Newsletter platforms
Top Ghost competitors 10 competitors in Ghost's market
- Competitors listed
- 10
- Ranked on the scorecard
- 10
- Ghost's rank
- #18 of 27
- With a free plan
- 5
Data checked Oct 14, 2026 against the vendors' own pages. How we verify
These are the 10 tools closest to Ghost in its own market: newsletter platforms that list newsletter platforms too, picked by shared categories and how close their entry price is to Ghost's (the rules are below).
10 of them are ranked on the newsletter platforms scorecard; Flodesk is the highest at 98/100 (#1 of 27 in the category).
Ghost itself is #18 of 27 with 71/100, so 9 competitors on this list rank above it.
Ghost's cheapest paid plan is $18 per month billed annually (Starter). On the same billing basis, 4 of 6 competitors with a published price start lower and 2 start higher; entry plans are not like-for-like, so check the limits.
5 competitors have a free plan; Ghost does not.
Ghost vs its competitors: market position
| Rank | Tool | Score | From, billed monthly | From, billed yearly | Free plan | Public API | Integrations | Features verified | Data checked |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| #18 | GhostThis tool | 71/100 | Not offered | $18/mo | No | Yes | 8,000 | 6 of 9 | Oct 14, 2026 |
| #1 |  Flodesk | 98/100 | Free | Free | Yes | Yes | – | 6 of 9 | Oct 14, 2026 |
| #4 |  notifuse | 93/100 | $16/mo | $24.17/mo | Yes, unlimited emails per month | Yes | – | 5 of 9 | Oct 14, 2026 |
| #7 |  AWeber | 85/100 | $15/mo | $12.49/mo | Yes, 500 subscribers | – | 750 | 5 of 9 | Oct 14, 2026 |
| #10 |  Mailchimp | 83/100 | $13/mo | Not offered | Yes | Yes | 300 | 2 of 9 | Oct 14, 2026 |
| #11 |  ActiveCampaign | 82/100 | Not offered | $15/mo | No | – | 1,000 | 4 of 9 | Oct 14, 2026 |
| #12 |  GetResponse | 79/100 | $19/mo | $15.58/mo | No | Yes | 170 | 6 of 9 | Oct 14, 2026 |
| #14 |  warmbly | 78/100 | Not offered | $23/mo | Yes | Yes | – | 3 of 9 | Oct 14, 2026 |
| #16 |  Abstract27 | 74/100 | Not offered | $15.83/mo | No | – | – | 3 of 9 | Oct 14, 2026 |
| #17 |  Lighthouse | 73/100 | $19/mo | Not offered | No | Yes | – | 3 of 9 | Oct 14, 2026 |
| #21 |  Astro Send | 58/100 | $20/mo | Not offered | No | – | – | 3 of 9 | Oct 14, 2026 |
Each value links the page it was read from (hover for the check date).
– = not published by the vendor, or not verified yet.
How each competitor differs from Ghost
- Flodesk · #1, 98/100
Email marketing platform with a visual email builder, forms, landing pages, workflow automations and checkout and subscription tools.
- Score: 98/100, #1 of 27 (Ghost: 71/100, #18)
- Entry price: free; no paid plans published source
- Free plan: yes (Ghost: no) source
- Platforms: 1 platform (Ghost: 5); not on Facebook, X (Twitter), YouTube and Pinterest
- Verified features: Paid subscriptions, Automations / sequences, Custom domain, Landing pages and forms, Segmentation and tags and 2 more
9 of 14 tracked details verified
Homepage captured Oct 14, 2026 - notifuse · #4, 93/100
Open-source newsletter and transactional email platform offered as a managed cloud service or as self-hosted software with optional licences.
- Score: 93/100, #4 of 27 (Ghost: 71/100, #18)
- Entry price: $24.17 per month billed annually (Self-hosted licence), $6.17 more than Ghost's $18 source
- Free plan: yes (Ghost: no) source
- Verified features: Automations / sequences, Custom domain, A/B testing, Segmentation and tags, Open and click analytics and 1 more
8 of 14 tracked details verified
- AWeber · #7, 85/100
Email marketing platform for small businesses with automations, landing pages, signup forms, ecommerce pages and web push notifications.
