Klaviyo Review
Reviewed by Carlos Gil · Founder & Editor, The Best Network
Updated 6 min readEditorially reviewed
Quick facts
- Starting price
- Free to 250 active profiles; Email from $20/mo (500 profiles)
- Free plan
- Yes
- Best for
- Ecommerce brands, especially on Shopify, that want email and SMS driven by purchase and browsing data
- Platforms
- Web; iOS and Android apps
BestStacked Score
Weighted average of 5 categories. Methodology below.
Quick answer
What is Klaviyo, and is it worth paying for?
Klaviyo is a marketing platform for online stores: email, SMS and push messages driven by a customer database that pulls in orders, browsing and product data from Shopify and 350-plus other integrations. It's known for prebuilt ecommerce flows (abandoned cart, browse abandonment, post-purchase), detailed segmentation and predictive analytics, and now sells AI agents for marketing and customer service. It's worth paying for if email and SMS drive a meaningful share of your store's revenue. It gets expensive as your list grows: on October 14, 2026 the Email plan cost $20 a month for 500 active profiles, $100 for 5,000, $150 for 10,000 and $500 for 30,000, with SMS billed separately per message and AI, reviews and helpdesk tools sold as add-ons. The free plan covers 250 profiles and 500 emails a month, with email support for only the first 60 days.
- Best for
- Shopify and other ecommerce brands that want email and SMS triggered by purchase and browsing behavior.
- Skip it if
- You send newsletters to a large list with little ecommerce data, or need predictable flat pricing.
- Strongest capability
- Ecommerce data and segmentation feeding prebuilt flows, with 350-plus integrations.
- Biggest limitation
- Cost scales with every active profile, upgrades happen automatically, and many tools are separate add-ons.
- Current cost
- Free to 250 profiles; Email $20 (500), $100 (5,000), $150 (10,000), $500 (30,000) a month; SMS per message.
The Verdict
Klaviyo is the default choice for ecommerce email for good reason. Its customer database pulls in orders, products and browsing events from Shopify and 350-plus integrations, and segments, prebuilt flows, predictive analytics and AI tools such as Composer and Customer Agent all work from that data. SMS, reviews, a helpdesk and social marketing sit on the same profiles. The price of that depth is cost and complexity. Billing follows active profiles, so the Email plan climbs from $20 a month at 500 profiles to $100 at 5,000 and $500 at 30,000, paid plans upgrade automatically when you outgrow a tier, and many capabilities (Composer, Personalization, Reviews, Helpdesk, Customer Agent, higher support levels) are separate add-ons. Mobile messaging moved to per-message billing in July 2026, and the free plan's email support lasts only 60 days. We score Klaviyo 8.6/10.
Best for
Ecommerce brands that rely on email and SMS revenue and want flows and segments built on purchase data.
Skip if
You run a content newsletter or B2B list, or want flat pricing that doesn't grow with every contact.
AlternativesMailchimp, Brevo, ActiveCampaign
The Background
What Is Klaviyo?
Klaviyo is a Boston-based marketing technology company founded in 2012 by Andrew Bialecki and Ed Hallen and listed on the New York Stock Exchange (KVYO). It now describes itself as "the autonomous B2C CRM" and reported more than 205,000 customers and $370.6 million in quarterly revenue in August 2026. The platform stores a profile for each customer, combining email and SMS consent, orders, product views and other events from your store, and uses it for segments, automated flows, campaigns, sign-up forms, predictive analytics and reporting. Around that sit SMS and push messaging, Customer Hub (a self-service account area), Reviews, K:Social, Helpdesk and AI tools: Composer, a marketing agent, and Customer Agent, which answers shoppers. Klaviyo has a strategic partnership with Shopify, which invested in the company in 2022.
The Product
Klaviyo Features: What You Actually Get
Ecommerce data, segments and flows
Klaviyo syncs orders, products, carts and browsing events from Shopify and other platforms into customer profiles. Segments can combine any of that data, and prebuilt flows cover welcome series, abandoned cart and browse, post-purchase and win-back. Predictive analytics estimate things such as expected next order date and lifetime value on paid plans.
