10 best WordPress plugins to help you get the most out of your audience

Sifting through 50,000+ WordPress plugins might seem… overwhelming. But luckily, you won’t have to! We’ve curated a list of the 6 best WordPress newsletter plugins, so you can start building engagement and driving sales through email marketing today. Like right now.

But that’s not all! We also looked into the 4 best WordPress subscription plugins for maximum conversions so that you can capture more leads and grow your audience—so much so that you could sell out Madison Square Garden.

Before we dive in, let’s take a look at the 7 key factors you should look at in your WordPress newsletter plugins →

When sifting through the vast array of WordPress newsletter plugins, you want to find high-quality plugins that are as robust as they are intuitive. So, what should you be looking for in a WordPress newsletter plugin? Here’s the lowdown:

It may come as no surprise that we think MailerLite is the best WordPress newsletter plugin, but we aren’t the only ones. MailerLite's newsletter plugin is dedicated to simplifying the process, making it an appealing choice for small to medium-sized businesses (SMBs), entrepreneurs, non-profits, and e-commerce platforms.

The user-centric design aims to make the entire journey a stress-free experience, from drafting your first newsletter to managing an advanced automated email series.

The app was built with a gentle learning curve, ensuring that even email marketing newbies can effortlessly navigate through our extensive catalog of features.

MailerLite’s feature set is tailored to help you maximize the potential of your email list while growing alongside your business. We offer a generous free tier, allowing users to test the waters before committing to a paid plan. As your needs evolve, you can easily transition to a higher tier to access more advanced features.

E-commerce features

• Connect your WooCommerce store in minutes with a native integration built by MailerLite developers

• Automate emails based on buyer behavior such as purchases or abandoned carts 

• Sync contacts between your email platform and your e-commerce tool

• Share product recommendations in emails with e-commerce product blocks

• Sell digital products—such as paid newsletter subscriptions—from your online store, landing page, or newsletter with Stripe integration

Pros

• AI text generation: Use the AI subject line generator or AI email writing assistant to save time, optimize your email copy and refine your ideas

• Risk-free 30-day free trial: When you create a MailerLite account you get access to premium features like unlimited templates, AI text generation and more! Plus you’ll also have access to 24/7 live chat support during your first month to make getting started a total breeze

• User-friendly interface: The MailerLite dashboard and editors are all really easy to navigate

• Best email deliverability: MailerLite is repeatedly ranked no. 1 in email deliverability by Email Tool Tester. So you can rest assured that your emails are landing in inboxes

• Free automation and advanced segmentation: Everyone, including free plan users, can deliver the right messages at the right times to the right folks with zero hassle

• Budget-friendly pricing: Enjoy the liberty of a robust free plan with plan upgrades that deliver even more value starting from just $9 a month

• E-commerce integrations: Connect your online shop to MailerLite to send triggered emails to customers when they buy a product or abandon their carts, and track e-commerce conversions from your newsletters

• Language support: The MailerLite app is available in English, Spanish and Polish. Additionally, customer support is available in English, Spanish, Polish, Lithuanian, Russian, Portuguese and French

Cons

• Analytic capabilities: While you can track all the essential metrics, plus additional e-commerce metrics with a native integration, power users might want something more in-depth in the analytics department

Mailster is a WordPress newsletter plugin that allows users to create, manage, and track email campaigns directly within the WordPress dashboard. This plugin eliminates the need to work with external platforms by providing a comprehensive email marketing solution within WordPress itself. With a focus on integration, it provides facilities to manage subscribers, create campaigns using its built-in editor, and monitor email performance without leaving your site's backend.

Key features

• Email automation

• 400+ free and premium email templates

• Unlimited forms

• Unlimited subscribers

• Unlimited lists

Pros

• All-in-one dashboard: Provides functionality to handle all email marketing-related tasks within the WordPress dashboard

• No subscriber or email sending limits: Offers unlimited email sending and subscriber management without additional costs per tier

• Affordable plans: Mailster is quite cheap compared to other WordPress newsletter plugins

Cons

• Deliverability challenges: Some users might encounter deliverability issues, depending on their web hosting service, and may need to configure additional SMTP settings to improve it

• No monthly plans: Mailster requires users to commit to an annual subscription

• No free trial: Mailster doesn’t offer a free trial of email features, however, they do offer a 14-day money-back guarantee if you’re not satisfied

Mailpoet is another WordPress newsletter plugin that markets itself as a seamless plugin for inside your WordPress dashboard. They offer all of the basic features like the creation and distribution of newsletters, subscriber management, and statistics regarding the newsletters sent, all without needing to leave WordPress.

