HubSpot Email Templates vs. Custom Designed Email Templates in HubSpot: What’s Best for Your Brand?

If you’re running email campaigns in HubSpot, you must’ve hit this fork in the road:

Do you stick with ready-made HubSpot email templates, or go all in on a custom designed email template built inside HubSpot?

Now, no need to treat it like an existential crisis. We’re not deciding between “tea or coffee for the rest of your life.” But if email is one of your core marketing channels, this question deserves a real answer.

Here’s the twist, though: framing it as either/or is kind of missing the point. With the level of flexibility marketers have today, you can’t just pledge allegiance to one camp forever.

You’ll probably need both HubSpot’s quick, out-of-the-box templates and custom designed email templates at different stages of your campaigns.

So what’s the value of this blog, then? Simple: to unpack the strengths and shortcomings of each option—and show you when each is at its best. After all, it’s only when you align tools to your business needs and branding goals that your email templates start working like your marketing assets.

In the next few minutes, we’ll dig into HubSpot email templates versus custom designed email templates in HubSpot, weigh the pros and cons, and look at scenarios where one works better than the other. By the end, you’ll know exactly how to approach your campaigns without overthinking them.

What HubSpot Email Templates Offer

Unlike custom coded email templates in HubSpot, built-in HubSpot email templates are designed for overworked teams. The teams that need to ship campaigns at the eleventh hour quickly.

We’ve found that with such email templates, many teams move quickly without needing a developer on standby. They work best when speed and consistency are the priority.

Here’s what you should expect from HubSpot email templates:

• User-friendliness: HubSpot’s drag-and-drop builder is built for rookies. No one needs to code to assemble text, images, buttons, or CTAs in a pre-built framework. Within minutes, you can get a pro-grade email template ready.
• Speed and efficiency: Perfect for quick turnarounds. Sale announcement, event reminder, or product update, you can build and launch in minutes.
• Consistency: Every module is pre-optimized for mobile, so your emails render correctly across devices without extra testing.
• Limitations in flexibility: You’re restricted to HubSpot’s blocks. Advanced customization (like editing HTML or CSS) isn’t possible.
• Generic feel: With many businesses using the same layouts, your emails risk looking familiar instead of distinct.

In short, HubSpot templates give you a dependable framework. Quick, functional, and reliable. Ideal for routine email campaigns but not for when you want your brand personality to shine through.

What a Custom Designed Email Template in HubSpot Brings to the Table

If HubSpot’s ready-made templates are the quick off-the-rack option, a custom designed template is more like commissioning a suit tailored to your exact measurements, says Drupalsinh Barad, seasoned manager at Mavlers.

From the code to the email layout, every detail of the custom templates is optimized to serve your brand’s identity and marketing goals better.

Some key features of custom designed email templates in HubSpot are:

• Better rendering and compatibility: When you create templates from scratch using HTML and CSS, you have the flexibility to write the code with a custom design. Even JavaScript, if you need it.
  Plus, you can use responsive design techniques and media queries to create emails that adapt to various screen sizes and specific OS.
• Greater design freedom: You aren’t limited by the tools and templates offered by HubSpot. Unconventional layouts, custom fonts, complex structures, interactive features, dynamic content, or subtle animations. If your brand needs them, custom coding lets you design beyond the limits of HubSpot’s drag-and-drop modules.
• Stronger brand alignment: Because you can establish a consistent baseline for all brand elements, it’s easier for your custom email designs to echo your brand identity. As if they came from your own design system, rather than from HubSpot.
• Cleaner, optimized code: Prebuilt editors sometimes leave behind bulky code. If coded well, custom templates are leaner, load faster, and generally render well in inboxes like Outlook or Gmail. Not to mention, the deliverability is better compared to bloated, generic code.
• Complex coding: Coding for custom designed HubSpot email templates is no small feat. Solving complex technical challenges that come with custom designs needs niche coding skills. Skills that many web developers don’t always have, and most marketers definitely don’t.
• Maintenance overhead: Small edits that seem simple in a drag-and-drop editor may require you to call for developer support.
• Higher initial investment: Commissioning custom designed email templates demands time and budget up front. Nonetheless, the investment pays off in the long term if you’re regular on brand-heavy, custom email campaigns.

Custom designed email templates in HubSpot are the best bet if brand identity and design control can’t be exchanged for faster email production.

Here’s the table summing up the key differences: 

Choosing the Right Path for Your Brand

The good news is that there is no such thing as the single “best” option here. HubSpot email templates or custom email designs, the route you take really depends on:

• Where your brand is
• What resources do you have, and
• How much does email marketing matter to your growth?

You Benefit From Hubspot’s Drag-and-drop Templates If:

• You’re a relatively new brand and don’t want to hire developers.
• The speed of email production outweighs the finesse of custom design.
• You send out no-frills email campaigns. More transactional reminders or updates, which can obviously do without all the bells and whistles of custom designs.

Custom Designed Email Templates In Hubspot Are Your Go-to If:

• There is already a certain level of branding, and you want your emails to reflect that down to the pixel.
• Complex or high-value campaigns where just looking stunning is not enough are a part of your email program.
• You have access to high-quality design and development resources, or are willing to invest in them.

Here’s the bigger picture:

• Budget-conscious startups should take advantage of HubSpot’s prebuilt templates. They’re quick, efficient, and get you moving without draining time or money.
• Established brands can generally get more out of custom templates. Because at the stage where they are, branding and unique personality are non-negotiable for standing out in noisier inboxes.
• Fast-moving teams that launch campaigns weekly or daily often benefit from HubSpot’s editor.
• ROI-driven marketers should consider custom builds. Cleaner code and stronger branding usually translate to better engagement and deliverability.
• Hybrid teams (with both marketers and designers) don’t have to choose. They can mix both approaches, reserving custom templates for flagship campaigns while using HubSpot email templates for everyday sends.

If you are reluctant to build an email design system from scratch, good email design services are always a safety net. And even if you’re ready to go all-in on an internal team, there is no shame in getting help once in a while.

Good email design partners have been through this process countless times. They know the pitfalls—the layouts break, rendering issues arise, and ESP quirks occur. And the workarounds, too.