NSQ vs Socket.IO

	NSQ	Socket.IO
Time to "hello world" Reviewed by 3+ independent developers Ratings were given based on the average amount of time it takes to sign up to a new account and publish the first message.	4 / 5 5 = <30 min 4 = 30 min - 1 h 3 = 1-2 h 2 = 2-4 h 1 = 4+ h View code example	4 / 5 5 = <30 min 4 = 30 min - 1 h 3 = 1-2 h 2 = 2-4 h 1 = 4+ h View code example
Demos / Tutorials A selection of online demos and tutorials so you can test and see the code in action. Explore Ably's tutorials for our pub/sub messaging platform	NSQ Docs 1.2.0 - Installing NSQ Docs 1.2.0 - Quick Start NSQ - NYC Golang Meetup	Getting started with Socket.IO Whiteboard demo Build a realtime database with Socket.IO and MongoDB
Documentation Reviewed by 3+ independent developers Explore Ably's documentation for our pub/sub messaging platform	3.67 / 5 Getting started guides / 5 Information architecture and developer journey / 5 API reference documentation / 5 Readability, design and navigation / 5 Quality of code / 5 Breadth and quality of tutorials / 5 O: “Documentation is detailed and clear, the start up guide is simple to follow. There could be more examples of usages added.”. W: “There is a lot of information available and the documentation is easy to navigate. However i think there could be some more detailed tutorials and a more informative introduction.”. P: “The quick start is easy to follow and understand. The architecture documentation is thorough. There could be more tutorials.”	4 / 5 Getting started guides / 5 Information architecture and developer journey / 5 API reference documentation / 5 Readability, design and navigation / 5 Quality of code / 5 Breadth and quality of tutorials / 5 "Much like the solution, the documentation is pretty lightweight. You have an excellent getting started guide that requires no prior Socket.IO or Node.js knowledge. There are tens of code snippets throughout the docs, which is fantastic. There are almost no tutorials (not official ones), but you do have a chat and a whiteboard demo that you can grab from GitHub. The quality of writing is good enough. Most of the time, things are clear. Navigating between documentation, demos, and the API reference is quite annoying. They could have done a better job linking these sections and having them displayed in a common ToC. Although lightweight and generally clear, the documentation seems to have some holes in it, based on the number of GitHub and Stack Overflow questions about Socket.IO."
Dashboard or dev console Reviewed by 3+ independent developers Sign up for free and explore Ably's pub/sub messaging platform	3.67 / 5 Ease of use / 5 Stats and reports / 5 Functionality / 5 O: “The admin dashboard allows you to manage and configure your topics. It has a clear interface and offers the ability to list information about each topic as well as perform a list of actions on them.”. W: “The admin dashboard is intuitive and it gives you the ability to manage your channels and queues and also see statistics for them. The dashboard looks a little basic but it’s easy to use and covers what you need.” P: “The dashboard gives you an overview over your topics, streams, nodes and metrics. It lets you manage your queues and topics. Gives you metrics on the number of messages a node has handled.”	1 / 5 Ease of use / 5 Stats and reports / 5 Functionality / 5 "Socket.IO does not provide a developer console or dashboard."
SDKs Note: Only official SDKs were taken into account. Explore Ably's 25+ SDKs for our pub/sub messaging platform	40 SDKs Including: Go Python Javascript	1 official Socket.IO server implementation (Node.js), and 4 official client implementations (JavaScript, Java, C++, Swift) Note that there are also several community-made server and client implementations in other languages, such as Python, .NET, and Golang.
API structure Reviewed by 3+ independent developers	4.50 / 5 API consistency across SDKs / 5 Well structured / 5 Intuitive / 5 Simple / 5 O: The API is straightforward. It is consistent for the official SDKs. However, some of the unofficial SDKs are missing support for pub/sub”. W: “The API is fairly consistent between the SDKs and it is structured in an intuitive way. The API endpoints are mostly self-explanatory and it is easy to understand what they will accomplish.”. P: “There exists a vast amount of SDKs. The official client libraries are consistent, but in the unofficial libraries, there are inconsistencies between features. The naming conventions in the SDKs are intuitive and easy to follow.”	5 / 5 API consistency across SDKs / 5 Well structured / 5 Intuitive / 5 Simple / 5 "Socket.IO has a simple JavaScript-based API interface that has intuitive naming conventions. The API reference documentation is very detailed, with each resource described in detail, and with numerous code examples throughout. It’s easy to get started with both the Server and the Client APIs."

