Benchmark Email vs Brevo: Which Email Marketing Platform Is Better?

Benchmark Email vs Brevo: Which Email Marketing Platform Is Better?

Benchmark Email and Brevo are both designed to help businesses create email campaigns, manage contacts, automate marketing, and track campaign performance. However, they have different strengths.

Benchmark Email focuses heavily on making email marketing simple, with an easy-to-use email builder, contact management, forms, segmentation, reporting, and automation. Its current free plan includes up to 500 contacts and 2,500 monthly email sends.

Brevo takes a broader approach, combining email marketing with SMS, WhatsApp, transactional messaging, marketing automation, sales features, and other customer-engagement tools. Its current plans start at $0, with paid plans starting from $9/month.

Benchmark Email vs Brevo at a Glance

Brevo’s current pricing page lists Free, Starter from $9/month, and Standard from $18/month, while Benchmark Email currently lists a free plan and Pro starting at $19/month. Pricing and plan limits can vary by region and usage.  

Email Campaigns

Both platforms provide the core tools needed to create newsletters and promotional email campaigns.

Benchmark Email provides a visual email builder, templates, lists, tags, contact activity, forms, and reporting.  

Brevo also provides a drag-and-drop editor, templates, campaign management, reporting, and automation.  

🏆 Winner: Tie

Both are strong choices for standard email campaigns.

Email Builder

Benchmark Email places a strong emphasis on simplicity. Its drag-and-drop editor allows users to build emails without coding and provides reusable content blocks and responsive layouts.  

Brevo also provides a drag-and-drop editor and customizable templates.

If your priority is a straightforward email-building experience, Benchmark Email has a slight advantage.

🏆 Winner: Benchmark Email

Marketing Automation

Benchmark Email offers automation triggered by website and email engagement, including workflows such as welcome series, lead conversion, and purchase confirmation.  

Brevo offers broader automation capabilities, including welcome emails, birthday campaigns, abandoned-cart workflows, and other automated customer journeys.  

🏆 Winner: Brevo

Contact Management

Both platforms allow marketers to organize and manage subscriber information.

Benchmark Email includes lists, tags, contact activity, and segmentation tools.  

Brevo supports contact management alongside its wider CRM and customer-engagement ecosystem.  

🏆 Winner: Brevo — for broader customer management

Segmentation

Segmentation allows marketers to send more relevant messages to different groups.

Benchmark Email supports lists, tags, and segmentation.  

Brevo also supports segmentation and targeted campaigns.

🏆 Winner: Tie

Both platforms provide the essential tools needed for audience targeting.

A/B Testing

A/B testing allows marketers to compare different versions of campaigns.

You can test elements such as:

• Subject lines

• Email content

• Calls-to-action

• Campaign variations

Both platforms provide testing capabilities, although the exact functionality depends on the plan.

🏆 Winner: Tie

Analytics and Reporting

Benchmark Email provides campaign reporting and a contact activity feed designed to show email performance.  

Brevo provides reporting and analytics, with more advanced reporting capabilities available on higher plans.  

Third-party software comparisons currently give Brevo higher overall ratings for functionality and user satisfaction.  

🏆 Winner: Brevo

SMS and WhatsApp Marketing

This is one of the biggest differences between the platforms.

Benchmark Email is primarily an email marketing platform.

Brevo supports email, SMS, WhatsApp, transactional messaging, and other customer-engagement channels.  

Brevo’s email marketing features also specifically include SMS and WhatsApp campaigns.  

🏆 Winner: Brevo

Ecommerce Marketing

Brevo is better suited to businesses that need marketing automation connected to ecommerce activity.

Its automation capabilities include scenarios such as abandoned-cart emails.  

Benchmark Email can support marketing campaigns, but Brevo provides a broader multichannel approach.

🏆 Winner: Brevo

Signup Forms

Benchmark Email includes signup forms as part of its platform.  

Brevo also provides customizable forms designed to help businesses collect subscriber information.  

