FlockStack vs Kit

The short version

Kit is built around creators who sell. Its Free plan holds up to 10,000 subscribers, it puts no limit on sends, and it sells digital products and paid newsletters on every plan. Its price follows the size of your list. FlockStack is priced by the emails you send, takes 0% of what readers pay, and has its API and MCP server on every plan, and its code is open source.

Up to 10,000 subscribers, Kit's Free plan costs nothing, though it has no automations. Past that, or on Kit's Creator plan, which has them, the table below sets Kit's price beside FlockStack's for the same list, per Kit's pricing page read on October 21, 2026. If you want visual automations, Kit's recommendation network or a free plan for a list of several thousand, Kit is the better pick.

Choose Kit if

• Your list fits Kit's Free plan, or is large. Kit's Free plan holds up to 10,000 subscribers and has no sending limit. FlockStack's Free plan holds 2,500. A list that fits Kit's Free plan costs nothing there.
• You want visual automations and sequences. Kit's pricing page lists them from Creator, with a template library, link triggers and RSS campaigns. FlockStack has automations too, with 15 triggers and 10 kinds of step, but check newsletter automation against the flows you run.
• You want a network that brings readers. Kit lists free recommendations on every plan and paid recommendations from Creator. FlockStack has a small recommendations directory and no paid network.
• You email a big list every day. Kit's price follows subscribers, so a daily sender pays for no extra volume. FlockStack counts every email.

Choose FlockStack if

• You send on a schedule a plan holds. You pay for the emails, and the cap is on active subscribers: readers who stop opening are set aside as dormant and don't count. Kit bills confirmed subscribers, cold ones included.
• You want to keep all of what readers pay. FlockStack sets no application fee, so it takes 0%. Kit's fee is 3.5% + $0.30 a transaction with card processing included. Stripe's standard US rate is 2.9% + $0.30, so the difference between the two is the part Kit keeps.
• You want agents to run it, from the Free plan. The REST API has 234 endpoints, and the MCP server lets ChatGPT, Claude, Cursor or Codex use the same actions, with write access on every plan. Kit lists its MCP server on Creator and Pro. See the newsletter API and the MCP server.
• You want the code. FlockStack is open source under the AGPL-3.0 at github.com/ankurmans/flockstack. You can run it on your own server. Self-hosted newsletter software covers what that takes.

What each costs at the same list size

Kit sells Creator and Pro by the size of your list and puts no limit on sends. FlockStack sells plans by the emails you send. The table shows the FlockStack plan that holds the list when you send one issue a week to every subscriber, beside Kit's lowest plan for it, which is Free up to 10,000 subscribers, and beside Kit's Creator plan, billed monthly. Kit's price steps up in bands, so the table says what size each price is for. Kit's Pro costs more at the same size and adds engagement scoring and deliverability reporting. The plans do not include the same things: the FlockStack plans include the features on the pricing page.

Kit discounts yearly billing, and FlockStack's yearly plan costs 10 months' price instead of 12. The newsletter cost calculator works out your own list, sends and paying readers.

Three newsletters, worked out

The calculator's three examples, billed monthly. Fees are the platform's own share and card processing at Stripe's standard US rate. Kit's fee already includes card processing.

Fees on paid subscriptions

FlockStack sets no application fee on a sale. Readers pay your own Stripe account and Stripe's processing fees apply, at 2.9% + $0.30 for a US card. Kit's help center lists 3.5% + $0.30 per transaction on every plan, with card processing included and no monthly fee. Kit's pricing page describes that fee as Kit keeping 0.6% beside the card fee, and its commerce page says 0.6% plus card processing, so the two pages don't agree on how to read it. Kit pays out through its own Stripe Express account, weekly, and offers no PayPal.

Selling works on every FlockStack plan, the Free plan included, with up to 3 paid tiers, gifts and one-time products. The paid newsletter platform page has the details.

Automations and segmentation

Per Kit's pricing page, read on October 21, 2026, its Free plan has no automations, sequences or RSS campaigns. Creator adds them, and Pro adds subscriber engagement scoring. Tags and segments are on every plan. FlockStack's Free plan has 2 automations besides the welcome email, a paid plan can have up to 50 a newsletter, and a newsletter can save up to 50 segments.

API and agents

Kit's pricing page lists API access on every plan. Its developer documentation describes version 4 of the API, with an API key or OAuth, and rate limits of 120 requests a minute for a key and 600 for an OAuth token. Its MCP server, which its help center calls AI Connectors, is on Creator and Pro, and a Free account that connects is shown an upgrade prompt when it runs a tool.

FlockStack's REST API and MCP server have the same 234 actions and write access on every plan.

Where FlockStack is the weaker pick

• A smaller free plan. Kit's holds up to 10,000 subscribers; FlockStack's holds 2,500 and 10,000 emails a month.
• No paid recommendation network. FlockStack's recommendations are free and its directory is small. Kit also has an App Store of apps; FlockStack connects through its API, webhooks, Zapier and Make.
• A daily sender pays for every email. Kit's price does not follow the number of emails.
• Paying subscribers can't be moved across yet. FlockStack can't attach a subscription that exists on another platform to a contact.

What this page leaves out

It compares what Kit publishes on its pricing page, help center and developer documentation, and what FlockStack's plans and docs say. It does not compare editors, templates, deliverability, reporting or support, which we haven't tested side by side. Kit's Pro plan had a first-year offer on its pricing page when we read it, which this page leaves out; the Pro prices it mentions are Kit's standard ones. Kit changes its plans, so check its pricing page before you decide. For more options than one rival, see Mailchimp alternatives, which lists Kit. FlockStack is not affiliated with Kit.

Moving from Kit

FlockStack reads a Kit subscriber export as it comes, with each reader's status and signup date. Automations and sequences stay behind. Switch from Kit has the steps in order.