Key features

• Drag & drop email editor

• Email automation

• Last post notifications

• Signup forms

• Subscriber segmentation

• WooCommerce integration

Pros

• Integrated experience: Manage, create and analyze newsletters all within your WordPress website backend

Cons

• Limited segmentation in free plan: Basic segmentation available in the free version only allows you to segment subscribers based on a singular characteristic.

• Limited support: Mailpoet doesn’t offer live chat support on any of their plans, and priority email support included in premium versions may take up to 2 business days

Brevo caters predominantly to small and medium businesses, along with e-commerce platforms and entrepreneurs seeking a unified communications tool. It differentiates itself by not just being an email service provider (ESP) but by also offering SMS marketing, live chat, and CRM functionalities under one roof.

The platform comes with a tiered pricing model that is unique in the sense that it's centered around the number of emails sent, not the number of contacts stored, which can be beneficial for businesses with larger contact lists but low emailing frequency.

Key features

• Drag & drop email editor

• SMS marketing

• WhatsApp campaigns

• Live chat widgets

• Automated chatbot features

• Email automation

• Signup forms

• Landing pages 

Pros

• Multi-channel communication: Brevo offers both SMS and WhatsApp marketing, as well as marketing chatbots

Cons

• Surprise costs: Some features need to be purchased as an add-on, such as additional account users ($12/month per user) and additional landing pages ($24/month per 5 additional landing pages)

• Limited templates: Brevo only offers 65 pre-designed email templates

Constant Contact provides email marketing services, along with features for SMS and social media communication. Its social media capabilities include ad design, post scheduling, and comment interactions, while the SMS functions allow for text messaging to contacts. However, accessing some valuable email features, like dynamic content, surveys, and advanced automation tools requires a pricier Plus plan.

Key features

• Forms, popups and landing pages 

• Drag & drop email builder

• Ability to create and schedule social media posts 

• Autoresponders and workflows

• SMS marketing features 

• 300 integrations with tools including Shopify, Canva, and Vimeo

Pros

• Unique multi-channel features: Manage social media accounts and connect with customers via SMS from a single tool

• Plenty of templates: Shortcut the email design process with templates. Customizing these templates is easy thanks to the drag-and-drop builder

• Phone support: Get help from Constant Contact experts via phone on weekdays

Cons

• No free version: Even those with a small subscriber list have to pay to use Constant Contact

• Sending limits: Plans have a sending limit of 24 times your total contacts

• No website builder: You’ll need to build your website on another platform, which will add to your digital marketing costs

Newsletter Glue, the new kid on the block, launched in August 2020. This is another WordPress newsletter plugin that allows you to write, design and publish newsletters directly within WordPress. Their main USP is that Newsletter Glue lets you publish your newsletter to your subscribers and website at the same time, without having to copy-paste between them. They claim this frees up an hour or more per newsletter.

Key features

• Email template builder

• Subscriber segmentation

• Sign-up forms

• Ability to show/hide content from either the newsletter or blog version of your post

Pros

• Integrated experience: Creating, writing and publishing newsletters all take place in the WordPress dashboard

• Searchable newsletter archive: By publishing your newsletters and blog posts on your website, they are easily shareable and search engine-friendly

• Time efficient: By sending your newsletter and publishing it as a blog post at the same time in a single click, you can cut your publishing time in half

Cons

• Limited design options: Newsletter Glue’s email template builder is much more basic than other plugins

• Limited templates: Other newsletter plugins offer a richer variety of email templates, called “patterns” in Newsletter Glue

• Expensive: Newsletter Glue is significantly more expensive than some of the other plugins featured in this list

• No free plan or trial: Newsletter Glue doesn’t offer a free plan or a free trial of premium features. However, they do offer a 30-day money-back guarantee

OptinMonster markets itself as a “conversion optimization toolkit”. They offer a whole host of opt-in forms, including lightbox pop-ups, floating bars, scroll boxes, gamified wheels, and exit intent pop-ups. 