- Score: 85/100, #7 of 27 (Ghost: 71/100, #18)
- Entry price: $12.49 per month billed annually (Lite), $5.51 less than Ghost's $18 source
- Free plan: yes (Ghost: no) source
- Platforms: 1 platform (Ghost: 5); not on Instagram, X (Twitter), YouTube and Pinterest
- Integrations: 750 (Ghost: 8,000) source
- Verified features: Paid subscriptions, Automations / sequences, Landing pages and forms, Segmentation and tags, Open and click analytics
7 of 14 tracked details verified
- Mailchimp · #10, 83/100
Email and SMS marketing platform with automations, audience tools, templates, popup forms and reporting.
- Score: 83/100, #10 of 27 (Ghost: 71/100, #18)
- Entry price: $13 billed monthly; not compared with Ghost, which publishes no price on the same billing basis source
- Free plan: yes (Ghost: no) source
- Platforms: 2 platforms (Ghost: 5); not on Instagram, X (Twitter), YouTube and Pinterest; adds LinkedIn
- Integrations: 300 (Ghost: 8,000) source
- Verified features: Automations / sequences, Open and click analytics, Public API
5 of 14 tracked details verified
- ActiveCampaign · #11, 82/100
Marketing automation platform with email, WhatsApp and SMS messaging, segmentation, landing pages, CRM add-ons and AI features.
- Score: 82/100, #11 of 27 (Ghost: 71/100, #18)
- Entry price: $15 per month billed annually (Starter), $3 less than Ghost's $18 source
- Platforms: 3 platforms (Ghost: 5); not on X (Twitter), YouTube and Pinterest; adds WhatsApp
- Integrations: 1,000 (Ghost: 8,000) source
- Verified features: Automations / sequences, Landing pages and forms, Segmentation and tags, Open and click analytics
6 of 14 tracked details verified
- GetResponse · #12, 79/100
Email marketing and automation platform with landing pages, signup forms, SMS, web push, webinars and a course creator.
- Score: 79/100, #12 of 27 (Ghost: 71/100, #18)
- Entry price: $15.58 per month billed annually (Starter), $2.42 less than Ghost's $18 source
- Platforms: 1 platform (Ghost: 5); not on Instagram, Facebook, YouTube and Pinterest
- Integrations: 170 (Ghost: 8,000) source
- Verified features: Paid subscriptions, Automations / sequences, Custom domain, Landing pages and forms, Segmentation and tags and 2 more
10 of 14 tracked details verified
- warmbly · #14, 78/100
Open-source cold email platform that warms up mailboxes, sends campaign sequences and gathers replies in one inbox, with a built-in CRM.
- Score: 78/100, #14 of 27 (Ghost: 71/100, #18)
- Entry price: $23 per month billed annually (Starter), $5 more than Ghost's $18 source
- Free plan: yes (Ghost: no) source
- Verified features: Automations / sequences, A/B testing, Open and click analytics, Public API
5 of 14 tracked details verified
- Abstract27 · #16, 74/100
Managed hosting service for Ghost websites that bundles newsletters, memberships and paid subscriptions, hosted in the EU.
- Score: 74/100, #16 of 27 (Ghost: 71/100, #18)
- Entry price: $15.83 per month billed annually (Solo), $2.17 less than Ghost's $18 source
- Verified features: Paid subscriptions, Custom domain, Newsletter website
4 of 14 tracked details verified
- Lighthouse · #17, 73/100
Toolkit for makers to build waitlist pages with survey questions, send newsletters, collect feedback and analyse signup answers with AI.
- Score: 73/100, #17 of 27 (Ghost: 71/100, #18)
- Entry price: $19 billed monthly; not compared with Ghost, which publishes no price on the same billing basis source
- Verified features: Custom domain, Landing pages and forms, Open and click analytics, Public API
6 of 14 tracked details verified
- Astro Send · #21, 58/100
AI-driven newsletter platform that researches content, drafts weekly issues and sends them, with sponsorship and product sales tools.
- Score: 58/100, #21 of 27 (Ghost: 71/100, #18)
- Entry price: $20 billed monthly; not compared with Ghost, which publishes no price on the same billing basis source
- Verified features: Paid subscriptions, Newsletter website, Open and click analytics
5 of 14 tracked details verified
Ghost head to head
How we picked
- Pool: tools in the same market as the tool on this page: they list its primary category, and their own primary category is one it lists too. Explicit competitor links count as well.
- Closest first, at most 10: explicit competitors, then the same primary category, then more shared categories, then the smallest gap in entry price (per month, on a log scale), then more shared platforms, then name.
