Email marketing with Wix: Is it really worth it?
Agathe, our CPO, with Cesar and Abdullah from Customer support
Wix is a well-known website builder. But did you know they’re breaking into the world of email marketing, too?
Wix promises a simple and effective email marketing plan, even if you aren’t a pro. To see whether it actually delivers, I created my own Wix email marketing campaign.
Here’s everything I learned, from its top features, to pricing insights, to some missing ingredients that might tip the balance.
Introducing Wix’s email marketing platform
Wix is best known for its website builder and online store capabilities. But it’s also an email marketing provider.
Previously called Ascend, Wix’s email platform is designed to be simple, straightforward, and fully integrated with any Wix site.
If you already use Wix, it’s an easy, all-in-one solution. However, if you don’t already have a website with them, you’ll have to create a full Wix account to access their email marketing features.
So, is it actually worth it?
Let’s put it to the test and find out.
How I tested the tool
As a freelance content writer, I’m always on the lookout for tools that make email marketing easier (and, let’s be honest, a little more fun).
So when I heard about Wix’s email platform, I just had to put the tool through its paces.
I even went so far as to create a coffee-themed newsletter called Espresso Yourself.
Pardon the pun.
Scoring criteria (out of 5)
To avoid plucking numbers out of thin air, here are the criteria I used to rate each feature.
🧘 Ease of use: Is this feature intuitive and beginner-friendly?
💥 Effectiveness: Does it work well? Are there any technical issues or limitations?
🧠 Advanced features: Does this feature offer modern tools like AI, marketing automation, or interactive elements?
🤝 Flexibility: How adaptable and scalable is the feature? Can it suit different needs, such as small or large campaigns or different business sizes?
Each category was worth up to 5 points, and I calculated an average score at the end.
Wix email marketing features (and ratings)
I signed up for a free Wix account and built my first Wix email newsletter. From design flexibility to automation, I scored each email marketing tool to see if Wix is a good option.
Here’s what I found.
Drag-and-drop email builder
I found that Wix’s drag-and-drop editor was self-explanatory and easy to use, making it an accessible option (no fancy design knowledge required).
The custom font options were a nice touch, but they may not display properly in every browser. For instance, the custom font I chose looked slightly different when I sent the campaign (see below).
But for me, the main downside was the lack of interactivity. Unlike with MailerLite, I couldn’t add elements like countdown timers, quizzes, carousels, and surveys.
This isn’t necessarily a dealbreaker if you’re creating a basic campaign—no fuss, no frills. But if you want to send an interactive email, you might feel limited.
Another challenge was the built-in AI email features.
It’s fantastic to see Wix integrating AI with its interface, with options for the AI to write the content based on your chosen tone of voice, newsletter goal, and so on.
When I asked the platform to simply “Write a newsletter about coffee”, it delivered an error message the first time, but on my second attempt, it created a full suggested layout for my coffee-themed letter (see below).
Drag-and-drop editor: ⭐️ 3.5/ 5
🧘 Ease of use: 5/ 5
Extremely intuitive and beginner-friendly interface, and no onboarding needed.
💥 Effectiveness: 3/ 5
Basic features work well, but AI and custom fonts need improvement.
🧠 Advanced features: 3/ 5
Lacks interactive elements, but the AI feature was a nice touch.
🤝 Flexibility: 3/ 5
Good design options, but lacks advanced elements for larger brands.
Email templates
I’m a writer, not a designer.
But I love tools that make me feel like I have a designer’s touch.
And Wix definitely delivers. With 4 basic templates, plus 19 designer-made templates, I had plenty to play around with. Plus, they’re all mobile-friendly.
As a bonus, Wix’s AI assistant helped me pick an email template based on what I wanted to share.
Here’s the suggested template, which matches Espresso Yourself’s brand identity. It’s a pretty basic template, but it works as a strong starting point.
Email templates: ⭐️ 4/ 5
🧘 Ease of use: 5/ 5
Templates are easy to edit, with AI to support the selection process.
💥 Effectiveness: 4/ 5
Mobile-friendly, but fairly basic. Advanced users might feel limited.
🧠 Advanced features: 3/ 5
The AI assistant is handy, but there aren’t many cutting-edge design elements.
🤝 Flexibility: 4/ 5
A decent variety of templates to choose from, but more creative layouts are limited.
Audience segmentation and personalization
What’s the key to great emails (and stellar open rates)?
Making it personal.
And I felt that Wix excelled at personalization, with a wide range of contact attributes to customize my email marketing campaigns.
From the email editor, I could personalize content with dynamic values, including:
Name: First name, Last name,
Contact details: Email, Phone, Website
Professional info: Company, Job title
Personal info: Language, Birthday
Location: City, Address, Country, ZIP/ Postcode
There was also a “fallback text” option if the data isn’t available for a particular contact.
