Customer.io

Say more, more powerfully with an AI-powered customer engagement platform fueled by first-party data. customer.io

Marketing Automation
★★★★★ 4.5
2012 Founded
201-500 Employees
8,000+ Customers
Portland, Oregon, USA Headquarters
Visit Website

Quick Facts

✓ Free Trial
Website
customer.io →
Starting Price
100
Pricing Model
tiered
Free Trial
14 days
Company Type
private
Social
LinkedIn Twitter/X

About Customer.io

Customer.io is a leading customer engagement platform built for tech-savvy organizations that want granular control over how they communicate with users across the lifecycle. Using first-party data, teams can design personalized journeys and send highly targeted messages across email, in-app, push, SMS, and webhooks from a single unified system. customer.io

The product portfolio centers on three core components: Journeys for marketing automation, Data Pipelines as a customer data platform (CDP), and their modern email editing environment (Parcel and the newer Design Studio). Together, these components let companies collect and route behavioral data, build complex visual workflows, personalize content using Liquid templating and custom objects, and analyze performance with conversion goals, A/B testing, and dashboards. customer.io

Founded in 2012 and headquartered in Portland, Oregon, Customer.io has grown from an early-stage email tool into a globally distributed, remote-first company used by more than 7,300–8,000 brands worldwide, from startups to publicly traded enterprises. The company has historically been very capital-efficient (“fundstrapping”), raising under $4M prior to a 2021 community crowdfunding round and a 2022 growth investment from Spectrum Equity after surpassing $30M in ARR. linkedin.com

Customer.io competes in the marketing automation and customer engagement market against providers like Braze, Iterable, Klaviyo, and HubSpot but differentiates with a developer-friendly, data-first architecture and flexible pricing that scales from small startups (via its Startup Program) to complex, regulated enterprises needing HIPAA, SOC 2, and ISO 27001 compliance. It is especially popular with product-led growth companies that need event-driven, multi-channel messaging tightly integrated with their data stack. customer.io

Key Features

Visual workflow builder - drag-and-drop canvas with time delays, branches, and reusable components to design complex multi-step journeys without heavy engineering support. customer.io

Omnichannel campaigns - orchestrate email, SMS, push notifications, in-app messages, anonymous messages, Slack, and webhooks from a single workflow. customer.io

Advanced segmentation - build data-driven and AI-assisted segments using unlimited attributes, events, and behaviors to target, filter, and measure campaigns. customer.io

Behavioral and event-triggered messaging - trigger campaigns from events, dates, form submissions, webhooks, relationships, and segment membership for highly contextual outreach. customer.io

Transactional and broadcast messaging - handle transactional triggers (password resets, receipts, alerts) alongside newsletters and one-off broadcasts in the same platform. customer.io

Design Studio and Parcel code editor - modern visual email editor with reusable blocks plus a powerful code editor for teams that want full HTML/CSS control. docs.customer.io

Data Pipelines / CDP - collect, transform, and route first-party data using APIs, SDKs, webhooks, Reverse ETL, and warehouse sync to and from tools like Snowflake and BigQuery. customer.io

Custom objects and relationships - model non-people data such as accounts, plans, courses, or properties to enable highly granular, relationship-based targeting. customer.io

Analytics, dashboards & conversion goals - track opens, clicks, conversions, and goals at message, campaign, and journey levels, with data exports for deeper analysis. customer.io

Experimentation / A/B & cohort testing - run tests on messaging content, timing, and paths at both broadcast and workflow level to continuously optimize performance. customer.io

Subscription & preference management - configurable subscription center so customers can manage topics and channels while staying compliant with consent requirements. customer.io

Localization & multi-language support - store language preferences and manage localized content variants across email, push, and in-app messages. customer.io

Mobile SDKs - official SDKs for iOS, Android, React Native, Flutter, and Expo to capture app events, identify users, and power push and in-app messaging. docs.customer.io

Anonymous events and cross-device tracking - capture pre-signup activity and tie it to user profiles later for more personalized onboarding and activation flows. customer.io

Security & compliance features - EU/US data residency, granular access controls, HIPAA readiness, SOC 2 Type II, ISO 27001, GDPR and CCPA compliance. customer.io

Pros & Cons

👍 Pros

  • Very powerful and flexible automation with an intuitive visual workflow builder that makes it easy to design complex customer journeys. g2.com
  • Robust behavioral segmentation and targeting, allowing campaigns to react to detailed user events and attributes across web and mobile. g2.com
  • True omnichannel support (email, SMS, push, in-app, and webhooks) in a single platform, which many reviewers say beats traditional ESPs. customer.io
  • Strong developer tooling and integrations with data warehouses, CDPs, and analytics tools, making it attractive for technical growth teams. customer.io
  • Helpful onboarding and responsive support, especially for Premium and Enterprise customers with access to CSMs and Technical Implementation Specialists. customer.io
  • Scales well to large volumes of events and messages, with reviewers noting reliable performance for high-volume lifecycle programs. globenewswire.com

