# beehiiv Review: 0% of Your Subscriptions, Priced by Your List

> A measured beehiiv review: Free to 2,500 subscribers, Lite from $49 a month billed annually, the 0% take rate against Substack with the plan fee included, opt-in tier upgrades, no refunds, and the October 2026 plan rename.

_Source: https://professionalstoolkit.com/articles/beehiiv-review — The Professional's Toolkit · updated 2026-10-09_

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beehiiv is a newsletter platform built for people who want the newsletter to earn money, and almost
every decision in its pricing follows from that. It takes nothing from paid subscriptions, it runs
an ad network and a paid recommendation marketplace, and it bundles a website, a podcast host and a
community into the same account. What it charges for is the plan, priced by how many active
subscribers you have across the whole workspace.

That makes beehiiv the cheapest serious option in our email category for a writer with paying
readers, and one of the most expensive for a sender who never charges anyone. This review measures
both sides. Our composite score is 3.61, fourth of the seven email platforms we have scored, behind
Klaviyo (3.88), MailerLite (3.71) and Constant Contact (3.63), ahead of Brevo (3.58), Mailchimp
(3.46) and ActiveCampaign (3.44).

Every figure below comes from pages the vendor published, read on 9 October 2026, from the
vendor's own machine-readable pricing file, or from our own arithmetic on those figures, which we
label as ours.

## What beehiiv is, in one paragraph

The vendor describes itself as *the newsletter platform built for growth*, and claims more than
130,000 publishers who have sent over 50 billion emails [31]. In practice it is five products
on one login: an email editor and sender, a website builder, a podcast host, a community with
channels and direct messages, and a store for paid subscriptions and digital products. The
monetisation layer sits on top: an ad network that pays per open or per click, paid
recommendations between newsletters, and a sponsorship storefront on Pro. It was built for writers,
journalists and media teams, and it shows. It is not built for online stores, and that shows too.



> 💡 **undefined:** Count every publication: the tier is the workspace total.

## The four plans

beehiiv sells four plans: Free, Lite, Pro and Enterprise [4]. The prices below are for a list
of up to 1,000 subscribers, from the vendor's pricing file [3]:

| Plan | Billed monthly | Billed annually | What it is for |
|---|---|---|---|
| Free | $0 | $0 | Up to 2,500 subscribers, no monetisation |
| Lite | $59 a month | $588 a year ($49 a month) | Paid subscriptions, ads, automations |
| Pro | $109 a month | $1,140 a year ($95 a month) | Branding removed, unlimited automations, Send API |
| Enterprise | Custom | Custom | Dedicated IPs, SSO, account manager |

The pricing page opens on the annual view, so the headline figures are $49 and $95 [2]. The
pricing page marks Pro "Most Popular", which is the vendor's emphasis, not our recommendation.

The plan names are new. Until early October 2026 the plans were called Launch, Scale and Max. A
reviewer on Trustpilot describes the change: "In early October beehiiv renamed and restructured its
tiers" [19]. The vendor's own full-site dump still uses the old names in places, for instance
"No, email automations are only available on the Scale plan and above." [31]. Scale was the
first paid plan, so a search for the Scale plan today means Lite, not Pro.

## How the price is set

The price is two choices multiplied together. The plan type decides the features; the subscriber
tier decides what you pay for those features. The vendor is explicit that the count is per
workspace: "Subscriber limits and plan tiers apply to your whole account, not to each publication."
[4]. Two newsletters of 3,000 and 2,000 subscribers are billed as one list of 5,000.

Only active subscribers count, but active is wider than it sounds. The help centre states that
"Suppressed subscribers may still appear as Active in your subscriber count because they are
filtered at send time, not by status." [10]. Addresses that can no longer receive your email can
still push you into the next tier until you delete them.

Eleven tiers are published, from "Up to 1,000" to "250,000+". Lite is sold to 100,000 and Pro to
250,000: "Lite is sold through 100,000 subscribers. Pro is sold through 250,000." [3].



