Mailrelay vs Brevo

Gmail

Mailchimp

Gmail is a free, advertising-supported email service offered as part of Google Workspace (formerly G Suite), with 15GB of storage, color-coded inbox filters, and 'unsend' button

Brevo

Brevo is a CRM and email marketing solution that helps businesses run multi-channel marketing campaigns across email, WhatsApp, SMS, web push, and Facebook ads. Teams can trigger transactional emails, SMS, and WhatsApp notifications over Brevo SMTP and APIs.

Mailchimp is an email and SMS marketing platform that combines artificial intelligence with marketing automation capabilities. The platform features a drag-and-drop builder, content creation tools, and audience management functions to help businesses design and distribute marketing campaigns across multiple channels.

Director lead coach

Had bad experience with the customer support executive.

Everything is included in the largest free account on the market, allowing you to send up to 80,000 emails per month at no cost to up to 20.000 contacts. Each month.

A/B Testing

Activity Dashboard

Autoresponders

Campaign Analytics

Campaign Management

Campaign Scheduling

CAN-SPAM Compliance

Click Tracking

Contact Management

Customer Journey Mapping

Customer Segmentation

Customizable Fields

Customizable Forms

Drag & Drop

Drip Campaigns

Dynamic Content

Email Campaign Management

Email Marketing

Email Sequences

Email Tracking

Engagement Tracking

Event Triggered Actions

GDPR Compliance

Generative AI

HTML Editor

Image Library

Landing Pages/Web Forms

Lead Capture

Lead Generation

List Management

Mobile Optimization

Multi-Campaign

Multi-Channel Marketing

Newsletter Management

Personalization

Real-Time Analytics

Reporting/Analytics

Segmentation

SMS Marketing

Subscriber Management

Template Management

Third-Party Integrations

WYSIWYG Editor

Mailrelay

Web-based

Windows

Linux

ActiveCampaign

Acumbamail

Pipedrive

MailerLite

Free

Prepaid 25.000 emails

Subscription 100.000

Rigidness to accept/ acknowledge the possible area of improvement in the system.

Creator

I had all kind of delivery problems and many of the emails didn't get to inbox.

Template Design

Customer Support

Email Sending

Ease of Use

Pricing

Small Business

Large Enterprises

Freelancers

Mid-size Business

From newsletters to automated customer journeys—join 1 million businesses scaling the easy way with MailerLite. 

ActiveCampaign is the AI-first marketing platform built to transform how marketers, agencies, and entrepreneurs work. Use Active Intelligence to power goal-aware automations and orchestrate personalized experiences across email, SMS, and WhatsApp. 

Support was kind & relatively reactive but did not address my question, so it took 4 back & forth over 3 days to get a solution.

Owner

Customer support was not only really fast to respond to my question, but also gave me an implementation example and further pointed out that certain help articles that may seem to pertain to my issue are actually describing something different, so that clarification being offered up without me asking was great foresight on their part!

american eagle limousine

Honestly, it is a professional service, and what I like most is the technical support and the team’s support for me in all my tasks via email and the explanations that are provided by technical support.

Trusted by over 500,000 businesses worldwide, Brevo (formerly Sendinblue) is the affordable, all-in-one marketing and CRM stack that helps growing businesses scale faster.

Alerts/Notifications

Archiving & Retention

Availability Management

Calendar Management

Campaign Planning

Campaign Segmentation

Channel Management

Collaboration Tools

Confirmations/Reminders

Contact Database

Content Management

Customer Surveys

Customizable Branding

Customizable CTAs

Customizable Reports

Customizable Templates

Customization

Data Import/Export

Data Recovery

Data Security

Email Distribution

Email Management

Email Monitoring

Email Templates

Form Builder

For Startups

Interaction Tracking

Lead Engagement

Lead Management

Lead Nurturing

Lead Qualification

Lead Segmentation

Live Chat

Marketing Automation

Meeting Management

Message Personalization

Mobile Access

Multi-Channel Communication

Online Booking

Performance Metrics

Pipeline Management

Preview Functionality

Queue Management

Real-Time Data

Reminders

Reporting & Statistics

Response Management

ROI Tracking

Routing

Sales Pipeline Management

Sales Reports

Scheduling

Shared Inboxes

Signature Management

Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP)

SMS Messaging

Social Marketing

Social Media Integration

Spam Blocker

Subscription Management

Tagging

Task Management

Reviews for Brevo come from a wide variety of industries, including Marketing and Advertising (9% of reviewers), Information Technology and Services (6%), and Computer Software (5%). The most frequent use case for Brevo cited by reviewers is email marketing (81% of reviewers).

