SMS vs Email Marketing for Online Stores: Cost, Consent and When to Use Each (2026)

Short answer: Email is the cheaper, longer and more forgiving channel; SMS is short, costs money for every recipient and needs its own opt-in. On published prices, one campaign to 1,000 subscribers costs about $0 to $1 by email on a platform that bills per send, and roughly $7 to $12 by SMS (credit-based SMS tools are priced by plan instead). Build your email list and flows first, then add SMS for messages where timing matters.

We may earn a commission from Omnisend links on this page. We do not earn one from the other tools mentioned, and the verdict above does not depend on that. We have not used any of these tools ourselves: everything comes from vendors’ published pages and Shopify’s help center, read on the dates shown. All prices are US dollars.

SMS vs email marketing at a glance

Cost: one campaign to 1,000 subscribers

To compare fairly we assume one campaign, one standard 160-character text (one segment), 1,000 US subscribers, and use only published per-message prices.

Email.

• Shopify Messaging: 1,000 emails sit inside the 10,000 free emails a month, so $0. Even past the allowance it is $1 per 1,000, so $1 (Shopify Help Center, checked November 4, 2026).
• Omnisend and Klaviyo charge flat monthly plans by contacts instead of per send. Omnisend Standard is $20 a month at 1,000 contacts, and Klaviyo Email $30 (from our Omnisend pricing and Klaviyo pricing guides, checked November 2 and October 20). A single campaign adds nothing on top while you stay within plan limits, which is why we leave them out of the chart.

SMS.

Notes on the table:

• The Omnisend $0.007 starting rate is labeled by Omnisend as applying to high-volume US sends, and the $0.009 small-pack rate comes from our Omnisend pricing guide (checked November 2). A store texting 1,000 people at a time will realistically see the second figure; those packs start at $10 of credit.
• Postscript’s Starter has a $49 monthly minimum spend, so a single $12.30 campaign does not stand alone; you would need to send more to use it. Postscript says you pay after you send, with no prepaid balances.
• SimpleTexting is credit based (a 160-character text is 1 credit), so it does not fit a per-message row. On November 8 its calculator showed the 500-text plan at $29 in credits plus $10 for a local number ($39 a month, with a yearly/monthly toggle), extra credits at 5.5 cents each, carrier fees of about $0.0025 per message and a one-time $4 carrier registration. The price of its 1,000-text plan did not appear in the page text, so check the calculator for your volume. Unused plan credits roll over only to the end of the following month.
• Klaviyo: its pricing page shows a free $5 of mobile messages per month and an SMS add-on, but we could not confirm a per-message rate today. Our Klaviyo pricing guide lists SMS from $0.01 plus carrier fees (October 20), while Klaviyo’s help center says carrier fees are bundled into its rates. Check your own rate in the account. See Klaviyo pricing.

What this means: at 1,000 subscribers, SMS costs roughly 7 to 12 times the email overage rate and far more than free email, and the spread widens as you add campaigns. Text only to people who expect it. Keep in mind that the email side also has a monthly plan price, so the real choice is between a plan you already pay and a per-recipient charge you add.

See Omnisend's email and SMS plans

Consent and compliance

This is a general summary, not legal advice. Rules depend on where your customers are, so check with a qualified lawyer.

Email (US). The FTC says CAN-SPAM covers all commercial email. You must use accurate headers and honest subject lines, label the message as an ad, include a valid postal address, give a clear way to opt out and honor opt-outs within 10 business days. The FTC says each violating email can cost up to $53,088. It is mainly an opt-out law. Our email marketing laws guide covers the UK and EU too, where opt-in is generally required.

SMS. Shopify’s help center says your opt-in method must comply with the laws that apply to you and names the TCPA for the US. It adds that:

• SMS consent is separate: a customer who opted in to email has not opted in to texts, and numbers without SMS consent are excluded.
• Your privacy policy and terms must cover SMS, including message frequency and how to opt out.
• Marketing texts are held during quiet hours in the customer’s time zone: 9pm to 8am in most US states, with longer windows in some states such as Texas.
• Some products cannot be promoted by SMS at all, such as alcohol, tobacco and vaping, cannabis and CBD, firearms and gambling.

Postscript says its tools are built to follow TCPA and carrier guidelines and its signup code includes TCPA-compliant language; treat that as a vendor claim and still review your own wording. Mailchimp requires an application and agreement to terms before you can buy SMS credits, and Klaviyo says it bills failed SMS deliveries but not skipped or inbound messages. Setup details are in our Shopify SMS marketing guide.

Character limits and what you can send

• A standard text is 160 characters; with an emoji or special character it is 70 (Klaviyo and Postscript both state this).
• Longer texts split into segments, each billed at the per-SMS rate (Postscript). Klaviyo says multipart segments hold 153 characters (67 with Unicode) because of a header.
• SimpleTexting bills 160 characters as 1 credit, a 306-character extended message as 2 credits and MMS as 3 credits.
• MMS, which lets you attach a picture, allows up to 1,600 characters, and costs more: Postscript lists $0.045 per MMS on Starter against $0.009 per SMS.

In practice, you get one offer and one link per text. Email can carry the whole story.

Use email for / use SMS for

Use email for

• Newsletters, new-collection announcements and anything that needs several images or links.
• Welcome series and post-purchase education, where length helps.
• Abandoned cart and win-back flows as the first touch, since they cost almost nothing per message.
• Receipts and order updates, which should stay free of promotions (see our laws guide).

Use SMS for

• Flash sales and limited drops where a few hours matter.
• Back-in-stock and low-stock alerts for people who asked for them.
• A short second nudge after an unopened abandoned-cart email.
• Early access for your best customers, who have chosen to hear from you.

Do not use SMS for long explanations, big promotional blasts to your whole list or products Shopify lists as restricted. Mailchimp says US users who sent both email and SMS saw a 58% higher click rate than email-only users from August 2023 to May 2024, and that SMS drove 16x ROI for US SMS users in its data. Those are Mailchimp’s own claims about its users, not a test of what SMS would do for your store, so we do not rely on them here.

Which tool fits

• One account for both channels: Omnisend (email plus SMS, from $0.007 per text at high volume) or Klaviyo. See Omnisend pricing and Klaviyo pricing.
• SMS specialist on top of your email tool: Postscript, covered in our Postscript review and Postscript vs Klaviyo SMS. SimpleTexting is a general texting platform whose credit pricing is shown above.
• Lowest cost to start: Shopify Messaging, with its rates in our Shopify Messaging pricing guide.

For a full ranking, see best SMS marketing for Shopify.

Compare Omnisend's plans

Related: Shopify SMS marketing · Email marketing laws for online stores · Postscript review

See SimpleTexting plans