ActiveCampaign integration: API key auth, contacts + lists + tags

ActiveCampaign uses API-key authentication with an account-specific URL. The connect flow asks for two things: your ActiveCampaign API Key and your account URL.

Where to find your credentials

1. Sign into ActiveCampaign.
2. Open Settings → Developer (or click your avatar → Settings → Developer).
3. Your API URL is shown at the top (looks like https://YOURACCOUNT.api-us1.com).
4. Your API Key is below the URL.

Both are needed for the connection. The API URL identifies which ActiveCampaign instance, the key authenticates against that instance.

Connecting ActiveCampaign

1. In our dashboard, go to Bulk Upload → Connect Email Platform → ActiveCampaign.
2. Paste both the API Key and the API URL.
3. Optionally name the connection.
4. Click Save Connection.

What you can verify

• Contact lists — manually managed lists of contacts.
• All contacts — your entire ActiveCampaign contact database.

Clean-list defaults

Same as other integrations. In ActiveCampaign:

• Unsubscribe changes the contact status to Unsubscribed — they remain in the database, stop receiving marketing emails, automation can still reference them.
• Delete removes the contact entirely. Cannot be undone from ActiveCampaign.
• Tags, custom fields, and automation history are preserved through Keep and Unsubscribe. Delete removes everything.

Common ActiveCampaign issues

"Cannot find API URL"

It is at Settings → Developer in the ActiveCampaign dashboard. The URL has the format https://YOURACCOUNT.api-us1.com — the us1 part may be different for European or other regional accounts.

"API authentication failed"

• Make sure both fields are pasted correctly (no trailing whitespace).
• Confirm you have admin permissions on the ActiveCampaign account — read-only users may not get a working API key.
• Try regenerating the API key in ActiveCampaign and re-connecting.

Cost

1 credit per contact verified. ActiveCampaign accounts with 100K+ contacts benefit from segmenting by list or by tag for ongoing monthly hygiene.

Next steps