Comparing Pusher and Ably?

Why customers choose Ably over Pusher

Ably delivers dependable, enterprise-grade realtime messaging - designed to scale, with guaranteed message delivery and best-in-class support. Join the engineering teams who’ve outgrown Pusher and need infrastructure they can trust.

Trusted by brands serious about realtime

Power realtime experiences with confidence

We power more WebSocket connections than any other pub/sub platform, serving over two billion devices monthly. Brands like DialPad, Kraken and HubSpot trust us to power their critical applications - reliably, securely and at serious scale.

<50ms

median roundtrip latency

1B+

connections per month

100%

uptime over 5 years

Why engineering teams choose Ably over Pusher

Unmatched reliability – no more outages

100% uptime over the past 5 years! Backed by a globally distributed, multi-region network with no single point of failure.

Scale without stress

Whether you’re supporting thousands or millions of concurrent connections, Ably delivers - handling over 2T+ API operations and 2B+ connected devices per month.

Award-winning support

Ably’s white-glove service includes unlimited architectural consultations, 24/7 mission-critical support with real engineers and a premium SLA with 99.999% uptime guarantees.

Enterprise-grade features built to scale

Get unmatched expertise paired with a host of value-adding options to keep your business-critical applications running at optimal performance. Built for realtime at scale — not just MVPs.

Actively invested, constantly shipping

We’re investing heavily in the platform, launching new products and features, shipping improvements, and giving developers the tools they need to move faster. We’re independent, developer-first, and built for the long haul.

Predictable, scalable pricing

Ably offers a choice of per minute usage-based billing and MAU pricing models, with a host of features designed to optimize your costs. No surprises on your bill. Just scale aligned with your growth.

Highly rated on G2

Ably earns top G2 reviews for its reliable realtime infrastructure, developer-friendly SDKs and customer support.

G2 Best Requirements Winter 2025G2 Best Support Winter 2025G2 High Performer Winter 2025G2 Users Most Likely to Recommend Winter 2025
Ably Advantages vs. Pusher new
Global infrastructureAbly

Yes

Distributed network with 700+ PoPs across 11 regions

Pusher

No

Proven scalabilityAbly

Yes

  • Supports 2B+ connected devices
  • 1.5B+ connections opened daily
  • 2T+ API operations per month.
Pusher

No

No scalability metrics published.

Low latencyAbly

Yes

  • <36ms median roundtrip latency
Pusher

No

Latencies typically 90–200 ms (often higher outside US/EU) due to a centralized hub architecture with limited regional clusters.

100% uptimeAbly

Yes

100% uptime for over 5 years

Pusher

No

Multiple outages reported.

Message reliabilityAbly

Yes

Guaranteed message delivery - exactly once and in order

Pusher

No

No message delivery guarantees; messages may be lost during disconnections.

Protocol adaptersAbly

Yes

Supports multiple protocols including PubNub, MQTT, and SSE.

Pusher

No

HistoryAbly

Yes

Pusher

No

PresenceAbly

Yes

Pusher

Yes

Chat capabilitiesAbly

Yes

Ably Chat supports 1:1 and group messaging, with APIs for edit & delete, message and room reactions, moderation, typing indicators, and more.

Learn more about Ably Chat
Pusher

No

Pusher has channels which enable read receipts, but no SDK, reactions, or read-receipts built in.

Read more
Serverless functionsAbly
  • AWS Lambda
  • Microsoft Azure Functions
  • Cloudflare Workers
  • Google Cloud Functions
Pusher
  • Limited integrations; lacks native support for event streaming platforms
Security & complianceAbly
  • SOC 2 Type II
  • ISO 27001
  • HIPAA
  • EU GDPR
  • EU and US-only data storage options
Pusher
  • ISO27001
  • HIPAA
  • EU GDPR
PricingAbly

Choice of per-minute billing or MAU pricing.

Pusher

Peak message and connection bundles.

Cost optimizationAbly

Yes

  • Server-side batching
  • Delta compression
  • Batch push notifications
  • Ephemeral messages
Pusher

No

Seamless migration – zero code changes required

  • Swap endpoints, keep your client code
  • Run Pusher and Ably in parallel during migration
  • No need for rewrites or retraining
JavaScript

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8


const pusher = new Pusher('appId.keyId', {
  wsHost: 'realtime-pusher.ably.io',
  httpHost: 'realtime-pusher.ably.io',
  disableStats: true,
  forceTls: true,
  cluster: 'eu'
});

Ready to upgrade your realtime stack?

Light style