Privy vs Klaviyo for Shopify stores

Last updated October 2026

Shopify merchants looking to grow their email list and convert more visitors will almost certainly run into Privy and Klaviyo. Both tools show up in the Shopify App Store with thousands of reviews. Both promise to help you capture emails, send campaigns, and automate post-purchase flows. But the two platforms come at the problem from very different starting points, and that difference matters more than any feature checklist.

Privy started as a popup and onsite conversion tool and expanded into email and SMS. Klaviyo started as an email and data platform and expanded into forms, SMS, and reviews. That origin story shapes how each product feels to use, what it prioritizes in its interface, and where its pricing model puts pressure on your budget as you scale.

This comparison breaks down what each platform does well, where it falls short, and how to decide which one belongs in your stack.

Privy

Privy built its reputation on popups, flyouts, banners, spin-to-win wheels, and other onsite displays designed to capture email addresses before a visitor leaves. Its popup builder remains one of the easiest to use in the Shopify ecosystem. You can launch a campaign in minutes without touching code, and the targeting rules (exit intent, scroll depth, cart value, device type) cover the scenarios most stores care about.

Over the past few years, Privy added email marketing, automations, and SMS. The email editor is straightforward and template-driven. You can set up welcome series, abandoned cart sequences, and post-purchase follow-ups without a steep learning curve. For a store that wants popups and basic email under one roof, Privy keeps things simple.

Where Privy shows its limits is in segmentation depth and data modeling. The platform does not offer the same level of granularity around customer behavior, purchase history, or predictive analytics that larger email platforms provide. If your email strategy depends on highly targeted segments built from event-level data, you will feel that ceiling.

Privy's pricing structure splits into three plans. The Convert plan starts at $24 per month and covers popups, forms, and onsite displays for up to 10,000 monthly pageviews, with the price increasing as traffic grows. The Starter plan begins at $30 per month for up to 1,500 mailable contacts and includes unlimited email sends, automations, and 250 free SMS credits. The Growth plan starts at $45 per month and adds expanded SMS marketing with 1,250 SMS credits. Both Starter and Growth scale in price as your contact list grows. Privy offers a 15-day free trial but does not advertise a permanent free tier on its pricing page.

The platform integrates natively with Shopify and includes a Shopify-specific app experience that makes installation and syncing painless. For stores doing under $1 million in annual revenue that want a combined popup and email tool without a lot of configuration, Privy is a reasonable starting point.

Klaviyo

Klaviyo positions itself as a customer data platform for ecommerce, and the product reflects that ambition. Its core strength is the depth of its Shopify integration. When you connect Klaviyo to your store, it pulls in order history, browsing behavior, product catalog data, and customer profiles, then lets you build segments from all of it. You can create a segment of customers who bought a specific product category more than twice in the last 90 days, have not opened an email in 30 days, and have a predicted lifetime value above a certain threshold. That kind of targeting is not decorative. It changes how you think about email.

The email builder supports drag-and-drop editing with dynamic product blocks that pull from your catalog. Flows (Klaviyo's term for automated sequences) are powerful and visual. The flow builder lets you add conditional splits, time delays, A/B tests, and triggers based on dozens of events. Pre-built flow templates cover the standard ecommerce scenarios, and customizing them is intuitive once you learn the interface.

Klaviyo also offers SMS, push notifications, and a reviews product. SMS lives inside the same platform as email, which means you can coordinate across channels without syncing data between tools. The reviews add-on, priced separately by monthly order volume, gives you a way to collect and display product reviews without a third-party app.

On the form and popup side, Klaviyo includes embedded forms, popups, and flyouts. These work well enough for list building, but the form builder is not as polished or flexible as what Privy offers. If onsite conversion optimization is a primary concern, you may find Klaviyo's popup tools adequate but not exceptional.

Klaviyo's pricing scales with your active profile count. The free plan supports up to 250 active profiles with 500 email sends and 150 SMS credits per month. The Email plan starts at $20 per month for 500 profiles, rising to $30 for 1,000 profiles, $60 for 2,500, $100 for 5,000, $150 for 10,000, and continuing upward to $1,380 per month at 100,000 profiles. The Email and SMS plan starts at $35 per month for 500 profiles. SMS credits are billed at $0.009 per US message, with international rates running higher. At scale, Klaviyo becomes a significant line item. A store with 50,000 contacts on the Email plan will pay around $720 per month.

The platform's learning curve is steeper than Privy's, but the payoff is a more capable system. Stores that plan to build a serious retention marketing program and have someone on the team willing to learn the platform will get more out of Klaviyo over time.

Comparison table

How to choose

The decision between Privy and Klaviyo usually comes down to where your store is in its growth and what problem you are solving first.

If your primary challenge is capturing more emails from site visitors, Privy's popup and display tools are best-in-class for that job. The popup builder is faster to set up, offers more display types (spin-to-win, banners, embedded forms, cart savers), and gives you granular targeting without requiring technical skill. Stores in the early stages of building an email list, or stores that already have an email platform and want a dedicated conversion tool, will find Privy focused on exactly that problem.