🏆 Winner: Tie

Landing Pages

Both platforms provide landing-page functionality, although availability can depend on the plan.

Benchmark Email includes landing pages among its marketing capabilities, while Brevo includes landing pages in its Standard plan.  

🏆 Winner: Tie

Integrations

Brevo has a broader ecosystem designed to connect email marketing with customer relationship management, sales, ecommerce, and other business workflows.

Benchmark Email also provides integrations, but it is more focused on core email marketing.

🏆 Winner: Brevo

Ease of Use

Benchmark Email’s biggest strength is simplicity. Its product positioning focuses on helping marketers create and send campaigns without unnecessary complexity.  

Brevo also emphasizes ease of use and states that users do not need prior technical knowledge to create campaigns, contact lists, and automated workflows.  

Current Capterra data gives Benchmark Email a 4.4/5 ease-of-use rating and Brevo a 4.6/5 rating.  

🏆 Winner: Brevo — slight advantage

Pricing

Pricing is one of the most important differences.

Benchmark Email currently offers:

• Free: $0/month

• Up to 500 contacts

• Up to 2,500 email sends/month

• Pro from $19/month

Brevo currently offers:

• Free: $0/month

• Starter: from $9/month

• Standard: from $18/month

• Professional: from $499/month

Brevo’s pricing is based significantly on email volume and plan features, while Benchmark Email’s paid plans are based more directly on contact levels and sending limits.  

🏆 Winner: Brevo

For businesses that send a high volume of emails or maintain larger contact databases, Brevo’s pricing model can be more flexible.

Benchmark Email for Small Businesses

Benchmark Email is a good option if your main requirements are:

• Email newsletters

• Promotional campaigns

• Contact management

• Signup forms

• Segmentation

• Basic automation

• Reporting

• Easy email creation

Its straightforward interface makes it attractive for teams that don’t want an overly complicated marketing platform.

🏆 Best Choice: Benchmark Email

Brevo for Growing Businesses

Brevo is a stronger choice if you need:

• Email marketing

• SMS

• WhatsApp

• Marketing automation

• Transactional messaging

• CRM features

• Ecommerce workflows

• Broader customer engagement

🏆 Best Choice: Brevo

Benchmark Email vs Brevo: Pros and Cons

Benchmark Email

Pros

• 🏆 Very easy to use

• 📧 Strong email builder

• 🎨 Professional templates

• 👥 Contact management

• 🎯 Segmentation

• 📊 Clear reporting

• ⚙️ Email automation

• 📝 Signup forms

• 🆓 Free plan

Cons

• More focused on email

• Smaller multichannel offering

• Less suitable if you need SMS and WhatsApp marketing

Brevo

Pros

• 🏆 Multichannel marketing

• 📧 Strong email marketing

• 📱 SMS campaigns

• 💬 WhatsApp campaigns

• ⚙️ Advanced automation

• 🛒 Ecommerce workflows

• 📊 Strong analytics

• 🔌 Broad business capabilities

• 💰 Competitive starting price

Cons

• More features can mean a steeper learning curve

• Some advanced features require higher plans

• Pricing and limits vary according to usage and selected features

Which One Should You Choose?

Choose Benchmark Email if you want:

Simple + Focused + Easy Email Marketing

Benchmark Email is ideal when email is the primary channel and you want a clean platform for creating campaigns, managing contacts, and tracking results.

Choose Brevo if you want:

Email + SMS + WhatsApp + Automation + CRM

Brevo is the better option when your marketing strategy extends beyond email.

Final Verdict

🏆 Benchmark Email wins for simplicity and focused email marketing.

🏆 Brevo wins for functionality, automation, multichannel marketing, and scalability.

Current third-party comparisons also favor Brevo for overall functionality, ease of use, value, and customer satisfaction, while Benchmark Email remains a strong choice for marketers who prioritize a straightforward email-focused experience.  

🏆 Overall Winner

For Simple Email Marketing → Benchmark Email 🏆

For Multichannel & Advanced Marketing → Brevo 🏆