> 💡 **undefined:** Run the Substack break-even with the plan fee included.

## What happens when the list grows

This is the mechanism that most separates beehiiv from MailerLite or Brevo. At beehiiv, moving up a
tier is a setting you choose. In Billing you can turn on *auto-upgrade my plan tier when I reach my
subscriber limit*; the vendor explains that "When you go over your current subscriber limit, you're
charged a prorated amount for the next tier of your current plan." [5].

If you leave it off, the vendor's warning is short: "If you don't turn this on, sends to your
subscribers may be delayed when you go over your plan limits." [5]. That is a real trade. With
the toggle off, you are never charged for growth you did not approve, but a newsletter that grows on
a Tuesday may not go out on a Wednesday. Imports behave the same way. An import that would take you
over the limit is held, and "beehiiv doesn't import part of a list to fill your remaining space."
[9]. You trim the file and import again.

**Worked example.** A Lite account on the 10,000 tier, billed monthly at $139, reaches 10,400
active subscribers in the middle of the month. With auto-upgrade on, it is charged the prorated
difference to the 25,000 tier, which is $199 a month, so about $30 for half a month. With
auto-upgrade off, nothing is charged and sending may wait until the list is trimmed or the plan
changed.

## The free plan

The free plan is a real one: up to 2,500 subscribers, unlimited email sends, a website, a podcast
feed and the recommendation network, with no time limit. In the vendor's words, "Yes. beehiiv's
Free plan is free, forever, with no credit card required." [3].

What it leaves out is the reason most people choose beehiiv. There are no paid subscriptions, no ad
network, no automations beyond the welcome email, beehiiv branding stays on, and you cannot attach a
new custom domain. Support is the Buzz chatbot: "Customers on the Free plan outside of a trial
should use Buzz as their primary support path." [14].

Against the rest of the category, 2,500 subscribers is generous. MailerLite's free plan now stops at
250 subscribers, and Mailchimp's at 250 contacts and 500 sends a month. Kit's free plan goes much
further, to 10,000 subscribers, and it lets you sell subscriptions, which beehiiv's free plan does
not [20].

One caution from the terms: "If you have a free account, we may cancel your account and reclaim the
subdomain after a period of inactivity." [15]. The same clause promises at least thirty days'
notice by email.



> 💡 **undefined:** Decide on auto-upgrade before your list nears a tier boundary.

## The trial

New accounts get fourteen days of Pro features with no card required [4]. The trial is narrower
than "Pro for two weeks" suggests. Paid subscriptions, paid recommendations, custom domains and
multiple publications are held back until you pay, posts are limited to one a day, and the Ad
Network is not available during the trial [7]. Features you build during the trial switch off at
its end unless you upgrade: automations turn off, custom pages unpublish, the Send API stops. "If
you choose not to upgrade to a paid plan when your trial ends, your account stays on the Free plan."
[7].

The practical advice is to use the trial to test the editor, the website and the automations you
expect to run, and not to launch anything readers depend on until you have chosen a plan.

## The money: what beehiiv takes and what it pays

**Paid subscriptions.** beehiiv takes nothing. The feature page says "beehiiv takes zero revenue
share, so you keep 100% of your subscription earnings" [17]. Stripe's processing fee of 2.9%
plus $0.30 per charge still applies, as it would on most platforms.

**Paid recommendations.** These are what the vendor used to call Boosts: one newsletter pays another
for each verified subscriber it sends. Here beehiiv does take a cut: "A 20% fee applies to all paid
recommendations to cover operational and Stripe transaction costs" [13]. The fee is built into
the marketplace price, so an offer of $2.50 per subscriber shows $2.00 to the newsletter that
recommends it.

