Head-to-head
Kartra vs ConvertKit (Kit)
Kartra bundles pages, checkout, courses and email on one login. Kit, formerly ConvertKit, is email-first with a large free plan. Here is which one fits you.
Quick answer
Pick Kartra if you need checkout, courses, memberships and an affiliate program on one login; pick ConvertKit (Kit) if you are growing an email list first and want a free plan that sends to up to 10,000 subscribers.
ConvertKit renamed itself Kit and now lives at kit.com, so both names refer to the same product. Kartra pitches itself as the replacement: its homepage says its built-in email works "without needing Mailchimp, ConvertKit, or any extra tools."
My take. For a creator whose business is the list, Kit is the better default, because the automations an email business runs on sit on its first paid plan, while Kartra keeps them for its third tier. Move to Kartra when you are selling a course or membership through a checkout and want partners promoting it.
See what each Kartra tier includes before you decide.
Side by side
The two tools you are choosing between, plus one more worth knowing if you run paid ads.
| Tool | Free trial | Best for |
|---|---|---|
| Kartra | 14 days | Established coaches and creators who want pages, email, checkout and memberships on one login |
| ConvertKit (Kit) | 14 days, no card, plus a free plan | Creators and newsletter writers who want list growth, email automations and light commerce without a full funnel stack |
| ElasticFunnels | 14 days, no card | Teams running paid traffic |
What you are really choosing between
Kit is an email platform for creators. Its feature pages center on broadcasts, sequences, visual automations, landing pages and selling digital products to the list. Kartra is a bundle: pages and funnels, email and SMS, checkout, courses and memberships, a calendar, a helpdesk and affiliate management behind one login, which its plans page lays out tier by tier.
So the real question is how much of your business happens outside the inbox. A writer who sends a weekly letter and sells an ebook now and then would use a sliver of Kartra and pay for all of it. A coach launching a paid program with a sales page, an order form, a members' area and partners on commission would need Kit plus two or three more tools to match what Kartra does alone.
Automations decide the price gap
Kit's help center puts visual automations and email sequences on Creator and Pro, its two paid plans. Kartra includes automations and affiliate management only from its Growth plan upward. If a welcome sequence and tag-based follow-ups are most of what you need, Kit gets you there for a small share of what Kartra costs.
Neither stays cheap as you grow
A thread on r/Emailmarketing titled Kit is getting expensive tracks Kit's Creator price rises, and a creator comparing Kit with other newsletter tools put it among the pricier platforms once automations matter. Kartra draws the same complaint from the other side: a buyer weighing it against a checkout-only tool warned that the monthly cost adds up. Kartra justifies its price when you sell: a user asking whether it works as a CRM was told it handles digital-sales automation well.
Where each one wins and loses
Kartra
What works
- One platform genuinely replaces the stack. You get pages and funnels, email and SMS, checkout, memberships, courses, a calendar, a helpdesk and an affiliate program on one login, and because they share one database the data joins up. Reviewers single out the detailed analytics and how convenient built-in affiliate management and payments are once everything sits in one place.
- Checkout and memberships are strong for selling knowledge. The checkout supports upsells, coupons and several payment processors, and the membership and course tools host your content and drip it out. For a coach selling a course or a membership, that is the core job done without plugins.
- No transaction fees on the main plans. From Starter up, Kartra charges 0% on your sales, so the platform is not skimming a cut of every order the way some checkout tools do. Only the entry Essentials plan carries a 5% fee.
- It is genuinely no-code, with templates and AI. The drag-and-drop builders, more than 100 done-for-you campaigns and Kartra AI mean a non-technical creator can get a funnel, emails and a checkout live in a few hours rather than wiring separate tools together.
- Real safety nets to try it. There is a 14-day trial and a 30-day money-back guarantee, so you can build a real funnel and see whether the platform holds up before you are locked in.
What to watch
- Bugs across the builders are the top complaint. Long-term reviewers describe a page builder that malfunctions, constant logouts and glitches across the email, page and membership tools. It is usable, but expect rough edges, and some reviewers feel updates polish the surface while core problems linger.
- Support is slow. The other recurring complaint is support: long waits on live chat, tickets left unanswered for days, and no phone or Zoom line. When something breaks mid-launch, a fast answer is hard to get.
- It is overkill for beginners. Kartra bundles eight to twelve tools, and if you only need one or two you still pay for and navigate all of them. Reviewers repeatedly say beginners find it overwhelming, and point them at simpler, cheaper tools. It pays off for established businesses that use most of the bundle.
- The entry plan is thin and carries a fee. Essentials looks cheap, but it caps you at 500 contacts and 5 pages and charges a 5% transaction fee. Unlimited pages, 0% fees and video hosting start on Starter, and automations and affiliates are only available from Growth.
- You are hosted on Kartra, and pages do not export. Everything lives on Kartra's servers, and pages built there do not move cleanly to another tool. If you leave, budget rebuild time. Your contacts export as a CSV file, and your pages stay behind.
ConvertKit (Kit)
What works
- The Free plan sends broadcasts to a list of up to 10,000 subscribers and includes unlimited forms and landing pages, so a new newsletter can grow for a long stretch before any bill.
- Email sequences and visual automations, with a template library, start on Creator, the first paid plan.
- Digital products and paid newsletter subscriptions sell from the same account that sends the email.
- The Creator Network lets other Kit creators recommend your newsletter to their readers, a built-in route to new subscribers.
- Paid features can be tried for 14 days without entering a card.
What to watch
- The Free plan has no sequences or visual automations, so the welcome series most creators want is the first thing you pay for.
- Long-time users complain about price rises. One r/Emailmarketing thread tracks Creator going up on both monthly and yearly billing, and another creator ranked Kit among the pricier email tools once automations are in use.
