PubNub vs. Stream
 | Stream | Why does it matter? | |
|---|---|---|---|
| PLATFORM PERFORMANCE | |||
| Uptime Guarantee | 99.999% For all customers. | 99.999%
| An uptime guarantee offers peace of mind for you and confidence in the service we provide. |
| Latency | WAN < 20 ms
50% of PubNub’s messages have below 20ms delivery speed. Our intranet latency is below 1ms, while our WAN latency is sub 30ms. | <40ms
| Lower latency provides a true real-time experience for users, which is crucial for increased engagement and adoption. |
| Multi Region Support | Yes PubNub defaults you to all 15 data centers at all times - this means that users are dynamically routed to the closest center. | Yes 5 Global data centers to pick from. US East, EU West, Singapore, Sydney and Mumbai. | If you have a user audience across the globe, you will experience higher latency and less localized support if you are fixed to one data center only. Having more data availability and replication ensures that data can always be accessed quickly by users around the globe. |
| Multiplexing | Yes PubNub offers high-volume channel subscriptions, with up to 20,000 channels for each connected user. | Not Listed | Multiplexing allows the transmission of a large number of messages to a large number of channels over the same connection. This is important to reduce complexity and optimize client resource consumption/usage. |
| Channel Groups | Yes PubNub offers a server-side channel subscription control. | Yes | This allows end-users to subscribe to a channel group that controls channel subscriptions for each end-user by a Server-side API. Having more data availability and replication ensures that data can always be accessed quickly by users around the globe. |
| Compression for Messages | Yes PubNub offers GZIP compression for both inbound and outbound messages. | Not Listed | Compressed messages require significantly less storage capacity and in turn may provide lower latency. |
| SCALABILITY | |||
| Concurrency | Unlimited Concurrency | Charges for concurrent users. | Unlimited concurrency gives our customers the ability to scale without the worry of the additional cost. |
| Channels | Unlimited Channels | Hard limit of 50 channel types. | Unlimited channels give our customers the ability to scale without the worry of additional pricing. This is especially important in use cases that require ephemeral channels (i.e. one-time password use case). |
| Scale Presence | Supports millions of users in a channel. | Unlimited channel users. | Supporting millions of users lets customers scale with ease. |
| Number of devices (As of 2021) | 800 million devices connected per month, and we can support even more. | Not Listed | Supporting millions of devices shows that we are trusted and used among many companies. |
| Number of messages (As of 2021) | 2 trillion messages delivered per month, and we can support even more. | Not Listed | The number of messages shows that PubNub can support a massive amount of usage each month. |
| CHAT CAPABILITIES - MESSAGING | |||
| 1:1 direct messaging | Yes | Yes | Connect users directly. One-on-one. |
| Group messaging | Yes Pubnub also has no limit on the number of users. | Yes | Connect groups. No limit on the number of users means no worries when hosting large events. |
| Presence indicators | Yes PubNub Presence lets you track the real-time status of millions of users on a single channel. | Yes | Allows users to see when others are there, allowing for more seamless engagement. |
| Advanced Presence | Yes Custom channel regular expression rules to configure presence eveents by naming patterns. | Not Listed | Reduces cost by targeting only necessary presence events for your application to be delivered. Improving the user experience enabling faster more efficient applications. |
| Super groups | Yes Up to 60,000 users for presence join/leave and millions of users for occupancy interval mode via presence ACLs. | Not Listed | An expanded version of a group channel that supports more than 2000 members. |
| Push notifications | Yes | Yes Through Firebase. | This feature ensures the messages users get are seen and received. |
| Advanced Access | Yes Access control patterns can be specified as regular expressions to match a diverse range of permissions. | Not Listed | The density of permissions can be customized to the desired range of resources using regex. Allowing more control over changes in your applications and code releases. |
| User & channel metadata | Yes Our Objects feature provides easy-to-use, serverless storage for the user and channel metadata. | Yes | The density of permissions can be customized to the desired range of resources using regex. Allowing more control over changes in your applications and code releases. |
| Programmable Functions | Yes PubNub can be used to transform messages in transit to provide real-time language translation or profanity filtering. | Not Listed | Programmable functions enable you to write code or leverage existing integrations to address your business needs, whether it's transforming, re-routing, augmenting, filtering, and even aggregating data for subsequent use. PubNub Functions are also serverless. |