**Ad Network.** Advertisers pay per thousand opens or per click, and beehiiv pays the publisher
monthly: "Payouts are sent on the 20th of each month for the prior month's ad units." [11].
Clicks are paid on what the vendor calls payable clicks, a quality-weighted count, and the weighting
is not disclosed: "We don't publish the exact weighting, which is standard across the industry."
[11]. Payouts run only through Stripe Express: "beehiiv does not support alternative payment
processors (such as PayPal, Wise, or PriyoPay) for Ad Network or Paid recommendations earnings."
[11]. If Stripe Express is not available in your country, you cannot take part.

The pricing page advertises *ad monetization, avg. $39/mo* on Lite and Pro [2]. It does not
say what that average covers: which plans, which list sizes, or which period. We would not plan a
budget around it.



> ⚠ **undefined:** All sales are final; no prorated refunds on cancellation.

## beehiiv against Substack, with the plan fee included

beehiiv's comparison with Substack is the most searched comparison for this product, at 590
searches a month in the United States, four times any other. The core claim is accurate: Substack
takes a share and beehiiv does not. Substack's own page says "Writers keep 90% of their revenue
minus credit card fees." [18].

The vendor's calculator, however, leaves something out. Its worked example, 2,000 paid subscribers
at $5 a month, concludes "You earn $11,652 / year more with beehiiv" [16]. That figure does not
subtract the beehiiv plan, and Substack has no plan fee. The fair comparison is the 10% Substack
keeps against what beehiiv charges for Lite:

| List size (all subscribers) | Lite, annual | Paid readers at $5/month to break even |
|---|---|---|
| Up to 1,000 | $588 | 98 |
| Up to 2,500 | $828 | 138 |
| Up to 10,000 | $1,428 | 238 |
| Up to 25,000 | $2,028 | 338 |

*Our arithmetic.* Ten per cent of a $5 monthly subscription is $6 a year, so the break-even is the
annual plan price divided by $6. Stripe fees are left out because both platforms pass them on. On
monthly billing, the break-even at 1,000 subscribers is 118 paying readers.

Below those numbers, Substack is cheaper. Above them, beehiiv is, and the gap widens with every paid
subscriber. On the vendor's own example, with Lite annual at the 2,500 tier subtracted, beehiiv still
comes out about $10,824 a year ahead. That is a strong result, and it needs no exaggeration.

## Policies that cost money

- **No refunds.** The refund article starts from "All sales are final upon subscription" and lists
  the cases it will not refund, including non-use and purchases made in error [6]. It adds that
  "Please note that submitting a ticket does not guarantee an exception or a refund." [6].
- **Cancelling.** You keep the plan to the end of the term, but the terms say "you will not be
  eligible for a prorated refund of any portion of the subscription fee paid for the then-current
  subscription period" [15].
- **Pausing.** Monthly plans can pause for up to 30 days. Annual plans cannot: "You can't pause a
  plan that's billed annually." [4].
- **Price changes.** The terms allow beehiiv to change fees with notice: "we may change the
  subscription terms or subscription fees at any time on a going forward basis by providing not less
  than thirty (30) days advance notice" [15].
- **Payment methods.** "Prepaid credit cards aren't accepted." [4].



> ⚠ **undefined:** Annual plans cannot be paused.

## Account reviews and blocks

Like every bulk sender, beehiiv reviews accounts for spam complaints, bounces and abuse. Two details
matter. First, review can stop sending at once: "Automated checks may pause sending immediately while
your workspace is reviewed." [8]. Second, part of the logic is not disclosed: "beehiiv's systems
weigh a range of risk indicators. The specifics aren't shared publicly." [8]. Listed triggers
include high complaint or bounce rates, suspicious links, chargebacks, and sign-up or sending
activity inconsistent with your stated location. A block can be final: "If a block has been ruled
non-contestable, the decision is final." [8].

In our Trustpilot corpus, five reviews of 100 describe a blocked account, and all five are one- or
two-star. That is a much smaller share than at Brevo, where one review in five described a
suspension, but the experience is just as bad for the people it happens to. Importing an
opted-in list and warming up gradually is the best protection.



