# Amazon SNS vs Expo Push Notifications

> Amazon SNS scores 72.8 (BB) to Expo Push Notifications's 58.8 (C) for push notifications. Prices, MCP, x402, uptime and agent notes side by side.

- Canonical: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/amazon-sns-vs-expo-push-notifications
- Markdown: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/amazon-sns-vs-expo-push-notifications.md (~2,600 tokens)
- Slim: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/amazon-sns-vs-expo-push-notifications.min.md (~680 tokens, same facts, less prose, for token-sensitive contexts)
- JSON: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/amazon-sns-vs-expo-push-notifications.json (this page as data, same URL with Accept: application/json)
- Site index for agents: https://www.anchorterminal.com/llms.txt (full text: https://www.anchorterminal.com/llms-full.txt)
- API: https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/index.json
- Updated: 2026-10-09

Amazon SNS scores 72.8 (BB) on agent readiness against Expo Push Notifications's 58.8 (C), and leads in 6 of 7 scored categories. Expo Push Notifications leads on payments & pricing. Both do push notifications.

- Amazon SNS: grade BB, 72.8/100, rank #99 of 950. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/amazon-sns.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/amazon-sns.json
- Expo Push Notifications: grade C, 58.8/100, rank #571 of 950. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/expo-push-notifications.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/expo-push-notifications.json
- Best notification APIs for AI agents: https://www.anchorterminal.com/best/notifications/index.md
- All 66 notifications comparisons: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/notifications/index.md

## Which one, for what

### Amazon SNS (BB)

Good for: Teams already on AWS that want cheap push, SMS and plain-text email alerts or fan-out to queues and functions under IAM and CloudTrail.

Ahead on:
- Reliability, 75 against 65
- Schema & documentation, 83 against 60
- Security & auth, 89 against 48
- Transparency & trust, 83 against 68

Also in its favour:
- Agent-ready, a grade of BB or better

Watch for: No idempotency token on `Publish` to a standard topic. Only FIFO topics deduplicate, over a five-minute window

### Expo Push Notifications (C)

Good for: An agent that must push to an app already built with Expo, at no cost and with one call for both platforms.

Ahead on:
- Payments & pricing, 40 against 35

Watch for: The send API needs no authentication by default, so anyone holding a push token can send to that device until the owner enables access tokens


## Score by category

| Category | Weight | Amazon SNS | Expo Push Notifications | Edge |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Reliability | 16% (20 this run) | 75 | 65 | Amazon SNS +10 |
| Performance | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Schema & documentation | 13% (16.2 this run) | 83 | 60 | Amazon SNS +23 |
| Agent ergonomics | 13% (16.2 this run) | 65 | 63 | Amazon SNS +2 |
| Security & auth | 14% (17.5 this run) | 89 | 48 | Amazon SNS +41 |
| Payments & pricing | 10% (12.5 this run) | 35 | 40 | Expo Push Notifications +5 |
| Task success | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Maintenance & community | 7% (8.8 this run) | 75 | 74 | Amazon SNS +1 |
| Transparency & trust | 7% (8.8 this run) | 83 | 68 | Amazon SNS +15 |
| Negative events | ≤15 | 0 | 0 | |
| **Total** | | **72.8 · BB** | **58.8 · C** | |

## Facts side by side

| Fact | Amazon SNS | Expo Push Notifications |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Kind | HTTP API | HTTP API |
| Vendor | Amazon Web Services | Expo |
| Hosted endpoint | `https://sns.us-east-1.amazonaws.com` | `https://exp.host/--/api/v2/push/send` |
| Transports | HTTP | HTTP |
| Auth | OAuth or key | OAuth or key |
| Pricing | Pay per use | Free |
| Price for push notifications | $0. per message | free |
| x402 | no | no |
| Licence | Proprietary service under the AWS Customer Agreement. The AWS SDKs and the AWS Labs MCP server are Apache-2.0 | Proprietary service under Expo's terms of service. The Node.js server SDK is MIT |
| Read-only variant documented | no | no |
| llms.txt | yes | yes |
| Last release | 2026-10-06 | 2026-08-24 |
| Terms last updated | 2026-08-14 | 2025-05-29 |
| Privacy policy last updated | 2026-05-18 | 2025-10-21 |
| Customer content may train models | not found in the text | not found in the text |
| Terms restrict automated access | not found in the text | yes |
| Terms restrict benchmarking | not found in the text | not found in the text |
| Terms or service can change without notice | not found in the text | yes |
| Arbitration or class-action waiver | yes | yes |
| Popularity | 6.5M npm/wk | 1k stars, 1.3M npm/wk |

## Verdicts

**Amazon SNS.** IAM and topic policies limit a credential to single actions and topics, a read-only managed policy exists, and CloudTrail can log each publish. Standard topics take no idempotency token, so a retried `Publish` can send twice. SNS has no user preferences, digests or in-app channel, email is plain text to confirmed subscribers, and SMS starts in a sandbox.