NSQ

Socket.IO

Getting started and developer experience

Time to "hello world"

Reviewed by 3+ independent developers

Ratings were given based on the average amount of time it takes to sign up to a new account and publish the first message.

4 / 5

5 = <30 min
4 = 30 min - 1 h
3 = 1-2 h
2 = 2-4 h
1 = 4+ h

View code example

4 / 5

5 = <30 min
4 = 30 min - 1 h
3 = 1-2 h
2 = 2-4 h
1 = 4+ h

View code example

Demos / Tutorials

A selection of online demos and tutorials so you can test and see the code in action.

Explore Ably's tutorials for our pub/sub messaging platform

Documentation

Reviewed by 3+ independent developers

Explore Ably's documentation for our pub/sub messaging platform

3.67 / 5

Getting started guides / 5

Information architecture and developer journey / 5

API reference documentation / 5

Readability, design and navigation / 5

Quality of code / 5

Breadth and quality of tutorials / 5

O: “Documentation is detailed and clear, the start up guide is simple to follow. There could be more examples of usages added.”.

W: “There is a lot of information available and the documentation is easy to navigate. However i think there could be some more detailed tutorials and a more informative introduction.”.

P: “The quick start is easy to follow and understand. The architecture documentation is thorough. There could be more tutorials.”

4 / 5

Getting started guides / 5

Information architecture and developer journey / 5

API reference documentation / 5

Readability, design and navigation / 5

Quality of code / 5

Breadth and quality of tutorials / 5

"Much like the solution, the documentation is pretty lightweight. You have an excellent getting started guide that requires no prior Socket.IO or Node.js knowledge. There are tens of code snippets throughout the docs, which is fantastic. There are almost no tutorials (not official ones), but you do have a chat and a whiteboard demo that you can grab from GitHub. The quality of writing is good enough. Most of the time, things are clear. Navigating between documentation, demos, and the API reference is quite annoying. They could have done a better job linking these sections and having them displayed in a common ToC. Although lightweight and generally clear, the documentation seems to have some holes in it, based on the number of GitHub and Stack Overflow questions about Socket.IO."

Dashboard or dev console

Reviewed by 3+ independent developers

3.67 / 5

Ease of use / 5

Stats and reports / 5

Functionality / 5

O: “The admin dashboard allows you to manage and configure your topics. It has a clear interface and offers the ability to list information about each topic as well as perform a list of actions on them.”.

W: “The admin dashboard is intuitive and it gives you the ability to manage your channels and queues and also see statistics for them. The dashboard looks a little basic but it’s easy to use and covers what you need.”

P: “The dashboard gives you an overview over your topics, streams, nodes and metrics. It lets you manage your queues and topics. Gives you metrics on the number of messages a node has handled.”

1 / 5

Ease of use / 5

Stats and reports / 5

Functionality / 5

"Socket.IO does not provide a developer console or dashboard."

SDKs

Note: Only official SDKs were taken into account.

Explore Ably's 25+ SDKs for our pub/sub messaging platform

40 SDKs

Including:

Go
Python
Javascript

1 official Socket.IO server implementation (Node.js), and 4 official client implementations (JavaScript, Java, C++, Swift)

Note that there are also several community-made server and client implementations in other languages, such as Python, .NET, and Golang.

API structure

Reviewed by 3+ independent developers

4.50 / 5

API consistency across SDKs / 5

Well structured / 5

Intuitive / 5

Simple / 5

O: The API is straightforward. It is consistent for the official SDKs. However, some of the unofficial SDKs are missing support for pub/sub”.

W: “The API is fairly consistent between the SDKs and it is structured in an intuitive way. The API endpoints are mostly self-explanatory and it is easy to understand what they will accomplish.”.

P: “There exists a vast amount of SDKs. The official client libraries are consistent, but in the unofficial libraries, there are inconsistencies between features. The naming conventions in the SDKs are intuitive and easy to follow.”