**Our scorecard — 3.6/5**
- Value for money: 3.4/5
- Capability & depth: 3.9/5
- Ease of use: 3.9/5
- Integrations: 3.4/5
- AI: 3.6/5
- Support & reliability: 3.1/5
- User sentiment: 3.9/5
- Docs & learning resources: 3.7/5

## Support

Support depends on the plan, and none of it is by phone. The vendor says "Buzz is not a live agent,
and no phone or email contact is currently available" [14]. Free accounts use the chatbot; paid
plans and trials can open tickets from the Help page; Pro gets priority. Response times are said to
vary by plan but are not published.

Reviewers are more positive about support than at most email vendors we have measured: in our
corpus, support comes up in 19 reviews, 12 positive and 7 negative.



> ⚠ **undefined:** Automated reviews can pause sending immediately.

## What users say

Trustpilot shows 4.0 from 406 reviews. Our sample of the 100 most recent averages 3.87, with 61
five-star, 11 four-star, 3 three-star, 4 two-star and 21 one-star [19]. Unlike Brevo or
Klaviyo, where the badge and the recent reviews tell different stories, beehiiv's badge describes
its present. Product Hunt shows 4.62 from 26 reviews and GetApp 4.4 from 16, both small samples.

The positive reviews praise the editor, the generous free plan and the growth tools. The negative
ones are about access and change: blocked accounts, plan restructuring, and limits that differ
between pages. Price comes up as too high in only one review.

## Integrations and the API

The API is open on every plan, with read access on Free, and the MCP server connects the account to
AI tools such as Claude, Cursor and Codex, read-only on Free and with write access from Lite
[26]. Webhooks are three on Lite and unlimited on Pro. The Send API, for sending email
programmatically, is Pro only [3]. Zapier and Make connect the rest [27].

Two gaps. The WordPress integration and S3 data sync are Enterprise only. And there is no native
mobile app: the community app is a Progressive Web App, and the vendor is clear that "you will not
find this app by searching the App Store or Google Play" [24].

## AI

The in-editor AI writes drafts, changes tone, translates and generates images, from Lite [25].
AI usage is expressed in the pricing table as "Limited" on Free, "Elevated" on Lite and "5x Lite"
on Pro, units the vendor does not define [3]. The models behind the tools are not named, and
no-training and zero-retention commitments appear only on Enterprise.

## Where the vendor disagrees with itself

We found four places where beehiiv's own pages give different answers:

1. The plan list in its pricing file places custom domains under Free, while the feature table in the
   same file marks them not included, and the downgrade article says "You can't add a new custom
   domain on the Free plan." [5].
2. The Pro card lists webhooks as a Pro addition, while the feature table gives Lite three [3].
3. The FAQ says paid plans start at $59 a month; the page's default view shows $49 [2].
4. The full-site dump still answers with the retired Launch and Scale names [31].

None of these changes what you pay, but together they explain a complaint that recurs in reviews:
it can take time to confirm what a plan includes.

## Who should choose beehiiv

- **Writers and publishers who charge readers or sell sponsorships.** Above roughly a hundred paying
  readers, the 0% take rate beats Substack, and the ad network and recommendations are built in.
- **Media teams running several newsletters.** Ten publications on Pro, one bill, one subscriber
  count.
- **Creators who want a website, podcast and community without four subscriptions.**

## Who should look elsewhere

- **Online stores.** Klaviyo scores 3.88 with us and holds 4.7 from 3,362 ratings on the Shopify App
  Store; beehiiv's Shopify connection is described only as "content ingestion, ecommerce
  workflows" [27].
- **Senders who will never charge.** MailerLite's Comfort plan is $10.80 a month billed annually at
  500 subscribers, a fraction of Lite.
- **A first newsletter under 10,000 subscribers that may sell later.** Kit's free plan covers four
  times beehiiv's free list and already allows selling subscriptions.



## FAQ

**How much does beehiiv cost?**

Free up to 2,500 subscribers. Lite is $59 a month or $588 a year and Pro $109 a month or $1,140 a year at up to 1,000 subscribers, rising by tier to $469 for Lite at 100,000 and $999 for Pro at 250,000+ on monthly billing.

