HubSpot vs Mailchimp: Pricing, CRM and Email Compared

These two get compared because both will send your email. That's about where the similarity ends. Mailchimp, owned by Intuit since 2021, is an email and marketing tool with a plan ladder priced by contact count. HubSpot's Marketing Hub is one part of a customer platform, sitting on the same CRM as its sales, service and content products. So the real question isn't which sends better email. It's whether you need a CRM.

The short answer

• Choose Mailchimp for local businesses, creators, agencies and online stores where a campaign, not a sales call, drives the next purchase.
• Choose HubSpot for B2B and sales-led teams that need contacts, companies, deals and campaigns in one record.
• Start on HubSpot's free tools if you are not sure: 2 users, a free CRM and 2,000 sends a month cost nothing to test.

HubSpot vs Mailchimp at a glance

Pricing and plans

HubSpot Marketing Hub pricing (as of November 2026)

Free is $0 for up to 2 users, no credit card. Starter is priced per seat: HubSpot's catalog lists a core seat at $20 a month. New customers currently get limited-time offers: $7 a seat a month paid annually on the pricing page, and $10 a seat a month on the Marketing Hub product page. It includes 500 HubSpot Credits and 1,000 marketing contacts. Professional includes 3 core seats, 3,000 credits and 2,000 marketing contacts for $890 a month with an annual commitment paid monthly, or $800 a month paid annually. HubSpot's catalog lists extra core seats at $50 a month, and the pricing page shows $45 a month with annual payment selected. There's also a required one-time $3,000 onboarding fee. Enterprise starts at $3,600 a month with 5 core seats, 5,000 credits and 10,000 marketing contacts, extra core seats from $75 a month and a required $7,000 onboarding fee. There's a 14-day trial of the marketing software too. See HubSpot pricing.

Mailchimp pricing (as of November 2026)

Free covers up to 250 contacts. Essentials starts at $13 a month and Standard at $20 a month, both for up to 500 contacts and both with a 14-day free trial that needs a payment method. Premium starts at $350 a month for 10,000 contacts, with a current offer of $297.50 a month for the first 12 months. Prices rise with your contact tier, and Mailchimp is advertising 15% off on larger contact tiers, so read the offer terms. Infrequent senders can skip the subscription with Pay As You Go email credits, which come with Essentials features. Nonprofits can ask for a 15% discount. See Mailchimp pricing.

Look closely at the small team case. Three people on HubSpot Starter cost $60 a month at list, or $21 a month on the annual offer while it lasts. Three seats come with Mailchimp Essentials at $13 for 500 contacts, against 1,000 marketing contacts on Starter. Neither is expensive. Then look at the next step up: moving from Starter to Professional is a jump from tens of dollars to at least $800 a month plus $3,000, and that's the moment most small teams should stop and do the math.

How contacts and sends are counted

This is the detail that changes your bill. Mailchimp counts subscribed, unsubscribed and non-subscribed contacts across all audiences. Cleaned, archived and deleted contacts don't count. If you pass your limit during a billing cycle, service continues and you see an additional charge; on Free, sending is held until you upgrade or trim the list. So archive people who've gone quiet, because unsubscribed contacts still cost money.

HubSpot splits contacts in two. Only marketing contacts count toward your tier, and contacts you don't plan to market to can be set as non-marketing and aren't billed. They can still get sales one-to-one emails, sequences and transactional email. The catch is that you have to manage that status, and HubSpot's help docs mention automatic tier upgrades. Monthly sends are 5 times your contact tier on Starter, 10 times on Professional and 20 times on Enterprise. Mailchimp gives 10, 12 and 15 times on Essentials, Standard and Premium.

Automation

Mailchimp's Free plan gets a preview of flows. Essentials caps a flow at 4 steps. Standard and Premium allow up to 200 flows, with multiple starting points and branching, plus predictive segments. For a welcome series, abandoned cart reminders and a win-back flow, Standard does the job at a price most small businesses can carry.

HubSpot's free tools allow 1 automated email action and Starter up to 10, which is thin. Real workflows start at Professional: up to 300 for 10 teams, and they act on CRM data, not just email. A workflow can enroll everyone who submits a form, send a marketing email and assign the contact to a salesperson. Enterprise goes to 1,000 workflows for 300 teams and adds behavioral events and predictive lead scoring. If routing and lead scoring aren't on your list, you won't get your money's worth.

CRM and sales

HubSpot's free CRM has contact management, deal tracking, tasks and pipeline views with no expiry date, and that free CRM is the strongest thing in this comparison for a small B2B team. Sales activity and campaigns live on one record, so a rep can see which emails a lead opened before a call. Mailchimp's marketing CRM centers on contact profiles, tags, surveys, segmentation and an inbox, and its plan comparison lists no deal pipeline. It connects to Salesforce if your sales team already lives there. Weighing HubSpot against a B2C marketing tool instead? Read Klaviyo vs HubSpot.

Channels

Both go past email, in different directions. Mailchimp includes landing pages, forms and social posting on every plan, with social scheduling and Google retargeting ads on Standard and Premium. SMS is an add-on from Essentials in select countries including the US, Canada and the UK; you need an approved application, credits don't roll over, and MMS needs Standard or Premium in the US or Canada. Transactional email is another paid add-on, for Standard and Premium.

