Quick answer: GetResponse charges by contacts; Bluey Email charges by emails sent. GetResponse Starter is $19/mo for 1,000 contacts and $79/mo at 10,000 contacts, with unlimited monthly sends (GetResponse, EmailTooltester). Bluey costs about $14/mo for 10,000 sends, and $30/mo on Grow covers roughly 50,000 sends with unlimited contacts. So GetResponse wins if you email a small list every day; Bluey wins if you hold a large list and email it monthly. GetResponse also has webinars, courses and paid newsletters that Bluey has no answer to. Full disclosure: Bluey is my own product; I score it on the same yardstick as GetResponse and say plainly where GetResponse wins.
The two tools are priced on opposite axes, which makes the comparison unusually clean. Everything below comes from GetResponse’s own pricing page and from EmailTooltester’s independently maintained pricing tables.
How much does GetResponse cost in 2026?
GetResponse has a forever-free plan and three paid tiers, all with unlimited monthly email sends. Price rises with contact count.
| Plan | 1,000 contacts | 10,000 contacts | 100,000 contacts |
|---|---|---|---|
| Free | $0 (500 contacts, 2,500 newsletters/mo) | — | — |
| Starter | $19/mo | $79/mo | $539/mo |
| Marketer | $59/mo | $114/mo | $599/mo |
| Creator | $69/mo | $134/mo | $690/mo |
Sources: GetResponse pricing (monthly rates; annual billing saves 18%, taking Starter to $15.58/mo) and EmailTooltester’s GetResponse pricing tables.
Two details do the damage. First, automation is gated: Starter includes exactly one custom automation workflow. Abandoned-cart recovery and advanced segmentation start on Marketer at $59/mo (GetResponse). Second, the tiers are hard steps. EmailTooltester’s Inka Wibowo, an email-marketing expert with over 15 years of experience, puts it bluntly: “if your contact list exceeds the limit specified in your pricing plan, you are automatically bumped to the next tier. So if you pay $19 a month for the Starter plan and you get to 1001 contacts, you will be charged a total of $29” (EmailTooltester).
She is fair about the entry price, too: “$19/month as a starting price is a fantastic deal” for unlimited emails, landing pages, a website builder and 24/7 support — but “GetResponse can be quite expensive compared to other tools” once you need more.
How much does Bluey Email cost?
Bluey bills on emails sent, not contacts stored:
- Free — 500 contacts, 500 sends a month
- Spark — from $7/mo; roughly $14/mo at 10,000 sends
- Grow — $30/mo, unlimited contacts, roughly 50,000 sends; about $84 at 250,000 sends and $180 at 1,000,000
- Business — $300/mo, adds the built-in CRM, landing pages, and pre-built ecommerce flows
Which is cheaper?
It depends entirely on your send frequency, and the arithmetic flips at a knowable point.
A 10,000-contact list emailed once a month = 10,000 sends. Bluey: about $14. GetResponse Starter: $79 — and that is before you need a second automation. A 5.6× difference for identical work.
A 5,000-contact list emailed daily = roughly 150,000 sends a month. GetResponse Starter at 5,000 contacts stays flat, because sends are unlimited. Bluey’s Grow plan climbs past $30 toward the $84-at-250,000 band. Here GetResponse is the cheaper tool, and it is not close.
The rule: unlimited sends is a subsidy for high-frequency senders, paid for by everyone who emails infrequently. If you email your list once or twice a month — which describes most small businesses — contact-based pricing charges you rent on people you barely talk to.
Feature comparison
| Bluey Email | GetResponse | |
|---|---|---|
| Pricing basis | Emails sent | Contacts stored |
| Free plan | 500 contacts / 500 sends | 500 contacts / 2,500 newsletters |
| Unlimited sends | No (send-metered) | Yes, all paid plans |
| Automation workflows | Included | 1 on Starter; unlimited on Marketer ($59) |
| Abandoned cart | Yes (Business flows) | Marketer and above |
| Built-in CRM | Yes | No |
| Transactional + marketing on one bill | Yes | No |
| Webinars | No | Creator plan |
| Online courses | No | Creator plan |
| Paid newsletters | No | Creator plan |
| Website builder | No | Yes |
| SMS marketing | No | Enterprise only |
Where GetResponse plainly wins
- Unlimited sends. If your list is small and your cadence is daily, no send-metered tool can match a flat fee.
- Content monetization. The Creator plan at $69/mo bundles webinars (up to 100 attendees), a course creator and premium newsletter subscriptions. Bluey does none of this. EmailTooltester’s one criticism here is cost: “Compared to other providers, you will be paying a lot more to be able to sell newsletter subscriptions.”
- The website and funnel builder. Landing pages, a website builder, conversion funnels and web push are all in the box.
- 24/7 chat support on every paid plan, in seven languages.
- Breadth of integrations. GetResponse lists 170+ integrations, including Shopify, Magento, PayPal and Zapier (GetResponse).
Where Bluey wins
- Send-based pricing. No charge for storing contacts you do not email; no automatic tier bump at 1,001 contacts.
- Unlimited contacts from $30/mo on Grow. GetResponse’s equivalent contact headroom (100,000) costs $539/mo on Starter.
- Transactional and marketing email on one bill. GetResponse has no transactional product; you would add a second vendor and manage two bills.
- A real CRM on Business, rather than a contacts database.
- No gating on automation count. One workflow on a $19 plan is a genuine constraint the moment you add a welcome series and a re-engagement flow.
Frequently asked questions
Is GetResponse’s free plan actually free forever? Yes, but narrower than it looks. You get 500 contacts, 2,500 newsletters a month and one landing page. Premium features are open for the first 14 days only, and every message carries a GetResponse badge until you upgrade (GetResponse).
Does GetResponse limit how many emails I can send? Not on paid plans — Starter, Marketer and Creator all include unlimited monthly sends. The free plan is capped at 2,500 newsletters a month (GetResponse).
Which is better for ecommerce? GetResponse’s Marketer plan ($59/mo) has abandoned-cart recovery, promo codes and revenue reports built in. Bluey’s pre-built ecommerce flows live on Business ($300/mo). For a store under 5,000 contacts, GetResponse Marketer is the better buy; above that, run the send math. See email marketing for ecommerce.
What happens when I cross a contact tier on GetResponse? You are moved up automatically and billed at the higher tier — 1,001 contacts costs the 2,500-contact price (EmailTooltester).
Can Bluey send transactional email? Yes, on the same account and the same bill as marketing campaigns. GetResponse has no transactional offering.
The verdict
Choose GetResponse if you email a modest list often, want webinars or courses in the same tool, or need a website builder and 24/7 chat. Its $19 entry price is honestly good value, and it is a mature, well-supported product.
Choose Bluey Email if you hold a large list and email it monthly, if you want transactional and marketing email on one bill, or if the idea of paying rent on dormant contacts irritates you. At 10,000 contacts emailed monthly that is roughly $14 against $79 — the single substantiated reason I rank it first here.
Compare the wider field in Best Email Marketing Software in 2026, see the ranked swap list in GetResponse alternatives, the sibling head-to-head Bluey vs Brevo, or start from the complete email marketing guide.
— Shivam