Azure SignalR pricing: What you need to know

Azure SignalR operates on a consumption-based pricing model, with costs scaling based on the number of messages and concurrent connections you use. Their paid plans offer up to 1 million messages free per day, with additional costs beyond that, a concurrent connections cap, and a daily service charge. Here’s a detailed breakdown of Azure SignalR’s pricing features, and the cost-optimization features that could lead to a better deal for your data:

Azure SignalR does offer generous limits on units and concurrent connections in their paid plans, and could be an option for those looking to stay within the Microsoft ecosystem, but it does come with a few downsides worth mentioning:

• Low free plan limits: The free plan only allows for 20 concurrent connections, which limits proof of concept flexibility before opting for a paid plan.

• Daily service charge: The service charge on top of the consumption costs can be off putting, especially when many of the reliability services needed for realtime infrastructure (e.g. autoscaling) are only available on the Premium plan, which comes with an elevated service charge.

In addition to this, the fact that critical infrastructural features like geo replication and managed auto scaling are only available on the Premium plan may be a turn off for those specifically seeking a highly-reliable and affordable solution. Azure SignalR still requires a fair amount of setup and configuration to get things up and running. While Microsoft handles hosting, scalability, and load balancing automatically, developers are still responsible for integrating SignalR into their applications—this includes setting up hubs, managing client connections, and implementing messaging patterns. Authentication, authorization, and handling connection events also require manual setup, making it more of a DIY solution than a truly plug-and-play experience.

Alternatives to Azure SignalR for realtime experiences

There are lots of alternatives to Azure SignalR for building realtime experiences, including Pusher, Firebase, and Microsoft Azure Web PubSub. Their strengths depend on your specific use case. Only one or two providers offer top reliability and scalability, however. If you’re looking for something that gives you more precise control over costs and provides highly fault-tolerant infrastructure, it’s worth exploring Ably.

Ably offers some unique advantages that set it apart:

• Cost control: With usage-based billing, Ably makes sure you only pay for what you use. This is especially helpful if your traffic tends to fluctuate—no surprises on your bill.

• Cost optimization features: Ably’s server-side batching and message compression means that you can lower costs on data delivery, saving you even more on your usage bill.

• Multi-region high availability: Ably’s global infrastructure is designed to keep things running even if there’s an issue in one region. That’s a big step up from single-region setups.

• Granular control over QoS: Need messages delivered in a specific order or with a certain level of reliability? Ably’s got you covered.

• Volume discounts: The more you use the platform, the lower your unit costs become, which keeps Ably affordable, even at extreme scale. 

• High scalability & availability: Built and battle-tested to handle millions of concurrent connections at scale. 

Sign up for a free account today to explore Ably’s features, and visit our pricing page to get a sense of how affordable we can be for you.