From the site’s dashboard, I could also manage my email list and segment people based on certain criteria, such as:
Contact attributes: Name, Email, Phone, Address, Company, Position
Email engagement/ behavior: Received/ Didn’t receive a campaign, Opened/ Didn’t open, Clicked/ Didn’t click
And if I was unsure where to start, the Wix AI assistant was able to make suggestions on the best segment.
Segmentation and personalization: ⭐️ 4.8/ 5
🧘 Ease of use: 4.5/ 5
Dynamic values are straightforward, but all the options might overwhelm beginners.
💥 Effectiveness: 5/ 5
Impressive range of contact attributes for personalization, plus fallback options.
🧠 Advanced features: 4.5/ 5
Strong personalization and AI support, but no predictive segmentation options.
🤝 Flexibility: 5/ 5
Detailed segments and behavior-based filters make it versatile for any team size.
Email scheduling
Send too early, and your message gets buried in a crowded inbox. Send too late, and you might miss the moment entirely. (If you’re wondering, here’s the best time to send your campaigns.)
The good news?
Wix makes scheduling simple. I could either click Send or schedule it for later. Plus, there’s some handy personalization for subject lines.
The less-good news?
The AI-powered subject line generator is still in beta mode. While it’s a fun addition, the suggestions it gave me were a little... well, cliché:
Brew Up Your Morning
Discover Coffee Delights
Elevate Your Coffee Experience ☕️
(Although with a newsletter called Espresso Yourself, perhaps there’s only so much they can do.)
Another minor annoyance was that while I could run a test email before sending, I couldn’t find a link to preview the campaign in my browser one last time.
But for me, the biggest limitation was not being able to schedule based on recipient time zones, optimal send times per subscriber, or auto resend frameworks.
It’s either send now or later, with no responsive or dynamic options in between.
Email scheduling: ⭐️ 3.3/ 5
🧘 Ease of use: 4/ 5
Simple “send now” or “schedule for later” options, but no final preview link.
💥 Effectiveness: 3.5/ 5
Works fine, but lacks intelligent scheduling via recipient behavior or time zones.
🧠 Advanced features: 2.5/ 5
Generic AI subject line suggestions, and no auto-resend or smart send-time tools.
🤝 Flexibility: 3/ 5
Personalized subject lines are great, but scheduling options remain basic.
A/B testing
(Or rather, the lack of it.)
Unfortunately, I couldn’t find any built-in A/B testing for email campaigns with Wix.
This meant I couldn’t:
❌ Test different subject lines.
❌ Compare email designs.
❌ Experiment with send times.
This felt like a big gap to me, and I imagine even more so for businesses wanting to optimize their campaigns in the long run.
Hopefully, A/B testing and multivariate testing are on Wix’s roadmap.
In the meantime, manual workarounds do exist, but they’re time-consuming. You’ll need to manually split your email list and send variations separately, which isn’t exactly a smooth solution.
A/B testing: ⭐️ N/A — Tool unavailable
Email automation
I love automation. You can literally set workflows to run on autopilot while you sit back, relax, and drink a good cup of coffee.
And I found Wix’s email automation tools were definitely up to the job.
It had lots of pre-built automation templates for different business needs, including:
Selling
Client engagement
Customer retention
Payments
Business management
I could set up workflows with automation triggers, actions, delays, and conditions, all mapped out in a clear, easy-to-follow interface.
For beginners and small businesses, the automation templates make it easy to get started. And for advanced users, the customization options mean that you can fine-tune your email automations however you like.
If there’s one thing that’s missing, it’s built-in A/B testing. It would be great to run 2-3 workflows at the same time, to identify which one is the most effective. Right now, the only option is to test them manually.
Even so, Wix’s automation capabilities have a great combination of being effective AND easy to use.
Email automation: ⭐️ 4.8/ 5
🧘 Ease of use: 5/ 5
Clear, beginner-friendly workflow builder and templates.
💥 Effectiveness: 5/ 5
Covers a wide range of automation needs with triggers, delays, and conditions.
🧠 Advanced features: 4/ 5
Pre-built options and customization, but no A/B workflow testing available.
🤝 Flexibility: 5/ 5
Highly adaptable for both simple follow-ups or complex sequences.
Analytics and custom reports
After I sent my campaign, it was time to crunch the numbers.
Here’s what I could view from my dashboard:
Delivery statistics: Delivery rate, open rate, click rate, bounces, and spam complaints
Traffic: Unique visitors and site sessions on my Wix website, after the email campaign
Unique clicks by device: Which devices people used to click links in the email
Top links clicked: How many people clicked links in the email
Social statistics: Views, clicks, and top links clicked from sharing the email on social media
If you’ve got a Wix website, the built-in analytics are pretty handy.
You can actually see how people interact with your site after they’ve received your newsletter—which is great for shaping your sales and marketing game plan.
