Teams look past HubSpot Marketing Hub when the step from Starter to Professional costs thousands up front, when marketing contact tiers keep adding to the bill, or when the subscription cannot be cancelled before the term ends. Most go to ActiveCampaign or Ortto for automation, or to Brevo and Zoho for lower cost.
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What each alternative does differently
1. ActiveCampaign
Flexible journey builder for small marketing teams · United States
Automation first, with a CRM add-on rather than a native CRM record. Starter limits each automation to five actions, Plus removes that cap, and Pro adds advanced segmentation and attribution tracking. Prices appear only after you configure a plan, so we could not read amounts. A free trial is offered.
Switch from HubSpot Marketing Hub if you want deep automation and do not need HubSpot's CRM.
Pricing: Published plans priced by contact count; attribution and split testing inside automations start at Pro, while lead scoring and the deals pipeline come with a paid CRM add-on. (free trial)
Full review: #1 of 15 in our ranking ·
Visit ActiveCampaign →
2. Ortto
Customer data platform with journeys and analytics · Australia
A visual journey builder on top of its own customer data platform, with email, SMS, push and advertising steps in one canvas. Journeys react to event data. Its pricing page returned a not-found error when we fetched it, so plans and amounts are unconfirmed here.
Switch from HubSpot Marketing Hub if you run product-led journeys driven by event data across several channels.
Pricing: Published plans priced by contact count, with higher tiers for advanced data and analytics features. (free trial)
Full review: #2 of 15 in our ranking ·
Visit Ortto →
3. Brevo
Email, SMS and WhatsApp automation from Paris · France
Billed by emails sent more than by stored contacts. Marketing automation is included on the free plan for up to 2,000 contacts, and Professional is listed at $350 a month with ten seats. Sales CRM seats are priced separately.
Switch from HubSpot Marketing Hub if you want automation priced by send volume at a far lower entry cost.
Pricing: A free plan with a daily sending cap, then paid tiers priced mainly by monthly email volume rather than stored contacts; SMS and WhatsApp messages are bought as credits. (free plan)
Full review: #13 of 15 in our ranking ·
Visit Brevo →
4. Zoho Marketing Automation
Low-cost journeys and scoring inside the Zoho family · India
Priced by contact count with a 14-day trial and no card required. Standard includes ten users, while scoring, landing pages and email A/B tests begin on Professional with fifteen users. Enterprise lists twenty-five users. It fits teams already inside Zoho's other products.
Switch from HubSpot Marketing Hub if you want contact-based automation at a low entry price and already use Zoho.
Pricing: Published plans priced by contact count at a low entry point, with lead scoring from the Professional plan; also included in Zoho One. (free trial)
Full review: #7 of 15 in our ranking ·
Visit Zoho Marketing Automation →
5. Customer.io
Product-event messaging for software companies · United States
Built for product and engineering teams that message from event data. Essentials starts at $100 a month and covers 5,000 profiles and one million emails a month. Premium starts at $1,000 a month billed yearly. A startup program gives qualifying companies twelve months free.
Switch from HubSpot Marketing Hub if your messages are triggered by product events rather than web forms and ads.
Pricing: Published plans from $100 a month for Essentials, priced by profiles with an email allowance; reverse ETL on every plan, warehouse destinations and data replay from Premium. (free trial)
Full review: #3 of 15 in our ranking ·
Visit Customer.io →
6. Klaviyo
Ecommerce email and SMS automation on purchase data · United States
Aimed at online stores and priced by active profiles. The free plan covers 250 profiles and 500 email sends a month, with $5 of mobile messages. Flows are its automation layer. Its pricing page lists no blog or ad management tools.
Switch from HubSpot Marketing Hub if you sell through an online store and want flows built on shopper behavior.
Pricing: A free plan for up to 250 active profiles and 500 email sends a month, then tiers priced by active profiles, with SMS and other mobile messages billed separately. (free plan)
Full review: #15 of 15 in our ranking ·
Visit Klaviyo →
7. Keap
Small-business CRM with built-in campaign automation · United States
Small-business CRM and automation on one published plan, starting at $299 a month ($2,988 billed yearly). Implementation services are required, which echoes HubSpot's onboarding fee. The site notes Keap is now part of Thryv.