5 / 5

API consistency across SDKs / 5

Well structured / 5

Intuitive / 5

Simple / 5

"Socket.IO has a simple JavaScript-based API interface that has intuitive naming conventions. The API reference documentation is very detailed, with each resource described in detail, and with numerous code examples throughout. It’s easy to get started with both the Server and the Client APIs."

NSQ	Socket.IO
// Create reader const nsq = require('nsqjs') const reader = new nsq.Reader('sample_topic', 'test_channel', { lookupdHTTPAddresses: '127.0.0.1:4161' }) reader.connect() reader.on('message', msg => { console.log('Received message [%s]: %s', msg.id, msg.body.toString()) msg.finish() }) // Create writer const nsq = require('nsqjs') const w = new nsq.Writer('127.0.0.1', 55004) w.connect() w.on('ready', () => { w.publish('sample_topic', 'Test message') }) w.on('closed', () => { console.log('Writer closed') })	var app = require('express')(); var http = require('http').Server(app); var io = require('socket.io')(http); app.get('/', function(req, res) { res.sendfile('index.html'); }); //Broadcasting events var clients = 0; io.on('connection', function(socket) { clients++; io.sockets.emit('broadcast',{ description: clients + ' clients connected!'}); socket.on('disconnect', function () { clients--; io.sockets.emit('broadcast',{ description: clients + ' clients connected!'}); }); }); http.listen(3000, function() { console.log('listening on localhost:3000'); }); //Handling broadcast events on the client side <!DOCTYPE html> <html> <head> <title>Hello world</title> </head> <script src = "/socket.io/socket.io.js"></script> <script> var socket = io(); socket.on('broadcast',function(data) { document.body.innerHTML = ''; document.write(data.description); }); </script> <body>Hello world</body> </html>

NSQ

Socket.IO

"Hello world" code example

// Create reader
const nsq = require('nsqjs')

const reader = new nsq.Reader('sample_topic', 'test_channel', {
  lookupdHTTPAddresses: '127.0.0.1:4161'
})

reader.connect()

reader.on('message', msg => {
  console.log('Received message [%s]: %s', msg.id, msg.body.toString())
  msg.finish()
})

// Create writer
const nsq = require('nsqjs')
const w = new nsq.Writer('127.0.0.1', 55004)

w.connect()

w.on('ready', () => {
  w.publish('sample_topic', 'Test message')
})

w.on('closed', () => {
  console.log('Writer closed')
})

var app = require('express')();
var http = require('http').Server(app);
var io = require('socket.io')(http);

app.get('/', function(req, res) {
   res.sendfile('index.html');
});

//Broadcasting events
var clients = 0;
io.on('connection', function(socket) {
   clients++;
   io.sockets.emit('broadcast',{ description: clients + ' clients connected!'});
   socket.on('disconnect', function () {
      clients--;
      io.sockets.emit('broadcast',{ description: clients + ' clients connected!'});
   });
});

http.listen(3000, function() {
   console.log('listening on localhost:3000');
});

//Handling broadcast events on the client side
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
   <head>
      <title>Hello world</title>
   </head>
   <script src = "/socket.io/socket.io.js"></script>
   <script>
      var socket = io();
      socket.on('broadcast',function(data) {
         document.body.innerHTML = '';
         document.write(data.description);
      });
   </script>
   <body>Hello world</body>
</html>

