6 free alternatives to PubNub

Pusher's free Sandbox plan includes 200,000 messages per day, 100 concurrent connections, standard support, and Functions access. It is a straightforward hosted realtime option for live updates, chat events, and notification workflows, with no credit card required. The main benefit over PubNub is daily message capacity, since the allowance is easy to understand and much more generous on a day-by-day basis. It falls short on monthly active users and does not publish storage or persistence allowances in the free tier. Switch here if your app is message-heavy but still small in connection count.

• Beats PubNub: Messages per day
• Falls short: No published free storage or MAU allowance
• Who should switch: Switch if you need a simple realtime messaging sandbox with more daily message volume than PubNub offers.

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Stream's free Build plan gives access to all Chat features, 1,000 monthly active users, 100 concurrent connections, community support, and no credit card requirement. It is aimed at builders who want chat-first workflows with the rest of the product already included in the free tier. Compared with PubNub, the main advantage is higher user capacity for chat apps, since the free plan is built around a larger MAU limit. It falls short if you need PubNub-style message persistence, file sharing, or serverless Functions on the free plan. Choose Stream if chat is the center of the app.

• Beats PubNub: Monthly active users
• Falls short: No free message persistence or serverless functions stated
• Who should switch: Switch if your main need is free chat capacity rather than general realtime infrastructure.

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Ably's free package lets you build a proof of concept for $0, with up to 200 concurrent connections, up to 500 messages per second, 6 million messages per month, access to any Ably product, and best-effort community and email support. It is a good fit for builders who care about sustained realtime throughput instead of PubNub's lower monthly activity ceiling. The tradeoff is that it requires a credit card, and it does not spell out a free storage allowance or push notification quota in the same way PubNub does. Pick Ably when your app is message-intensive and connection counts matter.

• Beats PubNub: Messages per month
• Falls short: Credit card is required
• Who should switch: Switch if you need more free realtime throughput and can accept a card on file.

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Azure Notification Hubs offers 1 million pushes per subscription per tier, up to 100 namespaces, up to 100 hubs per namespace, up to 500 active devices per namespace, cross-platform push to individual devices, push variables support, limited telemetry, queryable audience via registration queries, and disaster recovery region availability. It is clearly the strongest free choice when your workload is mobile push rather than general pub/sub messaging. It falls short on realtime app features like message transactions, presence, or functions, and the plan requires a credit card. Use it when your app is primarily about push delivery at device scale.

• Beats PubNub: Push capacity
• Falls short: No free realtime messaging or serverless features
• Who should switch: Switch if your main need is mobile push notifications instead of a broader realtime app platform.

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LeanCloud's Developer plan includes 30K API requests per day, 3 threads, 10K full-text search queries per day, 100 LiveQuery subscriptions per day, 5K LiveQuery messages per day, 1GB of storage, 6 months of message history, 500 daily active users for LeanMessage, 10K push notifications per day, and 20 concurrent users for LeanCloud Play, plus basic chat and push features. It gives you a broader backend package than PubNub's focused realtime tier. The tradeoff is that its usage is split across several services, so the per-feature ceilings are lower in some places than PubNub's monthly transaction limit. Choose it if you want backend, chat, push, and storage in one place.

• Beats PubNub: Breadth of included backend features
• Falls short: Lower messaging headroom in some individual services
• Who should switch: Switch if you want a free backend platform with realtime and storage in one bundle.

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Nhost's free Starter plan includes 1 project, 1GB of database storage, 1GB of file storage, 5GB of network egress, up to 10 functions with 1GB-hours of execution, unlimited authenticated users, social OAuth providers, community support, infrastructure as code support, and automated deployments. It is a better fit for builders who want a managed app backend with realtime adjacent features rather than a messaging-first platform. It falls short on PubNub-style push notifications, transaction counts, and message-centric realtime primitives. Choose Nhost if your app needs backend, auth, storage, and functions before it needs dedicated pub/sub scale.

• Beats PubNub: General app backend coverage
• Falls short: No free push notification quota or realtime message quota stated
• Who should switch: Switch if you want the most backend headroom around storage, auth, and functions.

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