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2026-10-28 22:51 Tool comparisons

Autopilot (Now Ortto) vs MailerLite (2027): Which Email Marketing Automation Tool Fits Startups and SMEs?

Autopilot (Now Ortto) vs MailerLite: Which Email Marketing Automation Tool Fits Your Startup?

If you search for Autopilot vs MailerLite, you will not find Autopilot any more under that name. Autopilot, the visual customer-journey tool from autopilothq.com, renamed itself Ortto in March 2022, and autopilothq.com now redirects to ortto.com. In April 2026 Canva bought Ortto; Canva says Ortto's team keeps building it as a standalone product. MailerLite is still MailerLite: an email marketing tool with automations, websites, landing pages and a free plan. We checked plans, prices, free limits, automation and AI features on ortto.com, help.ortto.com and mailerlite.com in October 2026, so this comparison shows what a startup or small business actually gets in 2027.
Quick answer: choose MailerLite if you are a founder or small team that needs newsletters, welcome sequences and simple automations at a known price: it is free up to 250 subscribers and, on the default yearly view of its pricing page, costs $10.80 a month (Comfort) or $22.50 a month (Power) for 500 subscribers. Choose Autopilot, now Ortto, if you have product or sales data to act on and want one platform for customer data, multi-channel journeys (email, SMS, push, in-app, chat) and analytics. Ortto has no free plan and does not publish its prices, so plan for a trial and a sales conversation.
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Autopilot (Ortto) vs MailerLite at a Glance

Autopilot, now OrttoMailerLite
What it isCustomer data platform with marketing automation, analytics and supportEmail marketing with automations, websites, landing pages and digital products
Free planNo; 14-day trial (all features except SMS, up to 10,000 contacts and 100 email sends)Yes: 250 subscribers, 2,500 emails a month, 2 seats, 3 active automations
Paid plansProfessional, Business, Enterprise; priced by contact tier plus add-ons, prices not publishedComfort $10.80/month and Power $22.50/month for 500 subscribers, billed yearly; Enterprise custom
Free trial14 days, no credit card14 days of paid features, no credit card
AutomationVisual journeys with real-time triggers, percentage and condition splits, filter gates, A/B testsWorkflows with up to 3 triggers, conditions, delays, A/B splits and webhooks
ChannelsEmail, SMS, web and mobile push, in-app messages, live chat, ad audiencesEmail campaigns and automations; SMS sits in a separate Transactional product
AIAI filters, AI decision shapes, lead scoring and enrichment, subject lines, MCP serverHeyLite: AI writing, landing page generator, smart sending, MCP server
OwnerCanva (since April 2026)MailerLite
Sources: ortto.com, help.ortto.com, the Canva newsroom and mailerlite.com (default yearly pricing view, 500 subscribers), checked 28 October 2026.

Autopilot Is Now Ortto: What Changed

Autopilot was known for its visual journey canvas: you drew a customer journey like a flowchart and the tool sent the emails. On its Autopilot is now Ortto page the company explains the history: in 2014 customers of its earlier platform, Bislr, mostly used an app called Autopilot, so in 2015 the company took that name. It later rebuilt the platform around customer data, messaging and analytics, and its About page says it rebranded the new platform to Ortto in March 2022. The company says "Autopilot" was a generic word, and that Ortto is pronounced "Auto" as a nod to the old name.
The second change is ownership. In April 2026 Canva announced it had acquired Ortto together with the AI company Simtheory; both were founded by brothers Chris and Mike Sharkey. Canva says Ortto has more than 11,000 customers in 190 countries and that Ortto's 40-person team will keep building the standalone product while working on Canva's marketing tools.