HubSpot adds live chat, ad management and conversational bots across its editions. Social media tools and WhatsApp (up to 1,000 messages a month) sit on Professional and Enterprise. SMS for marketers is a paid add-on on certain plans, sent from US-based numbers to +1 numbers only, which rules it out for most international programs.

AI features

HubSpot sells AI by the credit. Each paid edition includes an allowance (500, 3,000 or 5,000), and you can buy packs or pay as you go. Agents include Customer Agent, plus Content Agent and Nurture Agent in beta on Professional and Enterprise, and Agent Builder from Starter up. Mailchimp lists generative AI features as a no-cost add-on on Standard and Premium, with Write with AI in the editor, send time optimization and Intuit Intelligence in beta with limited availability on paid plans. It also connects to assistants including ChatGPT and Claude. Both move quickly here, so check what your plan actually includes before you buy on an AI promise.

Reporting and integrations

Mailchimp offers basic reports on all plans, with custom reports and anomaly detection on Standard and Premium, and lists 300+ integrations including Shopify, WooCommerce and Stripe. HubSpot lists 2,000+ apps in its marketplace and a two-way Salesforce sync. Custom reporting starts at Professional (up to 100 reports), and multi-touch revenue attribution is Enterprise only. That last one surprises people: tying campaigns to revenue across touches is the classic reason to buy HubSpot, and it costs at least $3,600 a month.

Who each is for

• Mailchimp fits local businesses, online stores, nonprofits and agencies that run campaigns from a list and want to manage it without a dedicated operations person.
• HubSpot fits companies with a sales process, where marketing passes leads to reps and someone will own the CRM. It suits teams that expect to grow into Professional and can budget for it.

Limits of each

• HubSpot: the jump from Starter to Professional is steep, and the required onboarding fee sits on top of the subscription.
• HubSpot: Starter's offers are for new customers and for a limited time, so budget at the $20 list price.
• HubSpot: SMS only sends from US-based numbers to +1 recipients, and AI agents draw on credits you have to watch.
• Mailchimp: no sales pipeline, and unsubscribed contacts still count toward your bill.
• Mailchimp: Free has no email scheduling or A/B testing and keeps Mailchimp branding; Essentials has only 4-step flows and no generative AI.
• Mailchimp: SMS credits expire at the end of each billing cycle.

Which should you choose

Ask who acts on a lead. If nobody does, because the email itself makes the sale, buy Mailchimp and start on Standard if you want real flows. If a salesperson follows up, start with HubSpot's free CRM today, whichever tool sends your email. Then write down the one automation you can't live without and check which edition includes it. That single check will tell you more than any feature table, including this one.

Alternatives worth a look

If you want more automation than Mailchimp without HubSpot Professional's price, read ActiveCampaign vs Mailchimp. For a Mailchimp competitor with its own pricing model, see Brevo vs Mailchimp. Store owners should read Klaviyo vs Mailchimp, and if HubSpot's cost is the blocker, our list of HubSpot Marketing Hub alternatives is aimed at SaaS startups.

Frequently Asked Questions

Is HubSpot or Mailchimp cheaper?
At the entry level it depends on seats. As of November 2026, Mailchimp Essentials starts at $13 a month and Standard at $20 a month, each for 500 contacts with several seats included. HubSpot Starter is priced per seat at a $20 list price, with new-customer offers from $7 a seat on annual billing. The big gap appears above that: HubSpot Professional starts at $800 to $890 a month plus a $3,000 onboarding fee, while Mailchimp Premium starts at $350 a month for 10,000 contacts.

Is HubSpot's free plan better than Mailchimp's?
For CRM and sending volume, yes. HubSpot's free tools cover up to 2 users and 2,000 email sends a month with HubSpot branding, plus a free CRM with deals, tasks and pipeline tracking. Mailchimp Free is limited to 250 contacts, 500 sends a month or 250 a day, and 1 seat, with email support for the first 30 days only.

Does Mailchimp have a CRM?
It has a marketing CRM, not a sales CRM. Mailchimp lists Marketing CRM as a feature, built on contact profiles, tags, segmentation, surveys and an inbox, and its plan comparison shows no deal pipeline. It does integrate with Salesforce. If salespeople need to work deals in the same system as your campaigns, HubSpot is built for that.

How does each one count contacts?
Mailchimp counts subscribed, unsubscribed and non-subscribed contacts toward your plan; cleaned and archived contacts do not count. HubSpot Marketing Hub charges by marketing contacts only, so contacts you do not market to can be set as non-marketing and are not billed.

Which is better for ecommerce?
Mailchimp is the easier fit of the two. It lists Shopify and WooCommerce integrations, purchase behavior data on every plan, and predicted lifetime value and purchase likelihood on Standard and Premium. If your store is your whole business, also read our comparison of Klaviyo and Mailchimp.

Can I use HubSpot and Mailchimp together?
You can run both, though you then have contacts in two systems. One setup keeps the free HubSpot CRM for sales records while Mailchimp sends campaigns. Decide which system owns consent and unsubscribes first, or the two lists will drift apart.