Key features

• Drag & drop form builder

• Yes/no forms

• Mobile-friendly pop-ups

• Animation and sound effect features

• Advanced targeting options

• A/B testing

Pros

• High customization: From the form’s design to when it appears and who it appears for, you can completely customize your OptinMonster forms

• Onboarding: All OptinMonster plans come with “Done-For-You Setup” where you get 1 complete campaign pre-made in your account

• Feature-rich: All OptinMonster plans come with a lot of features centered around creating pop-up campaigns

Cons

• Limited to pop-up forms: OptinMonster specializes exclusively in pop-ups, so there are no options for embedded forms or landing pages

• No monthly plans: All plans are billed annually, which can be a big commitment for new businesses

• No free plan or trial: OptinMonster doesn’t offer a free plan or trial. However, they do offer a 14-day money-back guarantee 

WPForms is a drag-and-drop WordPress form builder plugin that offers over 1,000 templates for contact forms, payment forms, survey forms, newsletter forms, and registration forms, which gives users a pretty well-rounded set of tools that go above and beyond subscription forms alone. One downside is that in order to integrate an ESP like MailerLite, you would need to upgrade to a more expensive Plus plan.

Key features

• Drag & drop form builder

• 1000+ templates

• Mobile-friendly

• Conditional logic settings

• Instant notifications

• File upload option in forms

• Email integrations

• Multi-page forms

Pros

• Beginner-friendly: Users report a minimal learning curve with WPForms

• Extensive knowledge base: WPForms has a large number of help articles and video tutorials available for users

Cons

• No free plan or trial: However, WPForms does offer a 14-day money-back guarantee if you aren’t satisfied

• No email add-ons for Basic plan users: Marketing integrations for ESPs such as MailerLite, Mailchimp, GetResponse, etc, are only available on the Plus plan tier and above (starting at $99.95 per year)

• No monthly plan options: All of WPForms plans are billed annually

Bloom is a WordPress form builder created by the team behind Divi, the visual WordPress site builder by Elegant Themes. Bloom is specifically designed to work with Divi. In fact, in order to purchase Bloom, you need to purchase an Elegant Themes subscription which comes with Divi, Extra, Bloom & Monarch.

So if your website is already designed, up and running, and ready to go, this might not be the best option for you. But if your website is still in its early stages, you might want to check out Elegant Themes.

Key features

• Visual form builder

• Various form types

• Pop-up forms

• Targeted display settings

• Embedded forms

• Forms for gated content

• Easy integrations

• A/B testing

Pros

• Design-focused: High-quality design options for a professional look

Cons

• Requires Elegant Themes membership: The whole Elegant Themes package may be unnecessary if your website is already built

WS Form is a highly flexible WordPress form plugin that caters to people with more complex form-building requirements. Its advanced features and developer-friendly tools make it a formidable choice for professionals and businesses with specific needs, such as customizing product or check-out forms.

Key features

• Drag & drop form builder

• 55+ field types

• Conditional logic

• Calculated fields

• Debug console

Pros

• High customizability: You can pretty much tailor every aspect of your form to meet your specific needs

• Developer-friendly: Advanced tools and custom coding options for developers

• Comprehensive documentation: Extensive guides and tutorials available

Cons

• Learning curve: Might be challenging for beginners due to the advanced feature set

• No pop-ups or landing pages: WS forms focuses exclusively on embedded website forms

• Email add-ons only on Freelance plan: ESP integrations are only available on the more expensive Freelance plan tier

• No monthly plans: All WS Form plans are billed annually

• No free plan or trial: However it does come with a 14-day money-back guarantee

Choosing the right WordPress newsletter plugin for you comes down to your business, your goals and your specific needs. If you take the time to assess what you want and follow the guidelines laid out in this article, you’ll have all the info you need to be tap dancing over those cracks like a native New Yorker.