Comparison
Beehiiv vs Kit vs Substack for a B2B newsletter
Beehiiv, Kit and Substack compared for a B2B newsletter: free plans, prices, automations, CRM sync, custom domains, fees and export. Checked October 2026.
By Ziad Hassan. Features and prices checked on 2026-10-08. Last updated 2026-10-08. Sources are listed at the end.
Quick answer
For most B2B teams, Kit is the safest pick: it has a native HubSpot app, visual automations and a free plan up to 10,000 subscribers. Beehiiv fits teams that want built-in growth tools and a newsletter site on one platform. Substack fits a founder writing in public, not a team running email as a sales channel.
All three platforms can send a weekly email to a few thousand people. The differences show up in what a B2B team needs around that email. A consumer newsletter needs a nice editor and a way to get paid. A B2B newsletter needs the list to talk to the rest of the business.
That means a few specific things: segments and tags so sales and product subscribers get different content, a sync to the CRM so a reply or a click shows up next to the deal, a custom domain so the newsletter looks like it comes from the company, automated welcome and nurture sequences, more than one team seat, and a clean export so the list is never stuck inside a tool.
This page compares the three on exactly those points, using only each vendor's own pricing and help pages, fetched on the date shown above. Prices change often, so treat every number here as a snapshot from October 2026 and confirm on the vendor's page before you buy.
Side by side
| Attribute | Beehiiv | Kit | Substack |
|---|---|---|---|
| Free plan and its limit | Free forever, up to 2,500 subscribers, unlimited sends, 1 team seat, 30 days of analytics (as of October 2026). | Free up to 10,000 subscribers, unlimited broadcasts, 1 user. No automations or sequences on the free plan (as of October 2026). | No plans. Publishing is free. Substack only charges when you sell paid subscriptions (as of October 2026). |
| Paid plan starting price and what it is priced on | Lite from $49 per month and Pro from $95 per month, both billed yearly. Yearly billing saves up to 20% versus monthly. Priced by subscriber count: Lite covers up to 100,000, Pro up to 250,000 (as of October 2026). | Creator $33 per month ($390 billed yearly) for 1,000 subscribers. Pro listed at $66 per month, with a first-year promo of $50 per month ($593 the first year). Priced by subscriber tier (as of October 2026). | No paid plan. You pay 10% of paid subscription revenue, plus Stripe's fees. $0 if you never charge readers (as of October 2026). |
| Automations and sequences | Automations on Lite and above, not on Free. | Unlimited visual automations and email sequences on Creator and Pro, not on Free. | Four welcome email templates (free, paid, imported, founding subscribers). The help center does not show a multi-step sequence builder. |
| Segmentation and tags | Static and dynamic segments built from engagement, tags, location and custom fields. | Audience tagging and segmentation, included on the free plan. | Segments are saved filters built from start date, activity level, paid status or subscriber tags. They update automatically. |
| CRM and integrations (HubSpot, Salesforce, Zapier) | Zapier and Make, an API, a Send API, and webhooks (webhooks on Pro). Its app marketplace says it pulls leads from HubSpot and Salesforce. | Native HubSpot app with two-way contact sync and deal or lead creation from automations; needs Creator Pro. Zapier and all other apps need a paid plan. No Salesforce app found on Kit's pages. | Google Analytics 4, Google Tag Manager, YouTube and LinkedIn. No Zapier, HubSpot, Salesforce or public write API on the features page. |
| Custom domain and branding | Custom domains on all paid plans. Removing Beehiiv branding needs Pro. | Connect your own domain on the free plan. Removing Kit branding needs Creator or above. | Custom domain is a one-time $50 fee per publication (as of October 2026). |
| Referral or growth features | Recommendation network on every plan. A referral program with milestones and physical or digital rewards. | Recommendations between newsletters, paid recommendations (Kit takes 23.5%), and a referral program on Pro through a free SparkLoop plan (as of October 2026). | Recommendations, Notes and search inside the Substack network. |
| Paid subscriptions and fees | Lite and above. Beehiiv takes 0%; Stripe charges 2.9% + $0.30 per transaction (as of October 2026). | Digital products and subscriptions on every plan. Fee is 3.5% + 30 cents per sale (as of October 2026). | 10% platform fee, plus Stripe's 2.9% + $0.30 per transaction and a 0.5% recurring billing fee (as of October 2026). |
| Data ownership and export | Export subscribers on all plans as a basic or full file (email, status, tier, custom fields, stats). Download links last 24 hours. | CSV export with name, email, status, tags, location, attribution and custom fields. The link is emailed and expires after five days. | You own the subscriber list. Export the list and all stats as CSV at any time. |
| Team seats | Free 1, Lite 2, Pro 10, Enterprise unlimited (as of October 2026). | Free 1, Creator 2, Pro unlimited (as of October 2026). | Admin, contributor and byline roles. No seat limit stated. |
| Analytics | Lookback window: 30 days on Free, 12 months on Lite, unlimited on Pro. Advanced analytics on Pro. | List growth reporting on Free. Engagement dashboard, deliverability reporting and engagement scoring on Pro. | Subscriber dashboard with activity, email opens (7 days, 30 days, 6 months), source and revenue per subscriber. |
Pick this if
You run email as part of a sales process
Pick: Kit
Its HubSpot app syncs contacts both ways and can create a deal or lead from an automation. Sequences and tags are solid, and the free plan goes to 10,000 subscribers. Plan on Creator Pro if you need the HubSpot app.
