Encharge vs Ortto
An independent, review-free comparison compiled by the SaaSTracker editorial team. Both products are profiled in full, and neither can pay for placement here.
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The short answer
Editorial assessmentOrtto compared with Encharge
Encharge does SaaS lifecycle email with a flow builder from $79 a month and stays deliberately narrow. Ortto is a platform play with five channels, a CDP, and reporting at several times the cost. If email automation on product events is the entire job, Encharge does it for a fraction of the money; if the job includes push, in-app, chat, forms, and executive reporting, Encharge cannot reach and Ortto can.
Choose Encharge if
Bootstrapped and seed-stage SaaS teams (and the agencies serving them) who want behavior-triggered email automation on product and billing events without enterprise pricing, admin overhead, or channels they will not use.
Choose Ortto if
Mid-market and scaling B2C or B2B companies that want a customer data platform, multi-channel journeys, and reporting from one vendor and can carry a three-figure monthly bill, particularly teams currently paying separately for a marketing tool, an analytics tool, and a chat widget.
Side by side
13 attributes| Attribute | Encharge | Ortto |
|---|---|---|
| Category | Automation | Automation |
| Starting price | $79/mo (Growth, 2,000 subscribers, billed annually) (14 days trial) | Not currently published (the pricing page was withdrawn after the Canva acquisition; last published around $237 a month annually at 10,000 contacts) (free trial) |
| Pricing model | Subscriber-count tiers with monthly email-send multipliers; two self-serve plans plus custom Enterprise above 50,000 subscribers. | Contact-based subscription across Starter, Professional, Business, and Enterprise tiers, with prices banded by contact volume, sending included, and month-to-month available on Professional while Business and Enterprise require an annual commitment. |
| Free plan | No | No |
| Free trial | 14 days | Free signup, no credit card required (length not stated) |
| Best for | Bootstrapped and seed-stage SaaS teams (and the agencies serving them) who want behavior-triggered email automation on product and billing events without enterprise pricing, admin overhead, or channels they will not use. | Mid-market and scaling B2C or B2B companies that want a customer data platform, multi-channel journeys, and reporting from one vendor and can carry a three-figure monthly bill, particularly teams currently paying separately for a marketing tool, an analytics tool, and a chat widget. |
| Setup time | First flows on imported contacts run the same day; wiring product events via API or Segment and billing events via Stripe typically takes a few hours to a few days of developer time. | A week to a first journey for a marketing team using the no-code connectors, longer if custom activities need to be instrumented by engineering. The CDP setup is the work; the journey builder is the easy part. |
| Learning curve | Low; the flow builder is the gentlest in this category, and most teams operate it without a dedicated ops person. | Moderate. The journey canvas is approachable and the reporting is comprehensible, but the platform is wide, and teams routinely use a third of it. Decide up front which of the five channels and which reporting surfaces you are actually adopting, or the tool sprawls. |
| Platforms | Web app, REST API | Web app, REST API, Mobile push SDKs, JavaScript tracking and chat widget, Webhooks |
| Compliance | GDPR-aligned practices (self-described); no published SOC 2, ISO 27001, or HIPAA certification | GDPR, CCPA, CAN-SPAM, SOC 2 |
| Founded | 2018 | 2015 |
| Headquarters | Miami, Florida, US (registered address) | Sydney, Australia |
| Ownership | Privately held, founder-led | Acquired by Canva in April 2026; previously venture-backed |
Strengths and limitations
Encharge
Strengths
- Genuinely easy flow builder; the 'alternative to clunky tools' pitch holds up, and non-technical founders ship working automations in an afternoon.
- Behavior-based email on product and billing events at a bootstrapper price, the core Customer.io use case at roughly half the entry cost.
- Stripe and Chargebee integrations make dunning and upgrade flows first-class rather than API projects.
- Unlimited flows and unlimited team members on every plan, with free email verification included.
Limitations
- Email is the only channel: no push, in-app, or SMS, so any multi-channel roadmap means a future migration.
- No published security certifications (SOC 2, ISO 27001, HIPAA), which rules it out for compliance-driven buyers.
- Segment, HubSpot, Salesforce, ecommerce integrations, and transactional email are all Premium-gated; the advertised $79 entry excludes much of what scaling teams need.
- Send caps tied to subscriber multipliers (10x/12x) plus $100 per 100k overage can surprise high-frequency senders.
Ortto
Strengths
- Genuine breadth for one subscription: CDP, journeys, five messaging channels, forms and surveys, live chat, a knowledge base, and a real reporting layer.
- The journey builder is a direct descendant of Autopilot's, which was one of the most legible visual canvases the category ever produced, and it still reads well.
- Because the data platform and the messaging platform are the same product, audiences and reports are computed from one dataset instead of two that disagree.
- Extensive no-code integrations, so a marketing team without engineering support can connect Salesforce, Shopify, Google Ads, Facebook, and Zendesk themselves.
Limitations
- Expensive for what a small team typically uses. At entry volumes Ortto costs several times Drip, Vero, or Encharge for what many buyers will use as an email automation tool.
- Mobile push, transactional email and SMS, dedicated IPs, landing pages, lead scoring, and NPS are all locked behind Professional, roughly doubling the price.
- Contact-count billing means dormant records cost money, which is the standard trap of profile-metered platforms and rewards ruthless list hygiene.
- The Canva acquisition introduces genuine roadmap uncertainty; Ortto now exists to strengthen Canva Grow, and standalone customers are no longer the only constituency.
