Zoho Campaigns Pricing: Everything You Need to Know 2026

Zoho Campaigns sits in an interesting spot among email marketing platforms—it’s clearly built for people who already live in the Zoho universe. You know—the businesses that use Zoho CRM, maybe Zoho Books, and want everything to talk to each other nicely. But what if you’re just looking for a decent email marketing tool? Does the pricing hold up?

In this comprehensive guide, I’ll break down every pricing tier, hidden cost, and competitive comparison so you can make an informed decision about whether Zoho Campaigns‘ affordable pricing options are truly worth it for your business.

Zoho Campaigns Pricing at a Glance

Zoho Campaigns Plans & Costs Reviewed

Forever Free Plan Review

Who this plan is perfect for: The Forever Free plan works best for solopreneurs, small startups, or hobbyists just testing the waters with email campaigns. If you’re sending occasional newsletters to a small list and don’t need fancy drip campaigns or email automation, this gets the job done.

Upgrade triggers: You’ll hit the wall when your list exceeds 2,000 contacts, you need more than 6,000 monthly sends, or you realize you can’t do A/B testing to optimize subject lines. The lack of autoresponders and workflow automation usually pushes growing businesses to Standard.

Standard Plan Review

Who this plan is perfect for: Growing SMBs that need unlimited sends and basic email automation. The Standard plan is where Zoho Campaigns starts feeling like real email marketing software. At $3.50/month (billed annually) for 500 contacts, it’s remarkably affordable.

Upgrade triggers: You’ll need Professional when your workflows require more than basic triggers, you need advanced segmentation based on behavior, or you want features like contact scoring, dynamic content, or cart abandonment sequences. The Standard plan caps at 100K contacts—beyond that, Professional is required.

Professional Plan Review

Who this plan is perfect for: Ecommerce businesses, marketing teams running sophisticated drip campaigns, and companies that rely on advanced email automation to nurture leads. Starting at $5.30/month (annually) for 500 contacts, the price jump from Standard is modest considering the feature unlock.

Upgrade triggers: If you’re managing multiple brands or clients, you’ll need the Agency plan. The Professional plan is actually the ceiling for most businesses—workspaces for team management and campaign approval workflows make it enterprise-ready.

Agency Plan Review

Who this plan is perfect for: Marketing agencies, consultants, and freelancers managing email campaigns for multiple clients. Starting at $683/year for 10,000 contacts, it includes all Professional features plus the agency-specific tools.

Key consideration: The 10,000-contact minimum and yearly-only billing means this isn’t for agencies just starting out. But if you’re managing 5+ clients, the centralized console and license sharing can seriously save time. Contacts can be reclaimed when clients leave—they return to your pool on the next billing cycle.

Zoho Campaigns Hidden Fees & Extra Costs

Here’s what I’d budget for beyond the base pricing plans: if you need a dedicated IP address to ensure email deliverability, they are sold separately at $35/month, billed annually, and SMS marketing is purely credit-based as an add-on.

Another thing to look out for is the Litmus inbox preview add-on. If you care about how your email templates render across Gmail/Outlook/mobile clients, Zoho Campaigns’ “Inbox preview (Litmus)” is not included by default—it’s an add-on for paid plans. Zoho sells it as a credit-based upgrade: 1 Litmus credit costs $1 and covers 5 preview tests (so it’s about $0.20 per test). This is a sneaky “pro user” cost because teams that QA every campaign (or multiple variants for A/B testing) can burn through tests quickly.

The biggest savings opportunity? Annual billing gives you 25% off—so a $4.70/month Standard plan drops to $3.50/month when paid yearly. That’s $14 saved per year at the lowest tier, but the savings scale significantly as your contact count grows. For 10,000 contacts on Professional, you’d save roughly $285/year by going annual.

Also note that local taxes (VAT, GST) are charged on top of listed prices in applicable regions. Transactional emails require ZeptoMail—Zoho’s separate transactional email service starting at $2.90 for 10,000 emails—which adds complexity if you need both marketing and transactional sends.

Zoho Campaigns Monthly Pricing by Subscriber Count

Zoho Campaigns Pay-as-you-go Costs

When Pay-As-You-Go Makes Sense

Pay-as-you-go is ideal for seasonal businesses, event-based marketers, or anyone who sends fewer than 2-3 campaigns per month. If you’re sending quarterly newsletters or annual promotional blasts, this eliminates subscription waste. However, you won’t get access to advanced automation features—it’s designed for simple, straightforward campaigns.

Credit System Explained

One of the best aspects: Zoho credits never expire. Buy 5,000 credits and use them over two years if you want—no rush. Your account data stays intact for 24 months between purchases. Each credit equals one email sent, and bounced emails still consume credits, so maintain clean lists.

Volume discounts kick in significantly—buying 25,000 credits drops your per-email cost to $0.0122 compared to $0.0328 at the 500-credit tier. No refunds on purchased credits, so buy conservatively.

Zoho Campaigns SMS Pricing & Costs

SMS is available as an add-on for Standard and Professional plans. Zoho operates their own SMS gateway for US, Canada, and India. Here’s what you need to know about credit consumption:

The 4x credit cost difference between US/Canada and India is significant for international campaigns. Unused SMS credits roll over to the next billing period. Note that you can only send marketing/promotional SMS—transactional messages aren’t supported through Zoho Campaigns.

Zoho Campaigns vs. Competitors: Which Costs Less?

Is Zoho Campaigns Worth the Price?

When Zoho Campaigns Makes Sense:

If you’re already invested in the Zoho universe (Zoho CRM, Zoho Books, etc.), Campaigns is a no-brainer—the native integrations eliminate data sync headaches and you get unified real time analytics. For budget-conscious businesses needing unlimited email sends, the value proposition is strong.

When to Choose Alternatives:

If you need stronger ecommerce features, better templates, or want best-in-class automation logic without compromise, you might want to invest in more expensive email marketing platforms. For max free value, Sender tends to beat most tools at the entry level.

And if you want to stay with Zoho, but need an all-in-one marketing suite beyond email, explore Zoho Marketing Plus or Zoho Marketing Automation for broader capabilities.

Zoho Campaigns Pricing FAQs