Benchmark Email features: what you get on each plan
Benchmark runs two products under one brand and labels neither. The pricing page documents a platform rebuilt in October 2025, the knowledge base documents the classic one, and they disagree on the free send allowance, on landing pages and on integrations. Most of the gating below comes from an article about what you lose when you downgrade, because no Benchmark sales page publishes it. Sources checked 27 August 2026.
Feature matrix
| Feature | Included | From plan | Verdict |
|---|---|---|---|
| Contacts on the free plan | Partial | Free (500) | Both platforms agree here |
| Free monthly send allowance | Partial | Free | 2,500 new, 3,500 classic, see notes |
| Paid send allowance | Yes | Pro | Ten times the contact limit |
| User seats | Partial | Free (1) | One on Pro too, $15/month each after |
| Authenticated domains | Partial | Free (1) | Ten on Pro, one while free |
| API keys | Partial | Free (2) | Ten on Pro, API on every plan |
| Signup forms | Partial | Free (1) | 5 Lite, 25 Pro, then unlimited |
| Signups accepted per day | Partial | Free (75) | A throttle, not a total |
| Campaigns per day | Partial | Free (10) | Free accounts are rate limited |
| Automation Lite | Yes | Free | Free and paid, both surfaces |
| Automation Pro | Yes | Pro | Lite loses it, despite being paid |
| A/B testing | Yes | Pro | Excluded from Lite, not just free |
| Landing page creation | Yes | Free | Unlimited pages, saved not served |
| Landing page publishing | Yes | Lite | Paid only, and disputed, see notes |
| Surveys and polls | Yes | Pro | Two surfaces name Pro and Enterprise |
| HTML code editor | Yes | Pro | Lite drops to the visual builder |
| Website tracking script | Yes | Pro | Named on the downgrade page only |
| Sub-accounts | Partial | Lite | Needs 1,000 contacts on Lite |
| Smart Content credits | Partial | Free (25) | 100 paid, unlimited on Pro |
| Image hosting | Partial | Free (1 GB) | Unlimited on any paid plan |
| Remove the Benchmark badge | Yes | Lite | Any paid plan clears the footer |
| List verification | Partial | Pro | Or $3 per 1,000 contacts |
| Inbox Checker | Yes | Add-on | $14 for 100 tests, one off |
| Dedicated IP | Yes | Add-on | $28.95, tier never stated |
| Transactional email or SMTP relay | No | — | Sending happens in the web app |
Two platforms, one brand, no label
Benchmark rebuilt its platform in October 2025 and kept the old one running, and nothing tells a reader which applies to them. That is where the disagreements come from. The free plan sends 2,500 a month on the new platform, five times its contact limit, and 3,500 on the classic one, seven times the list size; the article carrying 3,500 was updated in January 2026, so it is not stale, it describes a different product. Landing pages split the same way, publishable by paid accounts in the knowledge base and absent from the free plan according to the new platform’s own blog.
Read Lite carefully. It is a paid plan that still loses A/B testing, Automation Pro and the code editor, and it gets sub-accounts only above a thousand contacts. And there is no transactional product here: Benchmark’s own API page states that sending happens in the web app, so this is a campaign tool, not a relay.
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Plan costs and contact bands are on the Benchmark Email pricing page. The overall assessment is in the Benchmark Email review, and comparable platforms sit under Benchmark Email alternatives.
This review follows our email infrastructure testing methodology. We disclose affiliate relationships in our editorial independence policy.