| Webhooks | Yes We currently support webhooks using Functions. | Yes | Webhooks allow for the publishing of messages on the client-server over HTTP to trigger events. |
| Chat UI Components | Yes | Yes | Our chat UI components help you easily build the in-app features you want and get to market faster. |
| Dynamic User State | Yes Users can set flexible, dynamic user states. State changes generate state-change events. | Yes | Dynamic user state allows for real-time updates and support needs such as leaderboards etc. |
| Typing Indicators | Yes | Yes | This is crucial to providing an engaging chat experience and is built-in to your Chat UI components; implemented in the most cost-effective way. |
| Delivery and read receipts | Yes | Yes | This function gives end users the assurance that their messages are being delivered and read. |
| Unread message counts | Yes Users can add logic to store the last timestamp of messages read locally, or using objects in each channel. | Yes | This allows end-users to easily navigate their messages and catch up with their conversations since their last interaction. |
| Pre-delivery message filtering | Yes Clients can select messages to filter out on the server. Customers only pay for delivered messages. | Not Listed | Stream filtering reads input, filters, and passes it on. This can help to reduce overall transaction costs. |
| File and image sharing | Yes | Yes | File sharing adds new functionality to your chat application, allowing users to share files like images, records, documents, etc. |
| Message Reactions | Yes PubNub offers message reactions through our first-class native API. | Yes | Allows users to share custom reactions to other posts, allowing for a more dynamic experience for the end-user. |
| Real-time Translation | Yes via PubNub functions. | Yes for an additional fee. | Real-time translations help to break down language barriers and create a more global conversation. |
| Real-time Profanity Filtering | Yes via PubNub functions (integrated into our Audience Moderation module). | Yes for an additional fee. | By implementing a filter for your chat, you are taking precautionary actions against offensive words and behaviors before they reach your audience. |
| Chatbots | Yes For PubNub chatbots, developers have full control of which channels have access & how/if/when they respond to messages. | Yes | Chatbots can understand and respond to user requests automatically. They can be useful in a variety of situations, such as customer service, new user registration, e-commerce, etc. |
| Slash Commands | Yes PubNub Functions allow you to add programmable logic for slash commands. | Yes | Create shortcuts and a more seamless process for end-users with slash commands. |
| Voice and Video APIs | Yes We have partner integrations with Vonage, Agora, or Dolby | Yes Through partner integrations with Dolby. | With PubNub’s partners, these APIs allow for Voice and Video features to end users’ chat apps. |
| CHAT CAPABILITIES - MODERATION | |||
| Moderation Dashboards | Yes via our open source Moderation Dashboard. | Yes | Moderation dashboard allows for moderation in realtime, to keep your chats clean and safe for all ages. |
| Profanity filters | Yes
| Yes Through react native. | By implementing a filter for your chat, you are taking precautionary actions against offensive words and behaviors before they reach your audience. |
| Image moderation | Yes | Yes for an additional fee. | SightEngine’s image moderation allows developers to moderate and filter user-generated photos for adult content, validation, and phototype - Ideal for chat apps, forums, social media aggregators, and more. |
| Mute/Block users | Yes | Yes | This enables you to manage access controls for individual users, so they can be muted or blocked on specific channels. |
| SUPPORT & MONITORING | |||
| Message history (persisted data) | Yes Allow persisting messages forever. | Yes | Data persistence is important because of its non-volatility, reliability, stability, and time-independent features. |
| Operational dashboards | Yes with Gold Support Plan | Yes through the stream dashboard | Ability to monitor your app in realtime for any potential issues. |
| Export Operational metrics to a customer monitoring tool | Yes with Platinum Support Plan | Not Listed | Easily export data to gain insights and keep track of customers. |
| Support Team | 24/7 Support Team Physically located in four time zones and backed by 10 years of experience. | 24/5 Support Team 24/7 for Enterprise customers only | Support, whenever you need it. No time constraints means timely help and more seamless development. |
| COMPONENTS | |||
| Languages Supported | React, Android, and iOS
| React, React Native, Android, iOS | Supporting multiple languages offers greater flexibility when building. |
| Design Galleries | Yes Designs for multiple apps: basic, support, team, virtual events. | Yes | Designs for multiple apps offer more options for you and your end user- with more customization by the developer. |
| User, Message, and Channel Lists | Yes | Yes | Retrieve user, message and channel data - giving you the access you need, when you need it. |
*Information gathered from publicly available resources. Correct at time of collection - Dec 2021