You want growth tools and a newsletter website in one place
Pick: Beehiiv
Recommendations, a referral program, landing pages and a site come with the plan, and the free tier covers 2,500 subscribers. Automations start on Lite. Check the marketplace before you count on a CRM sync.
A founder or executive is writing in public
Pick: Substack
No cost until you charge readers, a built-in network for discovery, and a simple editor. It is weak on segments, sequences and CRM sync, so keep the company's email program somewhere else.
You already run email inside HubSpot, Salesforce Marketing Cloud or Customer.io
Pick: None of the three
Adding a second sending tool splits your contact data. Use the marketing email tool you have, and spend the money on content instead.
Pricing compared at three list sizes
These figures use only the prices each vendor showed on its own pricing page on 2026-10-08. Beehiiv and Kit both price by subscriber tier, and their pages showed a base price rather than every tier, so two of the cells below say to check the page.
- 1,000 subscribers: Beehiiv Free ($0). Kit Free ($0), or Creator at $33 per month billed yearly if you need automations. Substack $0.
- 10,000 subscribers: Beehiiv Lite, shown at $49 per month billed yearly, covers up to 100,000; confirm the price for your tier on the pricing page. Kit's free plan stops at 10,000, so you move to Creator; check the vendor's pricing page for the 10,000 tier. Substack $0.
- 50,000 subscribers: Beehiiv Lite or Pro, shown at $49 and $95 per month billed yearly; confirm your tier. Kit Creator or Pro; check the vendor's pricing page for the 50,000 tier. Substack $0, unless you sell paid subscriptions, where 10% of that revenue goes to Substack.
- The pattern: Substack is free until you charge readers. Kit's free plan is the largest. Beehiiv charges earliest but bundles the most on the paid tiers.
Automations for welcome and nurture sequences
A B2B newsletter usually needs at least two automated flows: a welcome sequence for new subscribers and a nurture sequence for people who downloaded something. The three platforms are not close on this.
Kit is built around visual automations and email sequences. Both are unlimited on Creator and Pro, and both are absent on the free plan. If you want a three-email welcome flow with a branch for sales replies, this is the tool that does it without workarounds.
Beehiiv includes automations on Lite and above. Dynamic content and webhooks need Pro. The free plan is for sending a newsletter, not for running flows.
Substack offers four welcome email templates: one each for free, paid, imported and founding subscribers. That covers a single welcome message per subscriber type. Its help center does not describe a multi-step sequence builder, so nurture flows would need to run elsewhere.
Integrations with a B2B stack
The question a B2B team should ask is not how many apps a platform lists. It is whether a subscriber event can reach the CRM without a person copying a CSV.
Kit has a native HubSpot app. It syncs new HubSpot contacts into Kit, syncs Kit subscribers back to HubSpot, syncs purchase data, and can create a deal or lead from a visual automation. Installing it requires Creator Pro. Zapier and every other app also require a paid plan. Kit's pages did not show a Salesforce app, so a Salesforce team would go through Zapier.
Beehiiv connects to Zapier and Make, offers an API and a Send API, and adds webhooks on Pro. Its app marketplace announcement says it can pull leads from HubSpot and Salesforce. Confirm the direction of sync you need inside the marketplace before deciding.
Substack's features page lists Google Analytics 4, Google Tag Manager, YouTube and LinkedIn. It does not list Zapier, HubSpot, Salesforce or a write API. Getting a Substack subscriber into a CRM means exporting the CSV.
Growth features and what they mean for B2B
All three sell growth. Beehiiv has a recommendation network on every plan and a referral program with milestone rewards. Kit has recommendations between newsletters, paid recommendations where Kit keeps 23.5%, and a referral system on Pro through a free SparkLoop plan. Substack has recommendations, Notes and search inside its own network.
For a B2B list, these features matter less than they do for a general-interest newsletter. Recommendation swaps bring readers who like newsletters, not necessarily buyers in your category. A referral program works when subscribers have a reason to share with peers, which is true for some niche B2B lists and not for most.