A skincare store sends a replenishment email to customers predicted to run out of a product, excluding anyone who bought in the last 30 days.
SMS and mobile messaging
SMS and push sit on the same profiles and flows as email. Since July 13, 2026, mobile messaging is billed per message in dollar tiers rather than credits: US toll-free SMS costs $0.01 per send plus carrier fees, which the pricing page's calculator includes (for example $15 a month for 1,000 messages and $125 for 10,000). Short codes, recommended above 95,000 recipients a month, cost extra. The free plan includes $5 of mobile messages a month.
A fashion brand sends an SMS early-access alert to VIP customers an hour before an email to the full list.
Composer and Customer Agent
Composer is an AI marketing agent that drafts campaigns, flows and segments; the free plan gets $5 of usage a month, and the add-on costs $20 a month for four times the usage, with extra usage at $10 per 1,000 credits. Customer Agent answers shopper questions on your site and channels and costs $140 a month for 200 AI resolutions, with the first 50 free. Klaviyo's terms say customer data isn't used to train third-party foundation models.
A small team asks Composer to draft a holiday flow, then edits the copy and timing before turning it on.
Reviews, Customer Hub, Helpdesk and social
Add-ons extend the same customer profiles: Reviews (from $25 a month at 250 orders), Customer Hub for order tracking and account self-service (from $20, 30-day trial), Helpdesk (from $185 a month for 1,000 tickets, 30-day trial), K:Social for social marketing (from $50) and Personalization, formerly Marketing Analytics (from $100).
A home-goods brand collects product reviews after delivery and uses review scores to choose products for its next campaign.
Feature recap
- Customer profiles built from store, order and browsing data
- Segmentation, prebuilt ecommerce flows and campaigns
- Predictive analytics on paid plans
- SMS and push billed per message since July 2026
- Composer AI marketing agent ($5/mo of usage free; $20 add-on)
- Customer Agent from $140/mo for 200 AI resolutions
- Reviews, Customer Hub, Helpdesk and K:Social add-ons
- 350-plus integrations; SOC 2 and ISO 27001
The Numbers
Klaviyo Pricing: Every Plan Explained
Klaviyo's pricing page builds a plan from the Email plan, priced by active profiles, plus optional mobile messaging and add-ons. These are the monthly prices shown on October 14, 2026, in US dollars; the page shows no annual discount.
| Plan | Monthly | Annual | Included Features | Best For |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Free | $0 | — | Up to 250 active profiles, 500 email sends a month, $5 of mobile messages and $5 of Composer usage a month, built-in reporting, email support for the first 60 days; Klaviyo branding | New stores testing flows |
| Email, 500 profiles | $20/mo | — | 5,000 email sends a month, logo removal, generative AI tools, predictive analytics, 24/7 email support and weekday live chat | Small stores |
| Email, 5,000 profilesBest value | $100/mo | — | 50,000 email sends a month; same features | Growing stores |
| Email, 10,000 profiles | $150/mo | — | 100,000 email sends a month (25,000 profiles $400; 30,000 $500; 50,000 $720; 100,000 $1,380; 150,000 $1,955) | Established brands |
| Mobile messaging | From $15/mo | — | Per-message pricing; US toll-free SMS $0.01 plus carrier fees per send (calculator: $15 for 1,000, $70 for 5,000, $125 for 10,000 messages); short codes extra | Stores adding SMS |
| Add-ons and support | From $20/mo | — | Composer $20; Customer Hub from $20; Reviews from $25; K:Social from $50; Personalization from $100; Customer Agent $140 for 200 resolutions; Helpdesk $185 for 1,000 tickets; Professional support from $500, Enterprise from $1,800 | Brands consolidating tools on Klaviyo |
Klaviyo's cost follows your active profiles, the contacts you can email or text, and its tiers aren't linear: 6,500 profiles cost $140 a month while 10,000 cost $150, and 15,000 cost $350. On paid plans Klaviyo moves you up a tier automatically at the start of the next billing cycle when you exceed your profile count, so suppressing unengaged profiles is the main way to control the bill. Each tier allows email sends of 10 times your profiles; when you hit that, you choose auto-upgrade (the default), a one-time flexible overage or stopping sends. SMS is now its own per-message plan, bought upfront in dollar tiers. Compared with BestStacked's other reviewed tools at 5,000 contacts, Klaviyo's $100 matches Mailchimp Standard and costs more than Brevo, which prices by emails sent. The terms bill fees in advance and make them non-refundable, renew plans automatically, require cancellation 5 days before renewal on monthly billing (30 days on other terms), and give 14 days' notice of price increases; downgrades take effect next cycle without a refund.