**Does beehiiv take a cut of paid subscriptions?**

No. beehiiv takes 0% of paid subscription revenue; Stripe's 2.9% plus $0.30 per charge applies. It does take 20% of paid recommendations.

**Is beehiiv better than Substack?**

For paid newsletters above about 100 paying readers at $5 a month, yes on cost, because Substack keeps 10% and beehiiv's plan costs less than that. Below it, Substack is cheaper.

**What happened to the Launch, Scale and Max plans?**

In early October 2026 beehiiv renamed them Free, Lite and Pro. Scale, the first paid plan, corresponds to Lite.

## The verdict

beehiiv is the best-built platform in our email category for a newsletter that is a business. Its
pricing is fully published, its monetisation is real, and its central claim against Substack holds
once the plan fee is put back in, as long as you have about a hundred paying readers. What holds the
score at 3.61 is everything around the money: no refunds at all, annual plans that cannot pause, a
review system that can stop sending without notice, support with no human channel on Free, and
documentation that has not caught up with the October 2026 restructure.




## Sources

[1] beehiiv vendor pricing page — https://www.beehiiv.com/pricing (2026-10)
[2] beehiiv machine-readable pricing file — https://www.beehiiv.com/pricing.md (2026-10)
[3] beehiiv help: plan types and tier pricing — https://www.beehiiv.com/support/article/23874462928663.md (2026-10)
[4] beehiiv help: change plan type and tier — https://www.beehiiv.com/support/article/13092031997847.md (2026-10)
[5] beehiiv help: refund eligibility — https://www.beehiiv.com/support/article/13092084756631.md (2026-10)
[6] beehiiv help: what the free trial includes — https://www.beehiiv.com/support/article/22101553752471.md (2026-10)
[7] beehiiv help: account reviews and blocks — https://www.beehiiv.com/support/article/43764493955991.md (2026-10)
[8] beehiiv help: importing subscribers — https://www.beehiiv.com/support/article/4412705350679.md (2026-10)
[9] beehiiv help: how subscribers are counted — https://www.beehiiv.com/support/article/42699429776279.md (2026-10)
[10] beehiiv help: Ad Network FAQ — https://www.beehiiv.com/support/article/17507491038231.md (2026-10)
[11] beehiiv help: the beehiiv Wallet — https://www.beehiiv.com/support/article/14194157250583.md (2026-10)
[12] beehiiv help: Recommendations Network FAQ — https://www.beehiiv.com/support/article/14194737991319.md (2026-10)
[13] beehiiv help: ways to contact support — https://www.beehiiv.com/support/article/18621437457303.md (2026-10)
[14] beehiiv Terms of Use — https://www.beehiiv.com/tou.md (2026-10)
[15] beehiiv comparison page against Substack — https://www.beehiiv.com/comparisons/substack.md (2026-10)
[16] beehiiv paid subscriptions feature page — https://www.beehiiv.com/features/premium-subscriptions.md (2026-10)
[17] Substack, going paid — https://substack.com/going-paid (2026-10)
[18] Trustpilot aggregate and review corpus for beehiiv — https://www.trustpilot.com/review/beehiiv.com?languages=all (2026-10)
[19] Kit vendor pricing page — https://kit.com/pricing (2026-10)
[20] Mailchimp vendor pricing page — https://mailchimp.com/pricing/ (2026-09)
[21] MailerLite vendor pricing page — https://www.mailerlite.com/pricing (2026-10)
[22] Brevo machine-readable pricing reference — https://www.brevo.com/pricing.md (2026-10)
[23] beehiiv help: the community app — https://www.beehiiv.com/support/article/42004299269655.md (2026-10)
[24] beehiiv AI features page — https://www.beehiiv.com/features/artificial-intelligence.md (2026-10)
