Last Updated on September 11, 2026
Checked against Companies House on 7 September 2026: neither Mailchimp nor MailerLite contracts with UK customers through a UK company. Mailchimp’s agreement is with a Georgia LLC while your payments go to Intuit Limited in London; MailerLite contracts from Dublin and shows UK buyers prices only in dollars or euros.
Email platform comparisons argue about templates and automation builders. The two facts that shape a small business’s year with one of these tools are the bill, which currency it arrives in and what it becomes as your list grows, and the entity behind it. Both are published. We read them.
Key facts
Key takeaways
- There is no Mailchimp on the UK register. A Companies House search for “Mailchimp” returns nothing at all. Your agreement is with The Rocket Science Group LLC of Georgia, USA, but UK payments are taken by Intuit Limited (Companies House 02679414, active since January 1992). The brand, the contract and the biller are three different entities.
- MailerLite contracts from Ireland and won’t quote you in pounds. UK customers contract with MailerLite Limited of Dublin, and the pricing page offers USD or EUR only, so your sterling cost moves with the exchange rate.
- Mailchimp publishes GBP prices; MailerLite doesn’t. Mailchimp’s paid plans start at £9.69 a month at the smallest list size. MailerLite’s start at $12. On like-for-like small lists MailerLite is usually still cheaper, but only Mailchimp tells you your price in your own currency.
- Both fail the who-you-sue test. In our six-tool series, only the two CRMs give a UK buyer a UK counterparty. For email, the choice is between two overseas contracts, so make it on bill shape with your eyes open.
The who-you-sue test
Before you compare editors, ask which legal entity is on the other side of the subscription, and whether you can read its filings on a register you trust. We call this the who-you-sue test. For the two email platforms UK businesses pick between most often, here is what the record says.
| Checked 7 September 2026 | Mailchimp | MailerLite |
|---|---|---|
| Your agreement is with | The Rocket Science Group LLC d/b/a Mailchimp, Georgia, USA (stated in its terms) | MailerLite Limited, 88 Harcourt Street, Dublin, Ireland, for UK, EEA and Swiss customers (stated in its terms) |
| Who takes your money | Intuit Limited for UK customers (per Mailchimp’s payment schedule). Companies House 02679414, active, incorporated 21 January 1992 | The Irish entity |
| On the UK register? | No company named Mailchimp exists on Companies House | Only an unconnected company of the same name, dissolved in 2017. The entity you contract with is Irish, not UK-registered |
| Billing currency shown to UK buyers | GBP (16 currencies offered) | USD or EUR only |
Verdict: both fail, differently. Mailchimp splits you across three entities in two countries but bills in your currency; MailerLite gives you one clean counterparty, in Dublin, priced in someone else’s money. None of that is a reason to avoid either product. It is a reason to stop treating an email subscription as too small to read the terms of.
What they cost a UK business
Prices read from each vendor’s own pricing page on 7 September 2026, from a UK connection, at the smallest paid list size (up to 500 contacts/subscribers). Both scale with list size. The entry price is the start of the curve, not the price. VAT/taxes excluded.
| Tier | Mailchimp (GBP) | MailerLite (USD) |
|---|---|---|
| Free | £0, limited sends, Mailchimp branding | $0, up to 250 subscribers, 2,500 emails/month |
| Entry paid | Essentials: from £9.69/month | Comfort: $12/month ($10.80 annual), 5,000 emails, 50 automations |
| Mid | Standard: from £14.91/month | Power: $25/month ($22.50 annual), unlimited emails, seats and automations |
| Top | Premium: from £221/month | None published (Power scales by list size) |
Mailchimp sells features by tier. The automation and testing tools you grow into sit on the more expensive plans, and the Premium rung jumps to three figures. MailerLite gives every paid plan the full feature set and charges only for list size and sending volume. For a typical small UK list, MailerLite works out cheaper, in a currency that moves against you some months, which is the same trade we flagged for dollar-priced software generally.
Which one fits, by stage
Start: MailerLite’s free plan is the more generous launchpad for a small list, and Comfort at $12 undercuts Mailchimp’s Essentials. If a fixed sterling cost matters more to you than a few pounds saved, Mailchimp Essentials at £9.69 is the predictable line.
Build: if email is becoming a revenue channel, with segments, flows and testing, compare Mailchimp Standard (£14.91 entry, feature-gated) against MailerLite Power ($25, everything included). Run the numbers at the list size you expect in twelve months, not the one you have today; both curves steepen.
Scale: at tens of thousands of contacts, the honest move is a full requote of the market. The ecommerce-focused platforms compete hard here, and Mailchimp Premium’s £221+ needs to justify itself against them, not just against MailerLite.
For the wider field, see our UK email marketing guide.
What this comparison did not do
- We did not run deliverability tests. Anyone quoting a single inbox-placement percentage for either platform is selling you a number that varies by sender.
- We did not build campaigns side by side for this page, and we make no hands-on usability claims.
- Every fact above is read from the public record or the vendors’ own published pages and terms, on the dates shown.
A comparison is only worth reading if it says what it could not check. How Whito works sets out the rest of the method.
Sources and dates
All read 7 September 2026: Mailchimp’s standard terms of use (contracting entity) and payment schedule (Intuit Limited for UK); Companies House filing for Intuit Limited; a Companies House name search for “Mailchimp” (no results) and “MailerLite” (dissolved 2017 entry only); MailerLite’s terms of service (contracting entity for UK/EEA); mailchimp.com/pricing/marketing; mailerlite.com/pricing.
Part of our head-to-head series: HubSpot vs Pipedrive · Semrush vs Ahrefs. Related: Best email marketing platforms UK.