Ortto (Formerly Autopilot): Customer Data and Multi-Channel Journeys

Ortto describes itself as marketing automation, analytics, customer data and support in one platform. Its journey builder is the direct successor of Autopilot's canvas: journeys start and stop on real-time customer data, split by percentage or by condition, wait at filter gates or until a date, A/B test one or several messages, and send email, SMS, web and mobile push, or update ad audiences. Journeys can also update records, assign leads to sales and send Slack alerts. Ortto syncs both ways with Salesforce, HubSpot and Pipedrive, and has dedicated versions for Salesforce and Shopify users.
  • Customer data platform: contacts, custom activities and product events from your app and other tools in one profile, with dashboards, custom reports, lead scoring and revenue attribution.
  • AI features: Ortto AI builds audience filters from plain text ("people in Europe"), adds AI decision steps that judge how well a contact fits a goal, enriches and scores leads, suggests subject lines with a predicted open rate, and drafts live chat replies from your site, help docs and past tickets. An MCP server lets ChatGPT or Claude read your Ortto data.
  • Support tools: a team inbox, live chat, messenger calls, screen sharing and a knowledge base sit next to the marketing tools.
  • Data and security: data hosting in the EU, the USA or Australia, SSO, two-factor login, user roles and audit logs; Ortto lists GDPR, ISO 27001, HIPAA and SOC 2 compliance.
Pricing: Ortto does not publish prices; ortto.com/pricing returned a "page not found" in October 2026. Its help centre explains how the bill is built: a contact tier (email volume rises with it) plus add-ons such as data storage, Talk seats, custom IPs and SMS. You can pay monthly, quarterly or annually, with discounts for longer terms, and extra emails over your limit cost $1 per 1,000. Since 11 July 2023 the plans are Professional (can be month-to-month), Business and Enterprise (both annual). The 14-day trial needs no credit card and includes every feature except SMS, up to 10,000 contacts and 100 email sends; an expired trial account without a plan is deleted after 90 days.
Best for: SaaS and e-commerce startups with product or purchase data, a sales team, or several channels to coordinate, and a budget that allows a sales-led purchase.
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MailerLite: Simple Email Marketing With a Free Plan

MailerLite is built for creators, founders and small businesses; it says more than a million creators and businesses use it. Next to email campaigns with drag-and-drop, HTML and simple editors, it includes automations, signup forms and pop-ups, landing pages, a website builder, digital products and paid newsletter subscriptions, plus integrations with Shopify, WooCommerce, Stripe, WordPress, Canva and Zapier.
Automations: the MailerLite automation builder starts workflows when someone joins a group or segment, completes a form, clicks a link, updates a field, reaches a date (such as a birthday or renewal), buys a product or abandons a cart. You can add up to 3 triggers per automation (multiple triggers are a Power feature), then combine delays, conditions, A/B tests with up to 3 variations, webhooks and group moves. Free allows 3 active automations with 5 steps, Comfort 50 automations and 100 steps, and Power unlimited automations with up to 100 steps.
AI features: paid plans include HeyLite intelligence: AI writing in the email and landing page builders, a landing page generator, smart sending at the time each subscriber is likely to engage, suggestions such as re-engaging your list (beta), an AI coding assistant in the HTML editor (beta), and an MCP server so ChatGPT or Claude can analyse your data and draft automations. The Free plan has limited MCP access without sending and can use the AI landing page builder once.
On the MailerLite pricing page (default view: 500 subscribers, billed yearly, October 2026):
  • Free: $0 for up to 250 subscribers and 2,500 emails a month, 2 user seats, 3 active automations, 1 website, 1 landing page, 3 forms and knowledge-base support.
  • Comfort: $10.80 a month ($129.60 billed yearly; $12 without the yearly discount) with 5,000 emails a month, 50 automations, 10 forms, 10 sites, 3 seats, HeyLite and email support.
  • Power: $22.50 a month ($270.00 billed yearly; $25 without the discount) with unlimited emails, automations, forms, sites and seats, multiple automation triggers, and live chat and email support.
  • Enterprise: custom pricing from 200,000 subscribers.
  • Trial and discounts: a 14-day trial of paid features without a credit card (your data stays if you do not upgrade), and 30% off paid plans for approved nonprofits.
Best for: founders who want to start a newsletter or waitlist today, send welcome and launch sequences, and keep a predictable monthly bill.
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What Changed Since the Old Version of This Comparison

  • Autopilot is Ortto. The rename happened in March 2022, and autopilothq.com redirects to ortto.com. We kept "Autopilot" in the title because that is still what many people search for.
  • Ortto is owned by Canva since April 2026 and continues as its own product.
  • Ortto prices are no longer on its website. The old article said Autopilot "starts at a higher price point"; today you need a trial or a demo to get a quote.
  • MailerLite's free plan is smaller. The old article said it was free for up to 1,000 subscribers; the current Free plan covers 250 subscribers and 2,500 emails a month.
  • Removed: the claim that "90% of startups fail" because of market fit or engagement and other statistics we could not source, plus links to third-party reviews.

Autopilot (Ortto) or MailerLite: Which Should Your Startup Choose?