What it really costs
Klaviyo at three store sizes
A new store with 2,500 active profiles that sends about 1,000 texts a month pays $60 for email plus $15 for SMS, or about $75 a month before add-ons, using Klaviyo's own calculator prices.
A store with 10,000 profiles sending 5,000 texts a month pays $150 for email and $70 for SMS, about $220 a month. Adding Composer and Reviews (at 250 orders a month) brings it to about $265.
A brand with 30,000 profiles pays $500 a month for email alone, before SMS or add-ons. At that size, list hygiene matters: suppressing 5,000 unengaged profiles drops the email bill to the 25,000 tier at $400.
Read before you buy
Where Klaviyo's own pages differ
Stale plan data: the pricing page's structured data still says the free plan includes 150 SMS/MMS credits a month and lists an "Email + SMS" entry plan at $35, while the visible page shows $5 of mobile messages a month and no combined plan, matching the July 2026 change to per-message billing.
Limits after upgrading: the free-plan FAQ says upgrading gives no send or profile limits on that tier, while paid email tiers cap monthly sends at 10 times your profiles. The free-plan FAQ also says sending stops until the next billing cycle or an upgrade, while the billing article says free accounts can't send until active profiles drop below the limit.
Smaller differences: the investor site's company description says 196,000-plus customers while its Q2 2026 results and the about page say more than 205,000; a help article says all plans are billed monthly while the terms provide for annual terms; and the pricing page renames Marketing Analytics as Personalization while the help center keeps the old name.
The Tradeoffs
Klaviyo Pros and Cons
What we love
- Deep ecommerce data, segments and prebuilt flows
- Email, SMS, reviews and helpdesk on one customer profile
- 350-plus integrations, led by Shopify
- Predictive analytics and AI tools on paid plans
- Free plan for up to 250 profiles
- SOC 2 and ISO 27001; customer data not used to train third-party foundation models
What could be better
- Price climbs with every active profile
- Paid plans upgrade automatically when you outgrow a tier
- SMS, AI agents, reviews and helpdesk cost extra
- No annual discount shown on the pricing page
- Free plan email support lasts only 60 days
- Fees non-refundable; downgrades not prorated
The Audience
Who Should Use Klaviyo?
Best for: Shopify brands where email drives revenue
Stores that make a meaningful share of sales from flows and campaigns get the most from Klaviyo's data and segmentation; the cost is easier to justify when attributed revenue is high.
Best for: brands consolidating email, SMS and reviews
Running SMS, reviews and customer service on the same profiles avoids syncing data between tools, though each add-on carries its own price.
Skip if: you send newsletters to a big list
Creators and B2B teams with large lists and little purchase data will pay less with send-based Brevo or a newsletter tool, and get little from Klaviyo's ecommerce features.
The Methodology
How We Reviewed Klaviyo
This is an editorial review, not a documented hands-on test. We didn't use a Klaviyo account for this review. It's based on Klaviyo's pricing page (profile slider, mobile messaging calculator, add-ons and FAQ), help-center articles on mobile messaging tiers, active-profile billing, send limits and billing changes, its about page, Q2 2026 results, Shopify partnership announcement, terms of service (December 17, 2025) and trust page, all checked on October 14, 2026. Where Klaviyo's pages differ, we report both statements. No deliverability, revenue or support results are claimed.
Our editorial evaluation considers product information, official documentation, pricing, features and professional experience. It is not a claim of documented hands-on testing.
Our review methodology →What changed
- : First published. Editorial review based on Klaviyo's pricing page (profile slider, mobile messaging calculator and add-ons), help-center articles on mobile messaging, active-profile billing, send limits and billing changes, about page, Q2 2026 results, Shopify partnership, terms of service and trust page, all checked October 14, 2026. Sub-scores are provisional pending editorial approval.