But after I sent my campaign, I got a notification saying it could take up to 24 hours for stats to update. Not ideal if I wanted to work fast.
Also, the stats themselves seem quite basic.
Compared to something like MailerLite, I couldn’t see location data, click-to-open rates, or even a breakdown of hard vs. soft bounces. There were no insights on forwards or top email clients, either.
Analytics and custom reports: ⭐️ 3.3/ 5
🧘 Ease of use: 4/ 5
Clear dashboard, but waiting up to 24 hours for updates can slow things down.
💥 Effectiveness: 3.5/ 5
Covers the basics well, but delayed reporting makes it harder to react quickly.
🧠 Advanced features: 2.5/ 5
Lacks click-to-open rates, location data, bounce breakdowns, and more.
🤝 Flexibility: 3/ 5
Great if you have a Wix website, but not as detailed as other platforms.
List management
Managing your email list can feel like a full-time job. You need to import contacts, keep them organized, stay up to date, and be GDPR-compliant.
Thankfully, I found that Wix has a whole suite of tools to keep things simple.
First off, I liked its auto-exclude feature, which means people who can’t receive my campaign won’t be sent emails by mistake. It can also filter inactive contacts to improve email deliverability.
There’s also a lot of flexibility when it comes to editing and managing contacts.
I could add notes, set tasks, and even attach invoices or price quotes. This is particularly useful for business owners, online stores and ecommerce platforms.
Plus, segmentation is straightforward. I could apply custom labels or sort contacts into specific groups based on criteria, making it easy to send targeted campaigns to the right people.
List management: ⭐️ 4.6/ 5
🧘 Ease of use: 5/ 5
Straightforward and GDPR-friendly with auto-exclusion for undeliverable contacts.
💥 Effectiveness: 4.5/ 5
Filtering, segmentation, and organization tools to keep deliverability high.
🧠 Advanced features: 4/ 5
Business-friendly tools like notes, tasks, invoices, and price quotes.
🤝 Flexibility: 5/ 5
Custom labels, segmentation, and multiple management options make it adaptable.
Wix’s email deliverability
Quick confession: I only tested my campaign on two email addresses (both mine), so I can’t say for sure how Wix performs at scale.
That said, I did get a 100% deliverability rate... to myself. 🎉
But when I checked one of my Gmail inboxes, I spotted a yellow warning banner.
This happened because I hadn’t authenticated my domain. But Wix still let me send the campaign anyway.
Email authentication is becoming more important. Providers like Gmail and Yahoo are cracking down on unauthenticated domains, which could mean emails landing in spam or not getting delivered at all.
For that reason, I think Wix should require authentication before sending.
Sure, my emails made it through this time. But on a larger scale? Who knows.
Wix’s customer support and user experience
I was curious to hear what Wix’s customers think about the service and customer support. To get a sense of everyone’s opinions, I searched online for reviews.
Like any platform, Wix has some mixed reviews.
But while one or two people complained that the customer support team isn’t particularly accessible, the general consensus seems to be the opposite.
In particular, reviewers praise its focus on easy, straightforward solutions for people with limited technical knowledge.
I also appreciated the in-built search bar in my Wix dashboard, which helped me to quickly access any documentation or resources when needed.
Wix email marketing pricing
Here’s a breakdown of Wix email marketing plans. Bear in mind that its premium plans and email marketing plans are two different subscriptions.
Let’s focus on their email marketing plan.
Free plan
Wix offers a free plan with 200 monthly email credits. Upgrading to a paid plan increases your email limit.
Essentials plan ($12/ month)
Limit: 500 marketing and automated emails per month
Features: Drag & drop editor, AI-generated content, designer templates, custom reports, remove Wix branding, and schedule emails
Ideal for: Occasional communications for a small email list
Core plan ($29/ month)
Limit: 5,000 marketing and automated emails per month
Features: Everything in the Essentials plan, plus the ability to send emails from multiple addresses and share emails in web view with a custom domain URL
Ideal for: Frequent email campaigns with a larger audience
Advanced plan ($59/month)
Limit: 1,000,000 marketing and automated emails per month
Features: Includes all the functionality of the Core plan, with the added benefit of many more monthly email credits
Ideal for: Large organizations with a big email list and sending frequency
How to upgrade Wix’s email marketing
I use MailerLite to promote my freelance writing business. From what I’ve seen, I don’t plan to switch over to Wix anytime soon. And even if I had a Wix website, I think I’d rather use the MailerLite integration to promote my business effectively.
Sure, Wix offers a simple, accessible solution. But for me, it simply doesn’t have the features to deliver a truly engaging email campaign. And a boring email just won’t bring the results I’m looking for.
Instead, I think it’s better to integrate Wix with a third-party email marketing provider. That way, you can enjoy all the functionality of Wix’s websites, whilst making the most of advanced email providers to get the best outcomes.