The growth lever that matters more for B2B is a lead magnet, a signup page on your own domain, and a LinkedIn post that points to it. All three platforms can host a signup page. Only Beehiiv and Kit let you put it on your own domain without a fee; Substack charges a one-time $50 per publication.
Migrating between them
Moving is less painful than it sounds, because every platform lets you export the list. Beehiiv exports a basic or full subscriber file on all plans, with links that last 24 hours. Kit emails a CSV with names, tags, location and custom fields, with a link that lasts five days. Substack lets you export the subscriber list and all stats as CSV at any time.
What does not move cleanly: automations, segments built on platform-specific data, and sent-email history. Plan to rebuild flows by hand and to re-tag subscribers after import. Each of the three publishes its own migration guide for coming from the others, which is a sign of how often people switch.
Before you move, check the destination's import rules and warm the sending domain. A big list moved in one day to a new domain tends to land in spam for a week.
What Sawa does with any of them
Sawa works inside whatever platform a client already uses. We do not sell or resell any of these tools. When a team has no platform yet, we help choose one based on the questions above, then build the newsletter, the welcome sequence and the lead magnet in it.
Frequently asked questions
Which of the three is cheapest for a B2B newsletter?
Substack costs nothing until you sell paid subscriptions, then takes 10%. Kit's free plan goes to 10,000 subscribers but has no automations. Beehiiv's free plan stops at 2,500. Once you need automations, Kit Creator starts at $33 per month billed yearly for 1,000 subscribers and Beehiiv Lite at $49 per month billed yearly, as of October 2026.
Can I connect any of them to HubSpot?
Kit has a native HubSpot app with two-way contact sync, but it needs Creator Pro. Beehiiv's marketplace says it pulls leads from HubSpot and Salesforce, and it also connects through Zapier and Make. Substack does not list HubSpot or Zapier on its features page.
Does Substack work for a company newsletter?
It works for a founder or executive writing in public under their own name. It is a poor fit for a company's main email program because it has no multi-step sequences, no CRM sync, and a $50 fee to use your own domain.
Do I own my subscriber list on each platform?
Yes. All three let you export the full list. Beehiiv and Kit export a CSV with tags and custom fields. Substack says you own the subscriber list and can export it and all stats at any time.
How many team members can log in?
Beehiiv: 1 on Free, 2 on Lite, 10 on Pro. Kit: 1 on Free, 2 on Creator, unlimited on Pro. Substack offers admin, contributor and byline roles with no stated seat limit. All as of October 2026.
Sources
Every price and feature above was read on these pages on 2026-10-08. Vendors change plans; check the linked page before deciding.
- Beehiiv pricing Plan prices, subscriber limits, team seats, analytics lookback, 0% take rate, Stripe fee, yearly savings. Fetched 2026-10-08.
- Beehiiv: new plans and pricing (October 2026) What Lite and Pro include, seats and publications, effective dates. Fetched 2026-10-08.
- Beehiiv integrations Zapier, Make, API, Send API, webhooks. Fetched 2026-10-08.
- Beehiiv app marketplace announcement HubSpot and Salesforce lead pull. Fetched 2026-10-08.
- Beehiiv segmentation Static and dynamic segments, criteria. Fetched 2026-10-08.
- Beehiiv referral program Milestones and reward types. Fetched 2026-10-08.
- Beehiiv help: custom domains Available on paid plans. Fetched 2026-10-08.
- Beehiiv help: exporting subscriber data Export formats, all plans, 24-hour links. Fetched 2026-10-08.
- Kit pricing Plan prices, 10,000 free limit, users, automations, fees, referral system, paid recommendations fee. Fetched 2026-10-08.
- Kit integrations App store, API. Fetched 2026-10-08.
- Kit help: Kit + HubSpot Two-way sync, deals and leads, Creator Pro requirement. Fetched 2026-10-08.
- Kit help: Kit + Zapier Paid plan required for Zapier and all apps. Fetched 2026-10-08.
- Kit help: how to export subscribers CSV fields, emailed link, five-day expiry. Fetched 2026-10-08.
- Kit Creator Network Recommendations and paid recommendations. Fetched 2026-10-08.
- Substack features 10% revenue share, custom domains, CSV stats export, team roles, integrations, list ownership. Fetched 2026-10-08.
- Substack FAQ: how paid subscriptions work 10% platform fee, Stripe 2.9% + $0.30, 0.5% recurring fee. Fetched 2026-10-08.
- Substack: add a custom domain One-time $50 fee per publication. Fetched 2026-10-08.
- Substack help: welcome emails Four welcome email types. Fetched 2026-10-08.
- Substack help: subscriber dashboard Segments as saved filters, dashboard columns. Fetched 2026-10-08.
- Substack help: multiple authors or contributors Admin, contributor and byline roles. Fetched 2026-10-08.