Pricing compared
Encharge
Subscriber-count tiers with monthly email-send multipliers; two self-serve plans plus custom Enterprise above 50,000 subscribers.
- Growth$79 annual / $99 monthly
- Premium$129 annual / $159 monthly
- EnterpriseCustom
At 2,000 subscribers, $79/month for unlimited flows, behavior triggers, billing-event integrations, and unlimited seats is among the best capability-per-dollar in SaaS marketing automation; the same money buys a fraction of this from HubSpot, and Customer.io starts at $100 with a steeper learning curve. Value erodes in two places: the Premium gate on Segment/CRM/transactional (which most scaling teams eventually hit, effectively making $129 the real price) and subscriber-based metering that charges for dormant contacts unless you prune. As an email-only lifecycle engine for a sub-50k-contact SaaS, it is hard to beat on price.
Ortto
Contact-based subscription across Starter, Professional, Business, and Enterprise tiers, with prices banded by contact volume, sending included, and month-to-month available on Professional while Business and Enterprise require an annual commitment.
- StarterNot published
- ProfessionalNot published
- BusinessNot published
- EnterpriseCustom
Ortto's value case is consolidation, and it only works if you actually use the breadth. If Ortto replaces a marketing automation tool, a chat widget, a form builder, and an analytics dashboard, then a few hundred dollars a month for one unified contact record is straightforwardly good economics and the reporting quality alone justifies part of it. If you use it as an email tool with a journey builder, you are paying several times what Drip, Vero, or Encharge charge for the same outcome. The Professional gate is the sharpest edge: mobile push and transactional sending sit behind roughly a doubling of price, and OneSignal gives away push entirely. Judge Ortto on how many other subscriptions it cancels, and be honest about that number before signing anything annual.
Editorial verdict on each
Encharge
Ease of UseEncharge is the pragmatic pick for SaaS lifecycle email: the flow builder is genuinely pleasant, behavior and billing-event triggers cover the automations that actually move SaaS revenue, and the pricing respects a bootstrapper's budget. Its boundaries are just as clear: one channel, no compliance certifications, and a Premium gate in front of the integrations most scaling stacks require, which makes $129/month the realistic price for serious use. Buy it as a focused email-automation engine you may eventually outgrow, not as a platform bet; at this price, that is a fair trade.
Read the full Encharge profileOrtto
Ortto is a consolidation play and should be judged as one. Buy it when you are cancelling a marketing automation tool, a chat widget, a form builder, and an analytics dashboard at the same time, because one contact record feeding journeys, five channels, and real reporting is genuinely worth a few hundred dollars a month. Do not buy it as an email tool: at that job it costs several times Drip, Vero, or Encharge and you will use a third of what you pay for. The Professional gate is the practical sting, since mobile push and transactional sending sit behind roughly a doubling of price, and contact-count billing means dormant records cost money forever. The Canva acquisition in April 2026 removes the survival question and adds a roadmap one, so prefer month-to-month over an annual commitment while the new owner's intentions become clear. For a five-person startup, this is not the first lifecycle tool to buy. For a thirty-person marketing team drowning in disconnected subscriptions, it is one of the more convincing single-vendor answers available.
Read the full Ortto profileEncharge profile last reviewed 2026-09-26; Ortto last reviewed 2026-09-26. Pricing is compiled from public sources and can change without notice. See our methodology.
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Frequently asked questions
6 questionsWhat is the difference between Encharge and Ortto?
Encharge does SaaS lifecycle email with a flow builder from $79 a month and stays deliberately narrow. Ortto is a platform play with five channels, a CDP, and reporting at several times the cost. If email automation on product events is the entire job, Encharge does it for a fraction of the money; if the job includes push, in-app, chat, forms, and executive reporting, Encharge cannot reach and Ortto can.
Is Encharge or Ortto cheaper?
Encharge starts at $79/mo (Growth, 2,000 subscribers, billed annually) (14 days trial). Ortto starts at Not currently published (the pricing page was withdrawn after the Canva acquisition; last published around $237 a month annually at 10,000 contacts) (free trial). The billing models differ, so the entry price is rarely the whole cost. Encharge pricing model: Subscriber-count tiers with monthly email-send multipliers; two self-serve plans plus custom Enterprise above 50,000 subscribers. Ortto pricing model: Contact-based subscription across Starter, Professional, Business, and Enterprise tiers, with prices banded by contact volume, sending included, and month-to-month available on Professional while Business and Enterprise require an annual commitment.
Does Encharge or Ortto have a free plan?
Encharge has no free plan. Trial terms: 14 days. Ortto has no free plan. Trial terms: Free signup, no credit card required (length not stated).
Who should choose Encharge?
Bootstrapped and seed-stage SaaS teams (and the agencies serving them) who want behavior-triggered email automation on product and billing events without enterprise pricing, admin overhead, or channels they will not use.
Who should choose Ortto?
Mid-market and scaling B2C or B2B companies that want a customer data platform, multi-channel journeys, and reporting from one vendor and can carry a three-figure monthly bill, particularly teams currently paying separately for a marketing tool, an analytics tool, and a chat widget.
What are the best alternatives to Encharge and Ortto?
SaaSTracker profiles 16 products in Marketing Automation. The Summer 2026 awards in the category went to HubSpot Marketing Hub (Category Leader), EngageBay (Best Value), Bento (Momentum). Every profile is compiled from primary sources, so a shortlist can be built from pricing, limitations, and fit rather than from star ratings.