- A commerce fee comes off every digital product sale on every plan, on top of payment processing.
- There is no affiliate program and no course or membership area to match Kartra's, so a creator selling a full program ends up adding a second tool.
What they cost
Both bill by list size, Kit by subscribers and Kartra by contacts. The table uses the figures each vendor publishes: Kit prices its paid plans at 1,000 subscribers, and Kartra gives each tier a fixed contact cap.
If you sell, two fees change the real cost. Kit charges a commerce fee on each digital product sale on every plan, on top of payment processing. Kartra's entry plan takes a cut of sales as well, and every tier above it takes none, so a creator selling through Kartra should start on Starter.
| Kartra | ConvertKit (Kit) | |
|---|---|---|
| Free plan | None | Up to 10,000 subscribers |
| Billed by | Contacts | Subscribers |
| Entry paid plan | Essentials: $59/mo, 500 contacts | Creator: $39/mo at 1,000 |
| Next tier | Starter: $119/mo, 2,500 contacts | Pro: $79/mo at 1,000 |
| Yearly billing | Starter: $99/mo | Creator: $390/yr |
| Automations from | Growth: $229/mo | Creator |
| Affiliate program | Growth and up | Not offered |
| Fee on sales | 5% on Essentials, 0% above | 3.5% + 30ยข per digital sale |
| Trial | 14 days, 30-day refund | 14 days, no card |
My take: price Kit at the list you expect a year from now with Creator switched on, because that is the plan most newsletter writers end up on. Price Kartra at Growth if you want automations or affiliates, since Starter carries neither. If the Kartra number is still within reach, the bundle is doing work you would otherwise pay three vendors for.
A third option, if you run paid ads
Kit and Kartra both assume an audience you already reach by email. If you buy traffic from Meta, Google or TikTok and the ad lands on an order form, the job changes: you need to test pages without resetting the ad's learning, and to trace each order to the ad that paid for it.
ElasticFunnels is a funnel platform for teams running paid traffic. Most teams pick it for same-URL split testing: page variants rotate on the server under one campaign link, so the ad platforms keep their learning while the test runs. It also builds pages with an AI builder that works from a prompt or clones a page from a URL, hosts the checkout with order bumps, one-click upsells and subscriptions, and keeps clicks, orders, rebills and refunds on one timeline with a CRM and automations reading the same data. Every feature is on every plan, from Starter at $97 a month, and the plans differ only by usage limits such as page views and brands. It charges 0.5% on revenue through its own gateways and nothing on sales sent to outside checkouts.
The drawback is proof. ElasticFunnels is newer than Kartra and there is very little independent review coverage to check its claims against, so until you run real volume through it you are largely relying on what the vendor says. That is what you would expect of a platform built since 2023, and it matters most to a team about to move a large ad budget onto it. If your traffic comes from your list and your social following rather than paid ads, stay with Kit or Kartra.
For an email-first creator choosing between these two, Kit is the safer default. Its free tier carries a young list a long way, Creator adds the sequences and automations a newsletter depends on, and you can sell a digital product from the account that sends it. Expect the bill to climb with the list and a fee on each product sale.
Choose Kartra when the list is one part of a bigger launch: a sales page, a checkout with upsells, a members' area and affiliates, which Kit only partly covers. Budget for Starter or Growth, and use the trial and the 30-day money-back guarantee to see whether the builder bugs and slow support that long-term reviewers report are something you can work around.
Our default pick
ConvertKit (Kit)
Pick Kit if your business is the email list and you want sequences and automations without paying for a funnel bundle.
Frequently asked questions
Is ConvertKit the same as Kit?
Can Kartra replace ConvertKit?
Which is cheaper for a creator just starting a newsletter?
Does Kit take a cut of my sales?
Can I pay affiliates through Kit?
Which one should I use for paid ad funnels?
What we read on Kartra
From Kartra
- https://kartra.com
- https://kartra.com/feature/funnel-mapper-simulator/
- https://kartra.com/feature/shopping-cart-software/
- https://kartra.com/plans-and-pricing/
Other sources
7 discussions and reviews read for this page. Quotes are excerpts; open a link to read the original in context.
- [capterra-buggy] Kartra Reviews | Capterra
- [capterra-support] Kartra Reviews | Capterra
- [capterra-500k] Kartra Reviews | Capterra
- [trustpilot-polish] Kartra Reviews | Trustpilot
- [trustpilot-support] Kartra Reviews | Trustpilot
- [g2-bugs] Kartra Reviews | G2
- [g2-positive] Kartra Reviews | G2
What we read on ConvertKit (Kit)
From ConvertKit (Kit)
Other sources
6 discussions and reviews read for this page. Quotes are excerpts; open a link to read the original in context.
- [kit-pricing] Kit pricing: Free, Creator and Pro by subscriber count
- [kit-free] Kit help center: the Kit Free plan
- [kit-creator-pro] Kit help center: Creator vs Pro, choose the right plan
- [kit-email] Kit features: email marketing
- [r-kit-expensive] r/Emailmarketing: Kit is getting expensive
- [r-kit-automation-tier] r/Emailmarketing: Kit newsletter vs other options
If your ads send buyers straight to an order form, ElasticFunnels is the tool on this page built for that, and its 14-day trial asks for no card.
Related reading
For the full picture on Kartra, read our Kartra review and the Kartra pricing breakdown. If you have ruled it out, our page of Kartra alternatives covers the tools users switch to. We have not reviewed Kit on its own yet. Course sellers deciding on a premium creator platform can read Kartra vs Kajabi, and other email-first creators may find Flodesk vs Systeme.io useful. If you run paid ads, ElasticFunnels vs Kartra covers that side. Still unsure? The 6-question funnel tool picker suggests a tool based on how you sell.