The Field
Klaviyo vs The Competition
Klaviyo competes with email platforms that have added SMS and automation. Prices below were checked on each vendor's pricing page on October 14, 2026, in US dollars, at the list sizes shown.
| Tool | Starting Price | Free plan | Best Feature | BS Score |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Klaviyo | Free to 250 active profiles; Email from $20/mo (500 profiles) | Yes | Ecommerce data, segments and flows | 8.6/10 |
| Mailchimp | Free under 250 contacts; Standard $100/mo at 5,000 contacts (Essentials $75) | Yes | Familiar editor and broad small-business features | 8.4/10 |
| Brevo | Free (300 emails/day); Starter $8.08/mo billed yearly ($9 monthly) | Yes | Pricing by emails sent, not contacts | 8.7/10 |
| ActiveCampaign | Starter $15/mo billed annually (1,000 contacts) | No | Advanced automation and CRM for B2B and services | 8.7/10 |
| Omnisend | Free (250 contacts); Standard $16/mo at 500 contacts | Yes | Ecommerce email and SMS at lower prices | —No BestStacked review yet |
Mailchimp: Mailchimp costs about the same as Klaviyo at 5,000 contacts on Standard. It's easier for general small businesses; Klaviyo goes deeper on ecommerce data and flows.Read our Mailchimp review →
Brevo: Brevo charges for emails sent rather than contacts stored, so large lists that email occasionally cost far less. Klaviyo's segmentation and Shopify depth justify its price for stores where email drives revenue.Read our Brevo review →
ActiveCampaign: ActiveCampaign's automation builder and CRM suit service businesses and B2B. Klaviyo is the better fit for product catalogs, orders and ecommerce flows.Read our ActiveCampaign review →
Omnisend: Omnisend targets the same Shopify stores with email and SMS at lower list prices and claims savings against Klaviyo on its pricing page. BestStacked hasn't reviewed Omnisend yet.
In The Wild
How People Actually Use Klaviyo
A new Shopify store
Start on Free (250 profiles) to set up welcome, abandoned cart and post-purchase flows, then upgrade when the list grows. Note that email support ends after 60 days on Free.
A $2M-a-year DTC brand
Expect $150 to $400 a month for email at 10,000 to 25,000 profiles, plus SMS. Review unengaged profiles monthly, since every active profile counts toward your tier.
A content creator with a large newsletter
Klaviyo's ecommerce features won't help much. A send-based platform such as Brevo or a newsletter tool will cost less.
The Ecosystem
Klaviyo Integrations
Klaviyo lists more than 350 built-in integrations, centered on ecommerce platforms.
- →Shopify (strategic partner and investor since 2022)
- →350-plus built-in integrations, by Klaviyo's count
- →Anthropic Claude and Figma integrations (announced Q2 2026)
- →Shopify Sidekick and Stripe Projects partner launches (Q2 2026)
- →Customer Agent API and Conversational Agent Builder (Q2 2026)
Klaviyo's Q2 2026 results announced Claude and Figma integrations and partner launches with Shopify Sidekick and Stripe. Data from integrations feeds the same customer profiles used for segments and flows.
Common Questions
Klaviyo FAQ
The Final Word
Should You Use Klaviyo?
Klaviyo is the strongest choice for ecommerce brands that live on email and SMS revenue, with data depth and flows that general tools struggle to match. Budget carefully: profile-based tiers rise automatically, SMS is billed per message and most extras are add-ons. Clean your list regularly and price the add-ons you'll actually use. We score Klaviyo 8.6/10.
Yes, if
You run an online store where email and SMS drive meaningful revenue and want flows built on purchase data.
No, if
You send newsletters to a large, low-data list or need flat, predictable pricing.
About the reviewer
Carlos Gil
Founder & Editor, The Best Network
Carlos Gil is the bestselling author of The End of Marketing, a LinkedIn Top Voice, and founder of The Best Network. He brings 15+ years in marketing to practical reviews of AI, SaaS, email marketing, creator, and ecommerce software.
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