In February 2025 Klaviyo changed how it calculates your bill. Before: you paid based on how many contacts you actually emailed each month. After: you pay for every active profile in the account, whether you've emailed them this year or not. No price-list change, but for accounts with big, old lists the invoice jumped anyway — which is why Klaviyo's Trustpilot filled up with billing complaints while the product reviews stayed fine.
| Profile state | Billable? |
|---|---|
| Has a valid email or phone, can receive marketing | Yes |
| Hasn't opened anything in 12 months (but not suppressed) | Yes — this is the trap |
| Suppressed (manually or via bulk job) | No |
| Unsubscribed | No |
| Deleted | No |
| Hard-bounced (auto-suppressed by Klaviyo) | No |
The key line from Klaviyo's own billing docs: suppressed profiles "do not contribute towards your billing plan." Suppression keeps all the data and is reversible — which makes it strictly better than deleting for bill control.
Once or twice a year: build an inactivity segment (created 180+ days ago, received your emails, zero opens/clicks/orders), optionally run a sunset flow, bulk-suppress the rest, then lower your tier. The full walkthrough with exact segment conditions is here: How to reduce your Klaviyo bill.
Deadweight audits your account read-only and replies with one figure: what you're overpaying per month. Free, and honest — if the savings are under $19/mo we'll say so.
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