Here’s why I personally prefer MailerLite over Wix.
Drag-and-drop email editor
Wix: Intuitive and easy to use, with plenty of custom fonts, but lacks interactive elements like countdown timers or quizzes.
MailerLite: Includes more interactive email features like countdown timers, quizzes, image carousels, and surveys—plus an AI email generator.
Audience segmentation and personalization
Wix: Offers a wide range of segmentation options and dynamic personalization.
MailerLite: Delivers more advanced segmentation functionality, also allowing you to group your subscribers by signup form, and combine different segments.
Email scheduling
Wix: Simple scheduling with personalization for subject lines, but no options for best send time or recipient time zones.
MailerLite: Has send-time optimization, allowing you to send based on timezones, or when subscribers are most likely to engage.
A/B testing
Wix: Currently doesn’t offer A/B testing for email campaigns.
MailerLite: Delivers both multivariate and A/B testing, so that you can find out what your email recipients love the most.
Email automation
Wix: Provides pre-built automation templates with a visual workflow, making setup easy for beginners, but no inbuilt testing options.
MailerLite: Includes multi-trigger automation, and you can also A/B test up to 3 different workflow variations, too.
Analytics and custom reports
Wix: Basic reporting with useful website traffic insights, but lacks advanced metrics like click-to-open rates or location data.
MailerLite: Shows more advanced performance reports, including click-to-open rates, bounce types, reading environment, email clients, location data, and more.
Email deliverability
Wix: Allowed me to send emails without domain authentication, which may affect deliverability for larger campaigns.
MailerLite: Requires domain authentication before sending, and shares resources on how to improve your deliverability (such as this video tutorial below).
E-commerce features
Wix: Offers Wix Stores, a professional e-commerce platform, but lacks advanced email design features to market the products and services effectively.
MailerLite: Allows you to connect your online store, including an integration with Wix, so that you can sync your e-commerce data. Also lets you sell digital products and subscriptions straight within your newsletters.
Pricing
Wix: Has separate plans for email marketing vs. its other services, which can become costly.
MailerLite: Offers a more affordable pricing model, with 12,000 monthly emails on its free plan alone, and integrated website and landing page functionality (no separate plan needed).
Along with newsletters, I’ve used MailerLite to build my own website, with the option to add in forms, pop-ups, and landing pages. This “all-in-one” approach has been a simple, affordable solution for my business, and I don’t intend to change that anytime soon.
Want to form your own opinion? Sign up for a Forever Free plan and see what you think.
And if you already have a Wix website, why not try out the MailerLite integration? It just might give your campaigns an extra little ‘je-ne-sais-quoi,’ while still enjoying all the functionality of your Wix account.
How to integrate Wix with MailerLite
Want to combine the powers of Wix and MailerLite? Easy!
Thanks to a new integration, you can make the most of:
Data syncing: Collect subscriber data from your Wix forms, plus purchasing information from your e-commerce store
Analytics: Monitor your communication results, track revenue, and see how emails are affecting your sales
Segments: Automatically create subscriber groups based on your Wix data
Product campaigns: Import product details from Wix, send automated messages based on buyer behavior, send abandoned cart emails, and more
Simply download the MailerLite app from the Wix app marketplace, follow the account authorization steps, and then choose which subscriber groups and data to sync.
This video breaks it down in more detail.
FAQs
Here are some commonly-asked questions about Wix’s email marketing tool.
Can I use Wix for email marketing?
Yes! Wix offers an email marketing platform with built-in automation, templates, and simple analytics. However, its features are fairly basic compared to dedicated email marketing tools like MailerLite.
How much does Wix email marketing cost?
Wix has a free plan that lets you send up to 200 emails per month. Paid plans start at $10/month for 500 emails and go up to $49/month for 1 million emails.
MailerLite offers more advanced features at competitive pricing, with 12,000 monthly emails in its free plan, alone.
Can Wix be used for automating emails?
Yes, Wix provides pre-built automation templates for different business needs. While easy to use, its automation options are limited compared to MailerLite, which also allows you to use multiple triggers and A/B test different workflows.
Final thoughts
Wix email marketing is a solid choice for beginners, especially if you already have a Wix site. However, I found that it lacks essential features like A/B testing and advanced analytics.
If you’re serious about email marketing, MailerLite offers a more affordable, advanced alternative to Espresso Yourself. 😉
Plus, you can always integrate the two platforms to enjoy the best of both worlds.
Try out MailerLite’s free plan and see what you think! I’d love to hear your thoughts in the comments.
Hi! I'm Megan, and I'm a freelance writer based in the heart of Paris (and never too far from a good croissant). I started my career at MailerLite, where I discovered the power of great email marketing, and it's a tool I still use for my own business today!