- Order on the page: tools ranked on the category scorecard by their category rank, then tools that are not ranked (no scorecard, or under 60% of the weight with verified data) in closeness order.
- Prices are compared only on the same billing basis (billed monthly with billed monthly, billed annually with billed annually). A feature counts as missing only when the vendor's page states it; a feature the vendor does not mention is not listed either way.
Every value is read from the vendor's own pages (or GitHub for licences and stars) and shown with the date we checked it. A value we could not verify is shown as a dash, never estimated, and never read as a “no”. We did not test these tools hands-on unless a listing says so. Methodology
The scorecard behind the ranks
Every one of these newsletter platforms is scored by the same 8 criteria (scorecard v2). Each criterion gives 0 to 100 from the vendor's published data; the total is the weighted average. A criterion without verified data is left out and the other weights are re-normalised. A tool with under 60% of the weight covered is listed as not ranked, and so is a tool with no verified price and fewer than 2 verified features (“needs a verified price”); each score shows how many criteria it is based on. The core criteria are the same in every category; the category criteria are specific to newsletter platforms. Nobody gets custom weights, including our own products.
| Criterion | Weight | Type | What we measure |
|---|---|---|---|
| Entry price | 25% | Core | Price per month of the cheapest paid plan, against the prices of other newsletter platforms on the same billing basis (monthly-billed prices against monthly, annual-billed against annual).Log scale. Billed monthly: $9/month or less = 100, $100 or more = 0. Only billed annually: $9/month or less = 100, $159 or more = 0. Only free plans = 100. Usage-priced and one-time plans are not scored. |
| Free plan or trial | 15% | Core | Whether you can use the tool before paying: a free plan, or failing that a free trial, as shown on the vendor's pricing page.Free plan = 100. No free plan but a free trial = 60. The pricing page lists plans but shows neither = 0. No plans read = not scored. |
| Pricing transparency | 10% | Core | How much of the pricing is public: the share of plans with a published price ("contact sales" counts against), and whether there are at least 3 published tiers.80 x (plans with a public price / plans listed) + 20 x (public plans, up to 3) / 3. No plans read = not scored. |
| Verified features | 15% | Core | How many of the 9 features we track for this category the vendor's own pages verifiably show (paid subscriptions, automations / sequences, custom domain, referral programme, a/b testing, landing pages and forms, segmentation and tags, newsletter website, open and click analytics). This counts verified features only: a tool that documents less scores lower here, and only here.Linear: verified features / 5 (half the tracked list) x 100, capped at 100. No tracked feature verified = not scored. |
| API, integrations and export | 10% | Core | Whether a public API exists, how many integrations the vendor states, and whether the vendor documents a way to export your data.Average of the parts with data: public API yes = 100, no = 0; integrations on a log scale (100 or more = 100); a documented data export = 100. None verified = not scored. |
| Cost at 1,000 subscribers | 10% | Category | Monthly price of the cheapest paid plan that allows at least 1,000 subscribers.Log scale: $5/month or less = 100, $100 or more = 0. Plans that do not state a subscriber limit are not used. |
| Free plan limits | 10% | Category | What the free plan allows: subscribers (full marks at 2,500), emails per month (full marks at 10,000).Each stated limit linear up to its full mark (unlimited = 100), averaged. Tools without a free plan, or whose free plan states none of these limits, are not scored here. |
| Paid subscriptions | 5% | Category | Whether writers can charge for subscriptions, and the platform's fee on that revenue.No paid subscriptions (verified) = 0; paid subscriptions: linear, 0% fee = 100, 15% or more = 0. Fee not stated = not scored. |
Sources are vendor pricing pages, docs and changelogs, each with the date we checked it. We did not test these tools hands-on unless a listing says so. Full formulas: methodology.
Questions, answered from the data
Who are Ghost's main competitors?
By our scorecard, the highest-ranked of its closest competitors are Flodesk (98/100), notifuse (93/100) and AWeber (85/100).
Which Ghost competitor is cheapest?
Billed monthly, Mailchimp starts lowest at $13 a month (Essentials). Entry plans differ in limits.
How does Ghost rank against its competitors?
Ghost is #18 of 27 ranked newsletter platforms with 71/100.
Which Ghost competitors have a free plan?
Flodesk, notifuse, AWeber, Mailchimp and warmbly.