AWeber
Depends
Confidence: Medium
Buy if you want dead-simple, reliable email marketing with a genuinely useful free tier of 2,500 subscribers.
Comparison
AWeber vs ActiveCampaign
AWeber and ActiveCampaign both land on Depends.
ActiveCampaign
Depends
Confidence: Medium
Buy it if you run serious multi-channel lifecycle marketing and accept per-contact pricing that users say keeps rising.
| Compare | AWeber | ActiveCampaign |
|---|---|---|
| Verdict | Depends | Depends |
| Best for | Solo creators and bloggers | SMB marketing teams |
| Who it's not for | Price-sensitive senders with large lists | Tiny contact lists . per-contact pricing makes it bad value |
| Privacy | Core product has a responsible-disclosure program and GDPR terms, but its WordPress plugins have had authorization CVEs, and a past breach plus leaked credentials are reported.⁷ | Vendor runs a trust center and SSO, but a reported data breach and several WordPress plugin CVEs are on record. |
| Support quality | Trustpilot users call support exceptional | Insufficient evidence in reviewed sources |
| Public sentiment | Users consistently praise ease of use, deliverability, and support, but complain loudly about price hikes and billing practices.⁴ | Users praise the automation depth but increasingly complain about rising prices and question the CRM. |
| Biggest gotcha | Grandfathered pricing removed . legacy customers saw bills jump, one reported +$85/month.⁴ | Pricing scales with contact count; Reddit threads document users leaving over increases.15 |
Pick AWeber when
- Solo creators and bloggers
- Small businesses sending simple newsletters
- Non-technical marketers
- Deliverability-focused senders
When AWeber is not a fit
- Price-sensitive senders with large lists
- Teams needing deep marketing automation . ActiveCampaign territory
- Healthcare orgs handling patient data
- Anyone expecting legacy pricing to be honored
Pick ActiveCampaign when
- SMB marketing teams
- Email/SMS lifecycle automation
- Teams outgrowing basic senders
- Ecommerce and agency use cases
When ActiveCampaign is not a fit
- Tiny contact lists . per-contact pricing makes it bad value
- Buyers wanting a primary sales CRM
- Anyone needing only a simple newsletter sender
- Price-sensitive teams after the latest hikes
Sources
- AWeber Review . Pros and Cons of the Newsletter Serviceemailtooltester.comreview
review
- AWeber Customer Service Reviews . Trustpilottrustpilot.comreview
review
- AWeber Price Increase: Grandfathered Pricing Eliminatedaudienceful.comnews
- AWeber pricing update 2024-25emailoctopus.comnews
security
- CVE-2025-49988nvd.nist.govsecurity
- Data breach at email list provider AWebervictorcaballero.comsecurity
- AWeber . Infostealer Credentialshudsonrock.comsecurity
- AWeber official siteaweber.comofficial
- How much does AWeber cost? . AWeber Docsdocs.aweber.comofficial
- ActiveCampaign Review 2026 - When (and when not to)emailtooltester.comreview
- ActiveCampaign Review: Why I No-Longer Recommendianbrodie.comreview