If your primary challenge is turning an existing email list into revenue through sophisticated campaigns and automations, Klaviyo is the stronger platform. Its segmentation engine, flow builder, and data model are built for merchants who want to send the right message to the right person based on what they have browsed, bought, and ignored. Stores doing over $500,000 in annual revenue that plan to invest in retention marketing will outgrow Privy's email capabilities faster than they expect.

Some merchants use both. Privy handles popups and list capture while Klaviyo handles email and SMS. This works if you are willing to manage the integration between the two, which is straightforward since both sync with Shopify. The tradeoff is paying for two tools and maintaining two dashboards.

Budget also matters at scale. Privy's pricing is competitive at lower contact counts, but Klaviyo's free tier gives very small stores a way to start without any cost. As your list grows past 10,000 contacts, both platforms become meaningful monthly expenses, and the question shifts from price to value. Klaviyo's revenue attribution reporting makes it easier to justify the spend because you can see exactly how much revenue each flow and campaign generates.

Neither platform is a poor choice. They serve different stages and different priorities. The worst outcome is picking one, building your flows and templates inside it, and then migrating six months later because it was not the right fit. Spend time in both free trials before committing.

Related comparisons

If you are evaluating your Shopify tech stack beyond email and popups, these comparisons may help:

• Replo vs Shogun covers landing page builders for Shopify stores that want more control over page design without custom development.

• Replo vs PageFly compares two popular Shopify page builders on flexibility, performance, and pricing.

• Best ecommerce tools is a broader roundup of the tools Shopify merchants use across marketing, conversion, and operations.

Frequently asked questions

What is the main difference between Privy and Klaviyo?

Privy is built around onsite conversion, popups, and list building, with email and SMS added as secondary features. Klaviyo is built around email marketing, customer data, and automation, with forms and popups as supporting tools. The two platforms overlap in functionality but emphasize different parts of the marketing funnel.

Does Privy have a free plan?

Privy does not advertise a permanent free plan on its pricing page as of late 2026. It offers a 15-day free trial across its paid tiers. Some older accounts or app store listings may reference a limited free option, but new signups should expect to choose a paid plan after the trial ends.

Does Klaviyo have a free plan?

Yes. Klaviyo's free plan supports up to 250 active profiles, 500 email sends per month, and 150 SMS credits per month. It includes access to the flow builder, segmentation, and basic reporting. For very small stores just getting started, this is enough to test the platform without paying.

Can I use Privy and Klaviyo together?

Yes, and some merchants do. A common setup uses Privy for popups and onsite displays to capture emails, then syncs those contacts into Klaviyo for email campaigns and automations. Both tools integrate with Shopify, so the data flow is manageable. The downside is paying for two platforms and maintaining two sets of configurations.

Which is better for a brand new Shopify store?

For a store with no email list and fewer than a few hundred visitors per day, Klaviyo's free plan is a practical starting point. It lets you set up basic popups, a welcome series, and an abandoned cart flow at no cost. Privy is worth considering once your traffic grows and you want more sophisticated onsite conversion tools.

How much does Klaviyo cost at 10,000 contacts?

The Email plan at 10,000 active profiles costs approximately $150 per month. The Email and SMS plan at the same profile count runs around $240 per month, depending on SMS usage. Pricing increases as your active profile count grows.

How much does Privy cost at 10,000 contacts?

Privy's Starter plan starts at $30 per month for up to 1,500 mailable contacts and scales upward with list size. At 10,000 contacts, the monthly cost will be higher than the base price, but Privy does not publish a detailed public pricing table for every contact tier. You will need to check the pricing calculator on their site for an exact quote.

Is Klaviyo hard to learn?

Klaviyo has a steeper learning curve than Privy, especially around segmentation, flow logic, and reporting. The platform is powerful, but that power comes with more options and more decisions to make. Stores with a dedicated marketing person or a willingness to invest time in learning the tool will get the most out of it. Shopify merchants who want simplicity above all else may find the interface overwhelming at first.

Does Privy support SMS marketing?

Yes. Privy's Growth plan includes SMS marketing with 1,250 SMS credits per month. The Starter plan includes 250 SMS credits. SMS is not available on the Convert plan, which covers only popups and onsite displays.

Which platform has better reporting?

Klaviyo's reporting is more detailed and more useful for understanding revenue impact. It offers revenue attribution at the campaign and flow level, showing you exactly how much money each email or automation generated. Privy's reporting covers standard metrics like open rates, click rates, and conversion rates but does not go as deep on revenue attribution or customer lifetime value analysis.

Can I migrate from Privy to Klaviyo or vice versa?

Yes, though migration requires some manual work. Email lists can be exported from one platform and imported into the other. Automations and flows will need to be rebuilt since they do not transfer between platforms. If you have complex segmentation logic, recreating it in the new tool will take time. Plan for a transition period where both platforms run in parallel before fully switching.

Do both platforms integrate with Shopify?

Both Privy and Klaviyo have native Shopify integrations available through the Shopify App Store. Klaviyo's integration is deeper, pulling in product catalog data, customer event data, and order history at a granular level. Privy's integration covers the essentials like syncing contacts and tracking basic purchase events. Both install in a few clicks and begin syncing data immediately.