available through accelerator programs and startup partnerships. Check GetAIPerks and similar platforms for any current ActiveCampaign credits or offers before signing up.

Negotiation at renewal: Multiple long-term users report successfully negotiating their renewal price — particularly at higher contact tiers where the cost is significant. If you are on a large plan and renewing annually, it is always worth asking the sales team whether there is a retention discount available.

Email Send Limits by Plan

This is another cost that catches people off guard. ActiveCampaign caps how many emails you can send per month based on your contact count and plan tier.

What this means in practice: on Plus at 1,000 contacts, you can send 10,000 emails a month. If you have 1,000 contacts and send weekly, that is 4,000 emails — well under the cap. If you send daily, that is 30,000 emails — you would need to upgrade to a higher contact tier or purchase additional send credits.

Additional email sends can be purchased in packs of 5,000 for a small fee if you hit your limit in a given month.

For most businesses sending two to four campaigns a month, the send limits are not a constraint. For businesses with very high sending frequency — daily emails, triggered transactional sequences — factor this into your plan selection.

User Seats by Plan

Starter and Plus giving you only one user seat is a real constraint for any team larger than a solo operator. If two people need to manage campaigns, you are either sharing login credentials — which is a bad idea from a security and audit trail perspective — or you need to upgrade to Professional for three seats.

Additional user seats can be purchased as an add-on. Check current pricing with ActiveCampaign directly as this varies by plan and region.

Which Plan Should You Choose?

Let me make this simple.

Choose Starter if: You are in the first two weeks of your trial and want to learn the platform before committing to a paid plan. There is almost no reason to stay on Starter long-term for a business running real marketing.

Choose Plus if: You are ready to use ActiveCampaign properly and need real automation, landing pages, lead scoring, and the AI tools. This is the right starting plan for most solo operators and small teams. If you are evaluating ActiveCampaign for the first time and have decided it is the right fit — start here.

Choose Professional if: You have been on Plus for at least six months, your automation is working, and you want to start optimising — predictive sending, automation A/B testing, conditional content, conversion attribution. Also choose Professional if you need three user seats from day one or if advanced segmentation is critical to how you target.

Choose Enterprise if: You are already using Salesforce or Microsoft Dynamics and need native integration. Or you need HIPAA compliance. Or your organisation has five or more people managing the email function. Or your contact list is large enough that the custom infrastructure and dedicated account team are worth the premium.

If you are a small business choosing between Starter and Plus — choose Plus and do not look back. The five-action automation cap on Starter makes it a trial plan, not a real plan.

The Real Cost of ActiveCampaign vs What You Get

Let me be honest about what the pricing trajectory looks like.

At 1,000 contacts on Plus — $49 a month — ActiveCampaign is competitive with most alternatives and offers the best automation in its price range.

At 10,000 contacts on Plus — $189 a month — it starts feeling expensive compared to MailerLite at $65 a month for the same list size.

At 25,000 contacts on Professional — $545 a month — you need to be absolutely certain the platform is generating revenue that justifies the cost.

The businesses that stay on ActiveCampaign at scale and feel the price is worth it are almost always the ones using the full depth of the automation, the CRM, the lead scoring, and the reporting. They are not just sending newsletters — they are running multi-touch customer journeys that are provably converting. For those businesses, the cost is defensible.

The businesses that leave ActiveCampaign are usually the ones who signed up expecting to use all of it and ended up using a fraction of it. They are paying for a platform that could do everything and using it to send monthly newsletters. For those businesses, the cost is hard to justify.

Before you commit to a high-contact-count plan, ask yourself honestly: which features in my plan am I actually using every month? If the answer is “just the email editor and a simple welcome sequence” — you are probably overbuying.

Better Options If ActiveCampaign Is Too Expensive

If you have run the numbers and ActiveCampaign does not fit your budget — or you want to compare before committing — here are the platforms worth considering at different price points and use cases.

MailerLite — Best value for small businesses and newsletters

MailerLite gives you email marketing, automation, landing pages, a website builder, and digital product selling starting at $10 a month for 500 subscribers. At 10,000 subscribers it costs $65 a month — compared to ActiveCampaign Plus at $189 a month for the same list size.