  • You are pre-launch and building a waitlist: MailerLite Free. A form, a landing page and a welcome automation cost nothing until you pass 250 subscribers.
  • You send a regular newsletter and a few automations: MailerLite Comfort; move to Power when you need unlimited emails, more than 50 automations or multiple triggers.
  • You run a SaaS product with trials and in-app events: Ortto, because journeys can react to product data and reach users by email, push and in-app messages.
  • You have a sales team on Salesforce, HubSpot or Pipedrive: Ortto's two-way CRM sync, lead scoring and sales assignment fit better.
  • You need SMS in the same journeys as email: Ortto (SMS is billed with numbers and credits). See also our guide to SMS marketing for startups.
  • You need a price before you talk to sales: MailerLite, which shows every plan on its pricing page.
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How Founders Use Email Automation

For an early-stage startup, email is the cheapest channel you own. Start with one signup form and a short welcome series, tag people by what they click, and only then add triggered flows for trials, carts or demo requests. Our guides show how to build a waitlist of 1,000 customers and how to land your first 10 paying customers; the complete guide to AI marketing automation covers the next step, and one of the CRM tools for startups keeps sales conversations next to your email list.
Email rarely works alone. Connect your form, shop and CRM with one of the open-source Zapier alternatives, schedule the social posts that send people to your signup page with the free Hootsuite alternatives or open-source Buffer alternatives, and if you also chat with customers, compare Zendesk vs Olark, Olark vs Intercom and, for Messenger and Instagram bots, ManyChat vs Chatfuel.
Plan the budget for your tools with the marketing budget calculator, turn your best emails into search traffic with the F/MS AI SEO Tool, and before you write a long nurture sequence, validate your startup idea with the first people who sign up.

FAQ About Autopilot vs MailerLite

Does Autopilot still exist?

Autopilot still exists under a new name. The company rebranded to Ortto in March 2022, and autopilothq.com now redirects to ortto.com. In April 2026 Canva acquired Ortto, which continues as a standalone product.

What is the main difference between Autopilot (Ortto) and MailerLite?

MailerLite is email marketing with automations, websites and landing pages at published prices, including a free plan. Ortto is a customer data platform with multi-channel journeys (email, SMS, push, in-app, chat), analytics and lead scoring, sold without public prices.

How much does MailerLite cost in 2027?

When we checked in October 2026, the default pricing view (500 subscribers, billed yearly) showed Comfort at $10.80 a month and Power at $22.50 a month. Prices rise with your subscriber count, and Enterprise is custom.

Is MailerLite free?

Yes. The Free plan covers up to 250 subscribers, 2,500 emails a month, 2 seats and 3 active automations with 5 steps, plus one website and one landing page.

How much does Ortto cost?

Ortto does not publish prices. Its help centre says the price depends on your contact tier plus add-ons such as SMS, data storage and custom IPs, with discounts for quarterly or annual billing. You get a quote after a trial or a demo.

Do Ortto and MailerLite have free trials?

Yes. Ortto has a 14-day trial without a credit card, with all features except SMS, up to 10,000 contacts and 100 email sends. MailerLite has a 14-day trial of its paid features without a credit card.

Which has better AI features?

Both have AI and an MCP server for ChatGPT and Claude. Ortto focuses on data: AI filters, AI decision steps, enrichment and lead scoring. MailerLite's HeyLite focuses on content: AI writing, a landing page generator and smart sending.

Which tool is better for a startup on a tight budget?

MailerLite, because its free plan and published prices let you start today and know your bill. Move to Ortto when you need product data, SMS, push and sales handoffs in the same journeys.

Where can I get a backlink by writing about my startup?

You can publish a guest post in one of the Fe/male Switch startup blogs, which rank in Google and in AI tools like ChatGPT and Perplexity. Get a quality backlink.

Can I use AI to write SEO articles that bring subscribers?

Yes. The F/MS AI SEO Tool turns a keyword into an article built to rank on Google and to be cited by AI assistants, with human editors checking it, so more readers reach your signup form.

About the Author

Violetta Bonenkamp, also known as MeanCEO, is an experienced startup founder with an impressive educational background including an MBA and four other higher education degrees. She has over 20 years of work experience across multiple countries, including 5 years as a solopreneur and serial entrepreneur. Throughout her startup experience she has applied for multiple startup grants at the EU level, in the Netherlands and Malta, and her startups received quite a few of those. She’s been living, studying and working in many countries around the globe and her extensive multicultural experience has influenced her immensely.