**Expo Push Notifications.** A free push relay with a small, well documented HTTP API, published limits of 600 notifications a second and written error codes. Sending needs no credential unless the owner turns on access tokens, there is no idempotency key or SLA, and the status page records three iOS push incidents since 4 August 2026.

## Before you call either

### Amazon SNS

1. Sign requests with SigV4 for service `sns` at `sns.<region>.amazonaws.com`, or call `aws sns publish --topic-arn <arn> --message <text>` from the AWS CLI
2. Track `MessageId` yourself on standard topics, because a retried `Publish` sends again. Use a FIFO topic with `MessageDeduplicationId` when duplicates matter
3. Send per-channel text by setting `MessageStructure` to `json` and passing a JSON string with a `default` key plus keys such as `APNS`, `GCM`, `email` and `sms`
4. Check `GetSMSSandboxAccountStatus` and the monthly spend quota before texting. Sandbox sends reach only verified numbers
5. Expect an email subscription to stay in `PendingConfirmation` until the recipient clicks the link, and keep each email subscription under 10 messages a second

### Expo Push Notifications

1. Send an array of up to 100 messages per request, all for one project, and stay under 600 notifications a second
2. Keep each ticket `id` and POST them to `/--/api/v2/push/getReceipts` about 15 minutes later. Receipts are cleared after 24 hours
3. Stop sending to a token when a ticket or receipt returns `DeviceNotRegistered`
4. If the project has enhanced push security on, send `Authorization: Bearer <access token>` or the call fails with `UNAUTHORIZED`
5. Retry 429 and 5xx with exponential backoff, and expect an occasional duplicate because there is no idempotency key

## Questions

### Which is better for AI agents, Amazon SNS or Expo Push Notifications?

Amazon SNS scores 72.8 (BB) on agent readiness against Expo Push Notifications's 58.8 (C), and leads in 6 of 7 scored categories. Expo Push Notifications leads on payments & pricing.

### Which is cheaper for push notifications, Amazon SNS or Expo Push Notifications?

Expo Push Notifications, at free against $0. per message for Amazon SNS. These are the vendors' published prices for the job.

### Do Amazon SNS and Expo Push Notifications need an API key?

Both take an API key or an OAuth sign-in.

### Can an agent call Amazon SNS and Expo Push Notifications without installing anything?

Yes. Amazon SNS has a hosted endpoint at https://sns.us-east-1.amazonaws.com and Expo Push Notifications at https://exp.host/--/api/v2/push/send.


## For agents

- This comparison as JSON: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/amazon-sns-vs-expo-push-notifications.json, and with the fewest tokens: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/amazon-sns-vs-expo-push-notifications.min.md
- Over MCP at https://www.anchorterminal.com/mcp (no key): `compare_tools {"a": "amazon-sns", "b": "expo-push-notifications"}`. From a terminal: `anchor compare amazon-sns expo-push-notifications`
- Each listing in full: https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/amazon-sns.json and https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/expo-push-notifications.json

## Other comparisons with Amazon SNS or Expo Push Notifications

- [Amazon SNS vs Courier](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/amazon-sns-vs-courier.md)
- [Amazon SNS vs Firebase Cloud Messaging](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/amazon-sns-vs-firebase-cloud-messaging.md)
- [Amazon SNS vs Knock](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/amazon-sns-vs-knock.md)
- [Amazon SNS vs MagicBell](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/amazon-sns-vs-magicbell.md)
- [Amazon SNS vs Novu](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/amazon-sns-vs-novu.md)
- [Amazon SNS vs ntfy](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/amazon-sns-vs-ntfy.md)
- [Amazon SNS vs OneSignal](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/amazon-sns-vs-onesignal.md)
- [Amazon SNS vs Pingram](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/amazon-sns-vs-pingram.md)
- [Amazon SNS vs Pushover](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/amazon-sns-vs-pushover.md)
- [Amazon SNS vs SuprSend](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/amazon-sns-vs-suprsend.md)
- [Courier vs Expo Push Notifications](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/courier-vs-expo-push-notifications.md)
- [Expo Push Notifications vs Firebase Cloud Messaging](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/expo-push-notifications-vs-firebase-cloud-messaging.md)
- [Expo Push Notifications vs Knock](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/expo-push-notifications-vs-knock.md)
- [Expo Push Notifications vs MagicBell](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/expo-push-notifications-vs-magicbell.md)
- [Expo Push Notifications vs Novu](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/expo-push-notifications-vs-novu.md)
- [Expo Push Notifications vs ntfy](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/expo-push-notifications-vs-ntfy.md)
- [Expo Push Notifications vs OneSignal](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/expo-push-notifications-vs-onesignal.md)
- [Expo Push Notifications vs Pingram](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/expo-push-notifications-vs-pingram.md)
- [Expo Push Notifications vs Pushover](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/expo-push-notifications-vs-pushover.md)
- [Expo Push Notifications vs SuprSend](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/expo-push-notifications-vs-suprsend.md)