👎 Cons

  • The UI and feature set can feel overwhelming for non-technical users, leading to a noticeable learning curve to fully unlock the platform's power. g2.com
  • Reporting and analytics are seen as less deep than dedicated analytics tools, so some teams export data to tools like Amplitude for more advanced analysis. capterra.com
  • Pricing based on total profiles can become expensive for companies with large databases but relatively low messaging volumes, especially for smaller B2C or e-commerce teams. docs.customer.io
  • Drag-and-drop email design capabilities and template management, while improving, are sometimes described as limited or clunky compared with best-in-class editors. capterra.com
  • Native SMS relies on providers like Twilio, and some reviewers note extra setup effort and limitations versus platforms with more deeply integrated SMS tooling. customer.io

User Reviews

G2
4.4
★★★★☆
Capterra
4.7
★★★★★
TrustRadius
8.8
★★★★★

Integrations

Salesforce HubSpot Segment Twilio Mixpanel Amplitude Snowflake Amazon S3 Google Ads Facebook / Meta Ads Facebook Lead Ads Google BigQuery Google Analytics Shopify Slack Zapier Typeform RudderStack mParticle Hightouch Webflow WordPress Stripe

Best For

Company Size

smb mid-market enterprise

Industries

SaaS Technology E-commerce FinTech Healthcare Education

Use Cases

Lifecycle and onboarding email sequences for new users and customers Product and feature activation campaigns powered by in-app, push, and email Transactional notifications such as receipts, password resets, and account alerts Retention, win-back, and churn-prevention campaigns across channels Cross-sell, upsell, and promotion workflows driven by behavioral data Newsletters and broadcast communications targeted by rich segmentation

FAQ

What is Customer.io?

+

Customer.io is a customer engagement and marketing automation platform that helps teams use first-party data to send personalized, event-driven messages across email, SMS, push, in-app, and webhooks. It combines a visual journey builder with powerful segmentation, a built-in CDP (Data Pipelines), and modern email editing tools so product, marketing, and growth teams can orchestrate complex lifecycle campaigns from a single place. customer.io

How much does Customer.io cost?

+

Customer.io's Essentials plan starts at $100 per month for up to 5,000 profiles and 1 million emails, billed monthly. The Premium plan starts at $1,000 per month billed annually, with custom profile and email volumes and additional support and integrations, while Enterprise pricing is custom and requires talking to sales. All plans include a 14-day free trial, and eligible early-stage companies may qualify for up to 12 months at $0 through the Startup Program. customer.io

What are the main features of Customer.io?

+

Key features of Customer.io include a drag-and-drop visual workflow builder; multi-channel campaigns (email, SMS, push, in-app, webhooks); advanced behavioral segmentation and personalization using Liquid and custom objects; transactional and broadcast messaging; A/B and cohort testing; analytics and conversion goals; a modern Design Studio email editor; mobile SDKs for iOS, Android, and cross-platform frameworks; and Data Pipelines for warehouse sync and Reverse ETL. customer.io

Who are Customer.io's main competitors?

+

Customer.io most often competes with other customer engagement and marketing automation platforms such as Braze, Iterable, Klaviyo, HubSpot Marketing Hub, Marketo Engage, and ActiveCampaign. It also overlaps with CDP and messaging infrastructure providers like Segment, mParticle, and Twilio, but differentiates by combining a marketer-friendly journey builder with a data-first, developer-friendly architecture. customer.io

Is Customer.io good for small businesses?

+

Customer.io can be a strong fit for small businesses and startups that are product-led and have or plan to build a solid data foundation, especially if they join the Startup Program for discounted or free usage. However, very small teams that only need basic newsletter sending and have no engineering resources may find simpler tools easier to adopt, since Customer.io's power comes from event instrumentation, integrations, and more advanced lifecycle workflows. customer.io

Book a Call

Ready to Scale Your Pipeline?

Schedule a free strategy call with our sales development experts.

SCHEDULE A MEETING TODAY!
1
2
3
4

Enter Your Details

Select Your Meeting Date

MONTUEWEDTHUFRI

Pick a Day

MONTUEWEDTHUFRI

Pick a Time

Select a date

Confirm

SalesHive API 0 total meetings booked
SCHEDULE A MEETING TODAY!
1
2
3
4

Enter Your Details

Select Your Meeting Date

MONTUEWEDTHUFRI

Pick a Day

MONTUEWEDTHUFRI

Pick a Time

Select a date

Confirm

New Meeting Booked!