Constant Contact is priced on contacts stored, like Mailchimp — but it differs in two ways that matter. It publishes its overage rate rather than leaving it vague, and it includes live phone support on every plan, including the cheapest one.
It also gates automation in a way the plan names do not make obvious. Here is how the pricing actually works.
The three plans
All prices are per month and rise with your contact count. The lower figure is with 12-month prepayment, which saves 15%.
- Lite — $12/month, or $10.20 prepaid annually. 1 user, 1 automation template, 1 custom segment, basic reporting. Monthly sends: 10× your contact count.
- Standard — $35/month, or $29.75 prepaid. 3 users, 3 automation templates, 10 custom segments, email scheduling, subject-line A/B testing, automatic resend to non-openers, AI campaign builder, advanced reporting. Sends: 12× contacts.
- Premium — $80/month, or $68 prepaid. Unlimited users, unlimited custom automations and segments, dynamic content, Google Ads Manager, SEO recommendations, revenue reporting, a dedicated priority support team, and 500 SMS messages included. Sends: 24× contacts.
A Multi-Account option exists for teams needing five or more accounts, priced on application.
The automation gate nobody mentions
Read the feature list carefully and you find the word template doing a lot of work.
Lite gives you one automation template. Standard gives you three automation templates. Neither gives you custom automations — those are Premium only.
So if your welcome series or cart-recovery flow does not match one of the supplied templates, you are on Premium at $80/month, not Standard at $35. That is the single most expensive misunderstanding available on this pricing page.
If you are building flows from scratch, price Premium and compare from there. Templates for the common ones are in our email template library.
The overage rate — published, which is unusual
Constant Contact charges $0.002 for every send above your monthly allowance. That is $2 per additional thousand emails.
Two things worth saying about that. First, publishing the rate at all is more transparent than most competitors — Mailchimp simply says it will bill you for overages without naming a figure. Second, $2 per thousand is not punitive; a one-off busy month costs you a few dollars rather than a forced upgrade.
The exposure is when it becomes routine. If you are consistently 100,000 sends over, that is $200 a month on top, and a higher plan will be cheaper.
What genuinely stands out
Phone support on every plan
Live phone and chat support is included on Lite. That is rare — Mailchimp reserves phone support for Premium at $350/month, and most competitors offer email or chat only at entry level.
If you are a small business that would rather ring someone than open a ticket, this is a real differentiator and it is priced at $12/month rather than $350.
The 24× send multiple on Premium
Premium allows 24× your contact count in monthly sends, against Mailchimp Premium’s 15×. For a frequent sender that is a materially more generous allowance at the top tier.
A 30-day money-back guarantee
Cancel within 30 days for a full refund. Unusual in this category, where 14-day trials are the norm and refunds generally are not.
Three costs that are easy to miss
1. Inbox preview is a $10/month add-on — on every plan
Including Premium. Seeing how your email renders across clients before sending is not included at any price point; it is $10/month on top wherever you sit.
2. SMS is US-only, and metered above the Premium allowance
SMS marketing is available to paid-plan customers in the US only. Premium includes 500 messages a month. On Lite and Standard it starts at $10/month for up to 500.
3. Nonprofits get nothing for paying monthly
The nonprofit discount is 20% for six-month prepayment or 30% for twelve. Pay monthly and there is no discount at all. If you run a charity, the decision is prepay or pay full price.
How it compares
At roughly 10,000 contacts, from our tested comparison (verified June 2026 — check vendor pages for current figures):
- Bluey Email $14 — per send
- Brevo ~$17 — per send
- MailerLite $89 — per subscriber
- Omnisend $132 — per contact
- Mailchimp $135 — per contact
- Klaviyo $175 — per profile
- ActiveCampaign $189 — per contact
Constant Contact’s entry pricing is competitive at small list sizes, and its published overage rate means a busy month is predictable rather than alarming. The cost rises with contacts like any per-contact platform, and the Premium requirement for custom automations is what pushes many accounts up rather than list growth.
Is Constant Contact worth it?
Yes, if you want a human on the phone without paying enterprise rates, your automations fit the supplied templates, or you value the 30-day refund while evaluating.
Probably not, if you need custom automation logic and do not want to be on Premium, your list is large relative to your sending, or you need transactional email on the same bill — which Constant Contact does not offer.
See Constant Contact alternatives or the direct comparison in Bluey Email vs Constant Contact.
Frequently asked questions
Does Constant Contact charge per contact or per email?
Per contact stored. Your monthly send allowance is a multiple of contacts — 10× on Lite, 12× on Standard, 24× on Premium.
What is the Constant Contact overage charge?
$0.002 per send above your allowance — $2 per additional thousand emails. Sending continues; you are billed the difference.
Which plan do I need for custom automations?
Premium. Lite includes one automation template and Standard three, but custom automations are Premium only.
Does Constant Contact include phone support?
Yes, on every plan including Lite. It is one of the few platforms not to reserve phone support for the top tier.
Is there a free plan?
No — there is a free trial with no card required, and a 30-day money-back guarantee on paid plans, but no permanently free tier.
Does Constant Contact do transactional email?
No. It is a marketing platform. Receipts and password resets need a separate provider.
If the automation gate is the problem
Bluey Email includes automations with conditional branching from the free tier rather than reserving custom flows for the top plan, bills on emails sent rather than contacts stored, and puts transactional email on the same bill. For senders above 100,000 emails a month, our team handles migration hands-on — lists, templates and automations. Below that, we guide you through it.
See Bluey Email pricing, or compare against Mailchimp pricing and Brevo pricing.
Plan structure, send multiples, overage rate and add-on costs verified from constantcontact.com/pricing, September 2026. Prices scale with contact count — check their pricing page for figures at your list size. Comparative price points dated June 2026.
Also in this series: ActiveCampaign pricing
Ready to switch? how to migrate from Constant Contact — step by step, without wrecking your deliverability.