	NSQ	Socket.IO
Realtime features
Pub/Sub messaging Pub/Sub is a design pattern that lets any number of publishers (producers) push messages to channels (also known as topics). Multiple subscribers (consumers) can subscribe to a channel to consume published messages. Explore Ably's pub/sub messaging implementation		Limited You can use the rooms feature to broadcast events to a subset of clients, but this applies exclusively to the server-side (i.e. clients don’t have access to the list of rooms it has joined). You can also use a Redis adapter to broadcast events to clients through the Redis pub/sub mechanism.
Message queues A message queue is a form of asynchronous service-to-service communication. Messages are stored on a queue until they are processed. Note that each message is only consumed by one subscriber (consumer). Explore Ably's message queues implementation
Presence Presence enables you to track the online and offline status of devices and end-users in real time and to store their state. Essential for chat apps and multiplayer games. Explore Ably's presence implementation
Message history Message history provides a means to retrieve previously published messages. For this to be possible, message data must be stored (persisted) somewhere. Explore Ably's message history implementation	Limited The --mem-queue-size can be increased and messages can be written to disk; however, this is mainly an in-memory messaging platform.
Connection state recovery (stream resume) In the case of unreliable network conditions, clients may suddenly disconnect.Connection state recovery ensures that when they reconnect, the data stream resumes exactly where it left off. Explore Ably' s connection state recovery implementation
Guaranteed message ordering Ordering ensures that messages are delivered to consumers in the same order that producers publish them. Explore Ably' s guaranteed message ordering implementation
Exactly-once semantics Exactly-once is a system-wide data integrity guarantee that ensures each message is delivered to consumers exactly-once. Explore Ably' s idempotent publishing implementation	Limited The only guarantee is that messages will be delivered at least once. However, it is possible to obtain idempotency with some client configuration.
Message delta compression Message delta compression enables you to only send the changes from the previous message to subscribers each time there’s an update, instead of the entire message. Useful for use cases where there is a significant degree of similarity between successive messages. Explore Ably' s message delta compression implementation
Native push notifications Native push notifications can be used to deliver messages even when clients are offline. Useful for geolocation updates or news alerts. Explore Ably's push notifications implementation
Webhooks Webhooks provide a mechanism to get messages and other types of events (such as clients entering or leaving channels) pushed to your servers over HTTP. Explore Ably's webhooks implementation
Serverless functions A serverless function is essentially an isolated, single-purpose piece of code that is only executed when it’ triggered by an event. For example, you can use serverless functions to send a welcome message to clients when they become present on chat channels. Note that serverless functions are usually fully managed by cloud vendors. Explore Ably's serverless functions implementation
Built-in integrations Which popular services & systems are NSQ and Socket.IO integrated with? Explore Ably's library of integrations	Webhooks Custom IFTTT Zapier Serverless functions AWS Lambda Cloudflare Workers Google Cloud Functions Microsoft Azure Functions Streaming Apache Kafka Apache Pulsar Amazon Kinesis Amazon SQS RabbitMQ AMQP	Webhooks Custom IFTTT Zapier Serverless functions AWS Lambda Cloudflare Workers Google Cloud Functions Microsoft Azure Functions Streaming Apache Kafka Apache Pulsar Amazon Kinesis Amazon SQS RabbitMQ AMQP
Known limits and constraints Find out practical limits, such as the maximum message size, or the maximum number of concurrent connections. Explore the practical limits of the Ably pub/sub messaging platform	Publisher throughput Unknown Maximum message size Unknown Maximum number of topics Unknown Maximum number of connections Unknown	Throughput Unknown Maximum message size Unknown, but the default is 1 MB Maximum number of topics N/A Maximum number of concurrent connections Unknown

Supported development platforms, languages, open protocols and cloud models
Development platforms & operating systems Which popular development platforms and operating systems do NSQ and Socket.IO support via official SDKs? Explore the development platforms supported by Ably	Android Java / JVM iOS macOS iPadOS tvOS watchOS Mono .NET	Android Java / JVM iOS macOS iPadOS tvOS watchOS Mono .NET
Languages Which popular programming languages do NSQ and Socket.IO support via offical SDKs? Explore the programming languages supported by Ably	JavaScript Node.js TypeScript Java Objective-C Swift Go PHP Python Ruby Flutter Clojure Scala	JavaScript Node.js TypeScript Java Objective-C Swift Go PHP Python Ruby Flutter Clojure Scala
Open protocols Which popular open protocols do NSQ and Socket.IO support? Explore the open protocols supported by Ably	WebSocket HTTP AMQP MQTT STOMP SSE Webhooks	WebSocket HTTP AMQP MQTT STOMP SSE Webhooks
Cloud models Which popular cloud models do NSQ and Socket.IO support?	Self-hosted Cloud-managed Serverless Globally-distributed	Self-hosted Cloud-managed Serverless Globally-distributed

