Veteran small business email marketing with strong deliverability and phone support
AWeber is one of the oldest email marketing platforms in the category, operating since 1998 and serving over 120,000 small businesses and entrepreneurs. Known for reliable deliverability, a large template library, and telephone customer support — unusual in email marketing SaaS — it is the trusted choice for small businesses and solopreneurs who value stability and accessible human support.
AWeber is a strong fit if its core strengths match your workflow, budget, and support needs. Use the quick signals below before opening the full review.
AWeber is the oldest platform still actively serving the small business email marketing market, operating continuously since 1998. While newer entrants have surpassed it on automation sophistication, interface design, and pricing competitiveness, AWeber retains a loyal user base through two enduring strengths: reliable deliverability built over two decades and telephone customer support — a genuine differentiator when the rest of the category has moved entirely to chat and ticket systems.
AWeber's phone support is the most commonly cited reason existing customers stay. During US business hours (Monday–Friday, 8am–8pm ET), AWeber users can call and speak to a support representative directly. Email marketing troubleshooting — deliverability issues, automation logic errors, integration problems — often requires conversational back-and-forth that chat interfaces handle poorly. The ability to speak directly to a person who can walk through configuration problems in real time has real value for non-technical business owners who are not comfortable diagnosing technical issues through a ticket queue.
This support model is increasingly rare. Mailchimp's paid phone support requires the Premium plan ($350+/month). MailerLite, Brevo, and Kit provide chat and email support only. For small business owners who experienced a generation of email support when phone was standard, AWeber's model feels like a meaningful service commitment.
AWeber's 600+ email templates are the most numerous in the category. Templates span newsletters, promotional emails, announcement campaigns, seasonal events, and lead nurturing sequences across every common industry vertical. The library breadth means most small businesses can find a starting template close to their needed design and customise from there rather than building from a blank canvas.
Template design quality ranges from professional to dated — some templates have not been updated since AWeber's earlier design era. The drag-and-drop builder allows full customisation regardless of starting template, but new users may find the template aesthetic inconsistent with modern email marketing visual standards.
AWeber's 26-year operation has produced well-established sender reputation across major inbox providers. The platform handles bounce management, unsubscribe processing, and spam complaint monitoring automatically. For standard small business email marketing — newsletters, promotional campaigns, event announcements — AWeber's deliverability rates are consistently high.
The sustained deliverability reputation benefits from AWeber's small business user base, which tends to produce lower spam complaint rates than platforms used heavily for high-volume cold outreach or list-rented campaigns.
AWeber's automation covers the standard small business email workflows: follow-up sequences triggered by form sign-up, broadcast campaigns sent to the full list, and date-triggered campaigns (birthday emails, anniversary reminders). Multi-branch conditional automation is possible through AWeber's Campaigns feature but less intuitive than Kit's visual canvas or GetResponse's flow builder.
For small businesses whose email automation needs are covered by a welcome series and occasional promotional broadcasts, AWeber's automation is sufficient. For businesses that need complex segmentation and multi-branch behavioural triggers, the tool's automation architecture is a limiting factor.
AWeber entered 2024 as a credible but not category-leading option. MailerLite is better priced, Kit is better for creators, Mailchimp has a larger ecosystem, and Klaviyo is better for e-commerce. AWeber's advantage is the combination of stability, phone support, deliverability reputation, and a familiar interface for its long-standing user base. For businesses already on AWeber with no compelling reason to migrate, the switching cost rarely justifies moving to a competitor. For new businesses evaluating options, MailerLite or Kit offer more modern experiences at comparable or lower prices.
AWeber is the right choice for small business owners who value telephone support access and stable deliverability over modern interface design and advanced automation. New users evaluating the category fresh should consider MailerLite for better value and Kit for creator use cases.
Score: 7.5/10 — Best phone support and largest template library; pricing and interface feel dated compared to modern alternatives.
Free
Free billed annually
$15/mo
$150/mo billed annually
$30/mo
$360/mo billed annually
$899/mo
$10,788/mo billed annually
AWeber is best for Small business owners and solopreneurs who want to speak to a real person on the phone when something goes wrong, Businesses that have been with AWeber for years and want stable, reliable email infrastructure without learning a new platform, Non-technical entrepreneurs who need maximum hand-holding in setup, template selection, and basic campaign configuration.
Yes. AWeber currently lists a free plan in ToolRankr data.
It has a free plan.
AWeber is reviewed using ToolRankr's scoring model for ease of use, value, features, support, and overall quality. Affiliate links may earn a commission, but sponsored labels do not change editorial scoring.
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