The automation is capable for most standard use cases — welcome sequences, re-engagement campaigns, post-purchase flows. It is not as deep as ActiveCampaign’s conditional logic and it does not have a real CRM. But for small businesses whose main needs are a clean editor, reliable automation, and landing pages — MailerLite delivers more for less with a gentler learning curve.

Brevo — Best for businesses that want email, SMS, and CRM without the contact-based pricing

Brevo charges based on how many emails you send — not how many contacts you store. If you have a large list that you do not email every week, this model is dramatically cheaper than ActiveCampaign.

Full automation is available from $18 a month on the Business plan. You also get SMS, WhatsApp messaging, live chat, and a basic CRM included. For businesses that need multi-channel marketing without paying ActiveCampaign prices — Brevo is the most direct alternative.

Klaviyo — Best for ecommerce stores on Shopify or WooCommerce

If you run an online store and the main reason you are looking at ActiveCampaign is for abandoned cart flows, post-purchase sequences, and product-triggered automation — Klaviyo does all of that better. The real-time Shopify integration, predictive analytics, and ecommerce-specific flow templates are things ActiveCampaign’s Shopify integration cannot fully match.

The pricing is similar to ActiveCampaign at comparable list sizes. The ecommerce depth is not.

GetResponse — Best for all-in-one marketing at a lower starting price

GetResponse offers webinars, landing pages, sales funnels, and automation from $59 a month on the Marketer plan — and the automation is deeper than what most Starter and entry-Plus ActiveCampaign users actually use. If you want more tools in one place at a price that sits between MailerLite and ActiveCampaign — GetResponse is worth evaluating.

HubSpot — Best if you need marketing, sales, and service unified

HubSpot is not cheaper than ActiveCampaign at the feature level where it is actually powerful — Marketing Hub Professional starts at $890 a month with a mandatory $3,000 onboarding fee. But if you need your marketing, sales, and customer service teams all working from the same platform and the same contact record — HubSpot’s architecture does this better than ActiveCampaign’s CRM add-on model.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is the cheapest ActiveCampaign plan?

The Starter plan starts at $15 a month for 1,000 contacts on annual billing — or $19 a month on monthly billing. However, the five-action automation cap makes Starter nearly useless for real marketing sequences. Most businesses should budget for Plus at $49 a month from the start.

Does ActiveCampaign have a free plan?

No. There is a 14-day free trial based on the Professional plan with no credit card required. There is no permanent free tier.

How much does ActiveCampaign cost for 10,000 contacts?

On annual billing: Starter is $149 a month, Plus is $189 a month, Professional is $375 a month, and Enterprise is $589 a month. These are base plan prices — add-ons for CRM, SMS, and custom reporting are on top.

Does ActiveCampaign charge for unsubscribed contacts?

For accounts created after November 3, 2025 — yes. New accounts are billed for all contacts including unsubscribed, bounced, and unconfirmed. Accounts created before that date keep the old active-contact-only billing. Archive inactive contacts regularly to keep your billable count accurate.

What is the best ActiveCampaign plan for a small business?

Plus at 1,000 or 2,500 contacts is where most small businesses should start. It unlocks unlimited automation, landing pages, lead scoring, and the AI tools — the features that make ActiveCampaign worth choosing over cheaper alternatives.

Can I get a discount on ActiveCampaign?

Yes. Annual billing saves 20%. Nonprofits get an additional 20% discount. Long-term customers can sometimes negotiate a retention discount at renewal. Startup credits are occasionally available through accelerator programs.

How do I cancel ActiveCampaign?

Go to Settings, then Billing. To cancel, you need to contact the support team directly — there is no one-click cancellation from the dashboard. Multiple reviewers describe this process taking several days. If you are on an annual plan, you will not receive a refund for the remaining months. Plan your cancellation timing accordingly.

Is ActiveCampaign worth it?

For businesses running serious marketing automation where the platform’s depth is genuinely being used — yes, usually. For businesses using it as a newsletter tool with a basic welcome sequence — there are better-value alternatives at lower price points. Run the numbers for your specific contact count and the features you will actually use before committing.