[25] beehiiv help: getting started with the MCP — https://www.beehiiv.com/support/article/39255979546263.md (2026-10)
[26] beehiiv integrations page — https://www.beehiiv.com/integrations.md (2026-10)
[27] beehiiv help: exporting content and subscribers — https://www.beehiiv.com/support/article/12258595483543.md (2026-10)
[28] beehiiv help: delete your account — https://www.beehiiv.com/support/article/32057514798231.md (2026-10)
[29] beehiiv help: pausing and retention — https://www.beehiiv.com/support/article/34177235644823.md (2026-10)
[30] beehiiv full machine-readable site dump — https://www.beehiiv.com/llms-full.txt (2026-10)
[31] beehiiv help: the Send API — https://www.beehiiv.com/support/article/36759164012439.md (2026-10)
[32] beehiiv help: domains — https://www.beehiiv.com/support/article/12999491162391.md (2026-10)
[33] beehiiv Enterprise page — https://www.beehiiv.com/enterprise.md (2026-10)
[34] beehiiv automations feature page — https://www.beehiiv.com/features/automations.md (2026-10)
[35] beehiiv Ad Network page — https://www.beehiiv.com/ad-network.md (2026-10)
[36] beehiiv recommendations feature page — https://www.beehiiv.com/features/recommendations.md (2026-10)
[37] Substack, about — https://substack.com/about (2026-10)
[38] Klaviyo vendor pricing page — https://www.klaviyo.com/pricing (2026-10)
[39] Constant Contact vendor pricing page — https://www.constantcontact.com/pricing (2026-10)
[40] beehiiv help: spam complaints — https://www.beehiiv.com/support/article/13092270804631.md (2026-10)
[41] beehiiv help: Stripe account types — https://www.beehiiv.com/support/article/30064926230679.md (2026-10)
[42] beehiiv help: delete a workspace or publication — https://www.beehiiv.com/support/article/12430837307287.md (2026-10)
[43] beehiiv help: migrate from Substack — https://www.beehiiv.com/support/article/14966988360215.md (2026-10)
[44] beehiiv help: migrate from Kit — https://www.beehiiv.com/support/article/22435253930519.md (2026-10)
[45] beehiiv help: Boosts became paid recommendations — https://www.beehiiv.com/support/article/41790356251159.md (2026-10)
[46] beehiiv help: using the Ad Network — https://www.beehiiv.com/support/article/17525818225431.md (2026-10)
[47] beehiiv comparison page against Kit — https://www.beehiiv.com/comparisons/convertkit.md (2026-10)
[48] beehiiv comparison page against Mailchimp — https://www.beehiiv.com/comparisons/mailchimp.md (2026-10)
[49] beehiiv comparison page against Ghost — https://www.beehiiv.com/comparisons/ghost.md (2026-10)
[50] beehiiv help: key policies and agreements — https://www.beehiiv.com/support/article/32902341812759.md (2026-10)
[51] beehiiv public status page — https://status.beehiiv.com/ (2026-10)
[52] beehiiv help: troubleshooting paid subscriptions — https://www.beehiiv.com/support/article/39165102555927.md (2026-10)
[53] beehiiv developer docs: rate limiting — https://developers.beehiiv.com/welcome/rate-limiting.md (2026-10)
[54] beehiiv developer docs: webhooks — https://developers.beehiiv.com/webhooks.md (2026-10)
[55] beehiiv developer docs: OAuth2 — https://developers.beehiiv.com/oauth2.md (2026-10)
[56] beehiiv Trust Center — https://security.beehiiv.com/ (2026-10)
[57] beehiiv MCP feature page — https://www.beehiiv.com/features/mcp.md (2026-10)
[58] beehiiv public MCP: company facts — https://www.beehiiv.com/api/mcp#get_company_facts (2026-10)
[59] beehiiv developer docs: getting started — https://developers.beehiiv.com/welcome/getting-started.md (2026-10)
[60] beehiiv developer docs: pagination — https://developers.beehiiv.com/welcome/pagination.md (2026-10)
[61] beehiiv developer docs index — https://developers.beehiiv.com/llms.txt (2026-10)