Kit

Kit (formerly ConvertKit) targets creators and newsletter publishers. Tagging-based audience model and visual automations. Decent API for developers but the product is built for non-technical operators.

At an early stage the deciding factors are what the free tier actually covers, what the first paid invoice looks like, and how much of a founding engineer's week the setup costs. Feature depth that only matters at a million sends a month is noise until it is not.

Against a waitlist, a launch announcement, onboarding email, and the first transactional sends, Kit covers developer experience, scheduling, SDK breadth, and webhook coverage, and does not cover operating track record. Whether that gap matters depends on how central those are to the build.

• Free tier: 10,000 subscribers, broadcasts only
• Best published rate per 1,000: Tiers not published in comparable form
• Starts at: $15/mo for 1,000 subscribers (Creator)
• DX score: 6/10
• Deliverability: Good for newsletter traffic; reputation tied to broader Kit pool.
• Operating since: 2013
• Scheduling: Yes
• SDKs: node
• Webhooks: Yes

Good for newsletter traffic; reputation tied to broader Kit pool.

Independent creators and newsletter publishers.