Switch from HubSpot Marketing Hub if you want one plan covering CRM and automation for a small service business.
Pricing: One published plan priced by contact count, from $299 a month billed annually with two users included, extra users at $39 each and a required paid implementation package; limited free trial. (free trial)
Full review: #14 of 15 in our ranking ·
Visit Keap →
8. Salesforce Marketing Cloud Account Engagement
B2B marketing automation built for Salesforce CRM · United States
Org-level pricing for B2B teams on Salesforce. Editions are listed at $1,250, $2,750, $4,400 and $15,000 a month, billed annually. Pricing is per org, not per seat or contact; contact count does not set the price.
Switch from HubSpot Marketing Hub if your sales team runs on Salesforce and you want marketing priced per org.
Pricing: Org-level editions with published list prices starting above a thousand dollars a month, billed annually, plus add-ons. (none)
Full review: #6 of 15 in our ranking ·
Visit Salesforce Marketing Cloud Account Engagement →
9. Braze
Customer engagement platform for consumer apps · United States
Enterprise engagement for large consumer brands, mostly app and cross-channel messaging. A contract combines an edition (Go, Select and above), monthly active users and a pool of Action Credits. A free trial is offered.
Switch from HubSpot Marketing Hub if you message millions of app and web users and need cross-channel orchestration.
Pricing: Quote-only contracts built from a platform edition, monthly active users and a pool of Action Credits spent on messages; trials and startup programs are offered. (free trial)
Full review: #11 of 15 in our ranking ·
Visit Braze →
10. Adobe Marketo Engage
Enterprise B2B marketing automation from Adobe · United States
A long-standing B2B automation platform sold by quote, per the category file. We could not load an Adobe pricing page, so packages and limits are unconfirmed here. Check Adobe's site before comparing it with HubSpot's published Professional and Enterprise prices.
Switch from HubSpot Marketing Hub if you run complex B2B programs and accept a quoted enterprise contract.
Pricing: Quote-only Select, Prime and Ultimate packages priced per thousand contacts; Marketo Measure attribution is included only in Ultimate, and account management is an add-on. (none)
Full review: #5 of 15 in our ranking ·
Visit Adobe Marketo Engage →
11. Oracle Eloqua
Enterprise B2B marketing automation from Oracle · United States
Enterprise B2B automation. Oracle's product page lists campaign orchestration, lead management, account-based marketing and data management, and directs buyers to a demo request instead of publishing prices. Expect a sales process and an implementation project, not a self-serve start.
Switch from HubSpot Marketing Hub if you are a large B2B team that wants account-based programs and a vendor-led rollout.
Pricing: Quote-only enterprise contracts, typically multi-year. (none)
Full review: #12 of 15 in our ranking ·
Visit Oracle Eloqua →
Questions and answers
Can I export my contacts and records from HubSpot?
Yes, HubSpot exports records in CSV, XLS or XLSX format to anyone with export permission. A download link arrives by email and expires after 30 days. Large exports can take hours and may arrive as several files in a zip.
Does a HubSpot export include activities and emails?
No, an ordinary record export downloads current property values and associations. HubSpot says contact activities such as calls and notes are exported separately, through individual contact data, certain activity reports or the engagements API.
Can I cancel Marketing Hub in the middle of a term?
No, the terms say you may not cancel before the end of the current term and prepaid fees are not refunded. Your subscription renews automatically unless you switch off auto-renewal in Account and Billing before the term ends.
Will HubSpot raise my price at renewal?
Yes, it may. On renewal HubSpot can increase fees up to its then-current list price and must tell you at least 30 days before the renewal. If you disagree, you can end the subscription at the close of the current term.
Can I lower my marketing contact tier during the term?
No, the catalog says the tier cannot be downgraded until the contract renewal date. Changing contacts to non-marketing takes effect only from the start of the next month or at renewal, whichever comes first.
What does Marketing Hub onboarding cost?
Onboarding is a required one-time fee of $3,000 on Professional and $7,000 on Enterprise, according to HubSpot's product catalog. Starter has no listed onboarding fee. Count that fee when you compare a move away from the product.
