beehiiv Pricing 2026: Free, Lite and Pro Plans Compared

beehiiv costs $0 up to 2,500 subscribers, then $49 a month for Lite and $95 a month for Pro at 1,000 subscribers when billed yearly ($59 and $109 billed monthly). Every paid price climbs with list size, sends are unlimited on every plan, and beehiiv takes 0% of paid-subscription revenue. Verified on beehiiv's pricing page in October 2026.

That makes beehiiv a newsletter-first platform that is cheap to start on and costly to grow on, which matters most to writers who expect their list to climb fast. The Free plan is generous by list size, but the first paid bill after you outgrow it is larger than most buyers expect, and Lite sits well above the category's typical entry price. The rest of this page puts a dollar figure on each step.

Toolradar data: Toolradar, the software directory we run, tracks 108 email marketing tools as of October 17, 2026, and the median cheapest paid plan across the 28 that publish a price is $19 a month (email marketing ranking). beehiiv's yearly-billed Lite entry price is roughly two and a half times that median, so you are paying for the growth and monetization tools, not for sending.

Dupple data: MarketingShot and Dupple's other newsletters are sent on beehiiv. This newsletter reached 35,000+ subscribers as of October 18, 2026, which places a list like ours in the "up to 50,000" pricing band discussed below. We do not share what Dupple's own account pays.

beehiiv plans at a glance

Plan	Best for	Price at 1,000 subscribers	Subscriber cap	What sets it apart
Free	Testing the editor and growing a first list	$0	2,500	Unlimited sends, website, podcast, recommendation network
Lite	Writers ready to automate and earn	$49/mo yearly, $59 monthly	100,000	Ad network, paid subscriptions, 10 automations, 2 seats
Pro	Teams and businesses running several publications	$95/mo yearly, $109 monthly	250,000	Branding removed, 10 seats, unlimited automations, priority support
Enterprise	Large media brands	Contact sales	Custom	SSO, dedicated IPs, account manager

beehiiv bundles its newsletter, website, podcast hosting, community and digital products into every plan, including Free. What changes as you pay more is the ceilings (seats, publications, automations, analytics history) and the monetization switches.

What does beehiiv cost at each list size?

beehiiv prices Lite and Pro by subscriber bucket. You pay the bucket your list falls into, so a list of 1,001 pays the "up to 2,500" price. These are the full published tiers in US dollars:

Subscribers	Lite monthly	Lite yearly (total)	Pro monthly	Pro yearly (total)
Up to 1,000	$59	$588	$109	$1,140
Up to 2,500	$79	$828	$149	$1,548
Up to 5,000	$109	$1,140	$199	$2,028
Up to 10,000	$139	$1,428	$239	$2,388
Up to 25,000	$199	$2,028	$349	$3,588
Up to 50,000	$299	$2,988	$469	$4,788
Up to 75,000	$389	$3,948	$589	$5,988
Up to 100,000	$469	$4,788	$699	$7,188
Up to 150,000	Not sold	Not sold	$799	$8,268
Up to 200,000	Not sold	Not sold	$899	$9,348
250,000+	Not sold	Not sold	$999	$10,428

Lite stops at 100,000 subscribers. Past that point Pro is the only self-serve option, and Enterprise is quoted by sales at any size.

What each beehiiv plan includes

Free: generous on list size, thin on tools

The Free plan covers 2,500 subscribers with unlimited sends, one publication, one seat and one guest author, plus the website builder, podcast hosting, the recommendation network, API access except the Send API, and read-only MCP access. Analytics only look back 30 days.

What Free leaves out is the earning side. There is no ad network, no paid subscriptions, no automations, no A/B testing and no custom HTML. Free suits a writer proving that people want the newsletter; it does not suit anyone who needs the list to pay for itself yet.

Lite: the monetization tier

Lite switches on the ad network, paid subscriptions with one paid tier, 10 live custom automations, polls, surveys, A/B testing, publishing to segments and a referral program with 3 milestone rewards. You get 2 seats, 3 publications, 3 guest authors and a 12-month analytics window.

The main limit is branding: Lite cannot remove the beehiiv badge. For a solo creator that rarely matters. For a company sending a branded newsletter to customers, it pushes the decision to Pro.

Pro: branding, scale and team seats

Pro removes beehiiv branding and lifts most ceilings: 10 seats, 10 publications, unlimited guest authors, unlimited automations and unlimited analytics history. It adds dynamic content, RSS to send, audio newsletters, the Send API, a sponsorship storefront, paid trials, group subscriptions and priority support.

At 1,000 subscribers Pro costs nearly twice Lite. That gap narrows in relative terms as the list grows: at 100,000 subscribers Pro billed monthly costs about 1.5 times Lite.

Enterprise: quote only

Enterprise adds SSO, dedicated IP addresses, unlimited seats, custom publication limits and a dedicated account manager. beehiiv does not publish its price.

How much does yearly billing save?

beehiiv's own FAQ says yearly billing saves up to 20% against paying month to month. In dollars, from the tier table above:

• Lite at 1,000 subscribers: $708 a year paid monthly versus $588 paid yearly, a $120 saving.
• Lite at 10,000 subscribers: $1,668 a year paid monthly versus $1,428 paid yearly, a $240 saving.
• Pro at 10,000 subscribers: $2,868 a year paid monthly versus $2,388 paid yearly, a $480 saving.
• Pro at 250,000+ subscribers: $11,988 a year paid monthly versus $10,428 paid yearly, a $1,560 saving.

The trade-off is commitment. A newsletter whose list is still volatile may prefer monthly billing for a few months, then switch once growth is steady.