Global and reliable edge service
Edge messaging network with latency-based routing Latency-based routing ensures that clients are always routed to the nearest datacenter and point of presence. Explore Ably's routing mechanism that mitigates network and DNS issues		N/A
Multi-region data replication (message durability) Multi-region data replication (storage) protects against single points of failure and ensures message data durability. Learn how Ably ensures message durability	Limited It is possible to set up redundant nsqd pairs that will receive the same portion of messages.	N/A
Uptime SLAs Here’s what the most common SLAs amount to in terms of downtime over a calendar year: 99.999% SLA = 5m 15s downtime per year 99.99% SLA = 52m 35s downtime per year 99.95% SLA = 4h 22m 58s downtime per year 99.9% SLA = 8h 45m 56s downtime per year 99% SLA = 3d 15h 39m 29s downtime per year Source: https://uptime.is/	N/A	N/A
Quality of Service What QoS guarantees do NSQ and Socket.IO provide natively? Explore Ably's availability and uptime guarantees for our pub/sub messaging platform	Multi-region data replication (storage) Exactly-once semantics Guaranteed message ordering Connection state recovery (stream resume)	Multi-region data replication (storage) Exactly-once semantics Guaranteed message ordering Connection state recovery (stream resume)

Security
API key authentication The simplest way to authenticate. Involves using private API keys that you can usually create and edit via a dashboard. Recommended to be used server-side, as private API keys shouldn’t be shared with untrusted parties. Explore Ably's implementation of API key authentication	N/A	N/A
Token-based authentication Which popular token-based authentication mechanisms do NSQ and Socket.IO support? Note that token-based authentication is usually the recommended strategy on the client-side as it provides more fine-grained access control and limits the risk of credentials being compromised. Explore Ably's implementation of token-based authentication	Ephemeral tokens JWTs	Ephemeral tokens JWTs
Configurable rules and permissions Which types of configurable rules and permissions do NSQ and Socket.IO support? Explore Ably's configurable rules and permissions	API keys rules and permissions Operation rules and permissions Admin rights	API keys rules and permissions Operation rules and permissions Admin rights
Message encryption Which types of message encryption do NSQ and Socket.IO support? Explore Ably's message encryption mechanisms	Encrypted at rest Encrypted in transit Message payload encryption	Encrypted at rest Encrypted in transit Message payload encryption
Formal certifications Which formal certifications are NSQ and Socket.IO compliant with? Explore Ably's security and compliance for our pub/sub messaging platform	SOC 2 TYPE I SOC 2 Type II HIPAA EU GDPR	SOC 2 TYPE I SOC 2 Type II HIPAA EU GDPR

Pricing & Support
Free package What do the free packages offered by NSQ and Socket.IO consist of? Explore Ably's free package for our pub/sub messaging platform	N/A	Socket.IO is a free & open-source solution.
Pricing model How are the NSQ and Socket.IO pricing models calculated? Explore Ably's pricing model for our pub/sub messaging platform	N/A	N/A
Enterprise package What benefits do the NSQ and Socket.IO enterprise packages offer? Explore Ably's enterprise package for our pub/sub messaging platform	N/A	N/A
Community Reviewed by 3+ independent developers Explore Ably's community support channel for our pub/sub messaging platform	3.50 / 5 Presence on multiple channels / 5 Size and activity / 5 “Nsqio nsq has 19k stars on GitHub. It's where the community resides. Historically the community has been active, but decreasing lately. There are a lot of unofficial SDKs for different languages and over 200 questions on StackOverflow. The latest version was released in August of 2019, therefore it seems like the project is merely being maintained, with no active feature development."	5 / 5 Presence on multiple channels / 5 Size and activity / 5 "Socket.IO is the most popular open-source WebSocket solution. It has a large and very active community. Client SDKs in several different languages? All of them community-made. Troubleshooting and support questions? The community will sort you out, almost always. As you’d expect, Stack Overflow and GitHub are very busy, with tens of thousands of questions, views, and responses about all things Socket.IO."
Support What types of support options and response times do NSQ and Socket.IO offer? Explore Ably's support options for our pub/sub messaging platform	N/A	General support options Technical documentation, Slack, Stack Overflow, GitHub. Enterprise support N/A Response time N/A

Disclaimer: The information presented for NSQ was last updated on 28 February 2021 and on 7 June 2024 for Socket.IO. It is possible that some details may now be out of date. If you think that’s the case, please let us know so we can update them. In any case, you should not rely solely on the information presented here and must check with each provider before deciding to integrate or buy any of these two solutions.

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