Users and use cases

Most reviewers indicate that Brevo delivers strong value for money, especially for small businesses, and they appreciate the generous free plan and affordable paid options. Some users report confusing pricing, restrictive free plan limits, and costly advanced features.

Value for money

The Brevo integrations most frequently cited by reviewers are: WordPress (a website builder product rated 4.6 out of 5 for its integration with Brevo), WooCommerce (an eCommerce product, 4.6), and Zapier (an integration product, 4.9).

Integrations

Brevo is an email marketing program offering key features such as email campaign management, email tracking, campaign analytics, contact management, and mobile optimization, among others.

iPhone

Android

SendGrid

Constant Contact

HubSpot Marketing Hub

Mailjet

Omnisend

GetResponse

Zoho CRM

Moosend

HubSpot CRM

Mailgun

Amazon SES

MailPoet

Klaviyo

EmailOctopus

Zoho Campaigns

Starter

Standard

Professional

Enterprise

Confusing list organization

Founder

When creating my waitlist, I tripped up over creating different lists of customer segments.

Consultant

This list management section was a bit difficult for me.

40% of reviewers feel negative about Brevo’s list management. Some users find the process of creating, editing, and organizing lists unintuitive and confusing, especially when dealing with multiple segments or folders. Reviewers indicate that managing lists can be cumbersome, with unclear navigation and technical explanations that are not user-friendly for non-experts. They also mention difficulties in updating, sorting, or understanding list attributes, which can hinder efficient campaign setup.

Restrictive email sending caps

ICT Intern

the bulk email limit for the free plan is too small, 300 emails per day is not enough.

Marketing Specialist

We had limitations with sending a limited number of emails per day and lack of access to advanced features such as marketing automation, it needs to be more advanced like other email marketing platforms in terms of personalization.

38% of reviewers feel negative about Brevo’s email limits. Some users are frustrated by daily or monthly sending caps, especially on the free plan, which they say restricts their ability to reach larger audiences or run time-sensitive campaigns. Reviewers mention that hitting these limits can interrupt automations or require splitting campaigns into smaller batches. They also express concerns about the lack of unlimited email options and the need to upgrade plans to access advanced features.

Strict and opaque account controls

As soon as your stats do not matched with the average, then your account is blocked, your contacts are blocked and without any recourse, they continue to charge you while the platform is blocked.

59% of reviewers feel negative about Brevo’s account management. Some users report frustration with frequent account suspensions, unclear compliance requirements, and a lack of transparency around account blocks or deactivations. Reviewers indicate that support can be slow or unhelpful in resolving account issues, and that the process for validating contacts or resolving payment problems is often cumbersome. They also mention dissatisfaction with credit expiration policies and difficulties managing team access or billing.

Frequent technical glitches

Inkoop / logistiek

We work with a desperately outdated Magento 2 plugin and we have been experiencing bugs since day 1.

Marketing

Often certain functionalities do not work and the first line helpdesk cannot solve it.

56% of reviewers feel negative about Brevo’s bugs and technical issues. Some users report experiencing slow load times, occasional platform instability, and persistent bugs in plugins or integrations. Reviewers mention that certain features may not work as expected, causing workflow delays or requiring extra troubleshooting. They say that support responses to technical problems can be inconsistent, and that documentation or help articles are sometimes unclear or insufficient for resolving issues.

Comprehensive email marketing tools

Co-founder

Another strong point is the all-in-one approach, combining email marketing, automations, and contact management in a single platform, which helps centralize communication.

Digital Marketing Executive 

It's an excellent email marketing and customer engagement tool with the capability to personalize messages and automatically send them to your customers, based on their behavior.

94% of reviewers feel positive about Brevo’s email marketing capabilities. Reviewers appreciate the wide range of features, including automation, segmentation, analytics, and integration with other platforms. Some users say the platform is suitable for both beginners and advanced marketers, allowing them to personalize messages, manage campaigns, and track performance effectively. They highlight the value of having all marketing tools in one place, making it easier to manage communications and drive business growth. Users think the flexibility and affordability are key benefits.