The cost nobody budgets for: leaving the Free plan

The first paid beehiiv bill is bigger than the headline price suggests. Free covers up to 2,500 subscribers. Once your list crosses that line you must pay, and a list of 2,501 sits in the "up to 5,000" bucket, so Lite bills at the 5,000 row of the tier table above, not the 1,000 row.

So the realistic jump is from $0 straight to nearly double the headline Lite price, even on yearly billing. The entry price only applies to someone who upgrades early, while the list is still under 1,000, to switch on paid subscriptions or the ad network. Plan the cash for that step before the list nears the free cap, not after.

Our newsletter growth guide covers how quickly a list tends to cross those thresholds once referrals and recommendations kick in, which is worth reading before you pick a billing cycle.

beehiiv vs Kit and MailerLite on price

Prices below were read on each vendor's own pricing page in October 2026.

List size	beehiiv Lite (yearly)	beehiiv Pro (yearly)	MailerLite Comfort (yearly)	Kit
1,000 subscribers	$588/yr	$1,140/yr	$17.10/mo	Free, or Creator at $390/yr
5,000 subscribers	$1,140/yr	$2,028/yr	$44.10/mo	Free
10,000 subscribers	$1,428/yr	$2,388/yr	$80.10/mo	Free

Two things stand out. Kit's Free plan covers up to 10,000 subscribers, four times beehiiv's free cap, though it leaves out automations and sequences, which start on Creator. MailerLite's Comfort plan at 10,000 subscribers costs $961.20 a year billed yearly, about a third less than beehiiv Lite at the same size.

beehiiv is the expensive option on raw sending cost. What the extra money buys is the growth and income stack: the ad network, the recommendation network, paid subscriptions with no platform cut, and a referral program built in rather than bolted on. If your newsletter will never carry ads or paid tiers, our Kit review and MailerLite review show cheaper routes, and beehiiv vs Kit works through the head-to-head in detail.

Paid subscriptions: what the 0% take rate is worth

beehiiv takes 0% of paid-subscription and digital-product revenue on paid plans. You still pay Stripe's standard processing fee, which beehiiv lists as 2.9% plus $0.30 per transaction.

A worked example: 200 paying readers at $8 a month bring in $1,600 a month. Stripe's fee on that is $46.40 plus $60 in fixed charges, so $106.40 a month, and beehiiv keeps nothing on top. A platform that charged a 10% cut on the same revenue would take another $160 a month, or $1,920 a year, more than the yearly Lite bill at 10,000 subscribers.

That is the real pricing logic of beehiiv: the subscription fee is high, but it is flat, and a paid newsletter keeps every dollar above processing.

Is beehiiv worth the price in 2026?

For a newsletter that will earn money, through ads, paid subscriptions or sponsorships, Lite is fairly priced, and the 0% take rate can cover the bill on its own once a paid tier has a few hundred readers. Pro is worth it when you need the beehiiv badge gone, more than 2 seats or unlimited automations.

For a list that will only ever send a free weekly email with no monetization, beehiiv is the wrong buy on price: Kit's Free plan covers four times as many subscribers, and MailerLite charges less at every size compared above. The full product picture, beyond price, is in our beehiiv review, and the wider field is ranked in best newsletter platforms. If you are weighing beehiiv for its growth tools, compare them with the best newsletter growth tools and the creator monetization tools that bolt onto cheaper senders, and check our newsletter open rate benchmarks to set realistic ad and sponsorship expectations. For how a contact-priced rival bills by comparison, see what Mailchimp costs.

MarketingShot covers newsletter economics like this in a short daily brief for marketers. Subscribe at marketingshot.com.

How we checked these prices

Methodology: every beehiiv price, limit and fee on this page was read on beehiiv's pricing page and its published plan data in October 2026. Competitor prices come from MailerLite's pricing page and Kit's pricing page, checked the same month. The annual savings, the Free-plan exit cost and the paid-subscription example are our own arithmetic on those published figures. We did not test these products. More on beehiiv's profile: beehiiv on Toolradar.

FAQ

How much does beehiiv cost per month in 2026?

beehiiv is free up to 2,500 subscribers. At 1,000 subscribers, Lite costs $49 a month and Pro $95 a month on yearly billing, and monthly billing costs more. Prices rise with each subscriber bucket, up to $999 a month for Pro at 250,000 or more subscribers on monthly billing.

Is beehiiv free?

Yes, up to 2,500 subscribers, with unlimited sends, a website and podcast hosting. The Free plan has no ad network, no paid subscriptions, no automations and keeps beehiiv branding, and its analytics only cover the last 30 days.

What happens when I pass 2,500 subscribers on beehiiv Free?

You need a paid plan, and a list just over 2,500 falls into the "up to 5,000" bucket. Budget for the Lite price at 5,000 subscribers, which is close to double the 1,000-subscriber entry price, rather than the headline figure.

Does beehiiv take a cut of paid subscriptions?

No. beehiiv charges a 0% take rate on paid subscriptions and digital products. Stripe's processing fee of 2.9% plus $0.30 per transaction still applies.

What is the difference between beehiiv Lite and Pro?

Lite adds monetization: the ad network, paid subscriptions, 10 automations, A/B testing and 2 seats. Pro removes beehiiv branding and adds 10 seats, 10 publications, unlimited automations, dynamic content, the Send API and priority support, at nearly twice Lite's price at 1,000 subscribers.

Is beehiiv cheaper than Kit or MailerLite?

No, not on sending cost. At 10,000 subscribers beehiiv Lite costs $1,428 a year billed yearly, MailerLite Comfort costs $961.20, and Kit's Free plan covers that list at no cost without automations. beehiiv costs more because the ad network, recommendations and paid subscriptions are built in.

Cite this: MarketingShot, "beehiiv Pricing 2026: Free, Lite and Pro Plans Compared", October 2026.

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