Choosing an email platform
Flodesk or Squarespace Email Campaigns
Your website is on Squarespace, so you have two options for a newsletter. Squarespace includes email. Flodesk is a separate tool you'd connect to your site.
The prices are close. The experience isn't.
The short answer
If you're starting a list from close to zero, I'd say Flodesk.
The reason is sign-ups. Squarespace asks every new subscriber to confirm by email before they count, and plenty of people never get around to it. So you lose a slice of everyone who wanted to hear from you, every month, and it never shows up on the invoice.
Squarespace does make sense in a few situations. Those are near the bottom of this page.
They charge for different things
Flodesk
Priced by people
- You pay for how many active subscribers you have
- Sending is unlimited on every paid plan
- Email as often as you like, cost doesn't move
- Unsubscribes and bounces stop counting
Squarespace
Priced by sends
- You pay for how many emails you send per month
- List size itself is not capped
- Also caps how many campaigns you can send
- Hit the ceiling and sending stops until next cycle
NOTE: So Flodesk gets more expensive as your list grows, and Squarespace gets more expensive as you write more often. A big quiet list is cheap on Squarespace. A small list you write to every week is cheap on Flodesk.
What it would cost you
Pick your numbers. Prices shown are per month on annual billing.
Flodesk
$19 /mo
Squarespace
$10 /mo
NOTE: Flodesk figures come from their published pricing. Squarespace has been adjusting its email tiers, so treat those as close rather than exact and check the live number in the billing panel before you commit. Both in USD.
Where they differ
| Flodesk | Squarespace | |
|---|---|---|
| Sign-up | Single opt-in. They fill the form, they're on the list. | Double opt-in, always. They fill the form, then have to find and click a confirmation email. |
| Templates | Why most people choose it. Beautiful out of the box, and you can use your own fonts. | Clean and on brand with your site, but a short font list and less control. |
| Automations | Full visual workflows. Welcome sequences, tagging, branching. One workflow on Lite, unlimited on Pro. | Basic triggers only. Welcome, after a purchase, check in. No sequencing, no branching. |
| Setup | A separate account, plus DNS records to verify your sending domain. Fiddly, one time only. | Already there. The sign-up form is part of your site and your domain settings are in the same account. |
| Branding | Flodesk footer stays on Lite. Removable on Pro. | Squarespace footer stays on the entry plan. Removable above it. |
| Selling | Checkout, sales pages, payment plans and abandoned cart on the top plan. | Uses your existing Squarespace shop, which is a real advantage if you already sell there. |
| Risk | Separate from your site. If one account goes down the other keeps working. | Site, domain and list in one account. Export your list regularly either way. |
The double opt-in problem
Squarespace asks every new subscriber to confirm by email before they're really on your list. You can't switch it off.
That confirmation email goes to the promotions tab, or it arrives while someone is standing in a queue on their phone. They meant to join. They never finished.
With twenty thousand subscribers you absorb it. With your first two hundred it's the difference between a list that grows and one that sits there. It's the main reason I point new lists toward Flodesk.
When Squarespace is the better choice
There are real cases where I'd tell you to stay where you are.
Pick Squarespace if
- You email rarely. A few times a year, not a few times a month
- You know yourself, and a second login is never going to happen
- Your shop is on Squarespace and you want purchase follow-ups tied to it
- You want to test whether you'll enjoy writing a newsletter at all before spending more
Pick Flodesk if
- You're building a list from close to zero and need every sign-up to stick
- You want a welcome sequence that runs without you
- How the email looks matters to you
- You plan to sell something to this list eventually
Squarespace is a sensible choice for a quiet, occasional letter. It gets frustrating the moment you want more from it, and moving to another platform later means setting everything up a second time.
If you'd like me to set it up
Either platform, you end up with something that looks like you and that you can run without me.
Flodesk setup
$500, one time
- Brand setup, your colours and fonts
- Email template designed and saved
- Sign-up form made and embedded on your Squarespace site
- Welcome workflow written and switched on
- Domain verification, which is the fiddly part
Squarespace Email setup
$450, one time
- Brand setup within the Squarespace editor
- Reusable email layout built and saved
- Newsletter block styled and placed on your site
- Welcome automation set up
- Sender details and domain checks sorted
Both prices are flat, paid once, and include a walkthrough at the end so you know how to send on your own.
Prices checked July 2026 and shown in USD on annual billing. Platforms change their plans without much warning, so confirm the live figure before you subscribe.
The Flodesk link above is an affiliate link. You get 25% off your first year, I get a small commission.
Kim Klassen