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Head to head · Push notifications · October 2026 research run

Courier vs Expo Push Notifications

Courier scores 70.5 (BB) on agent readiness against Expo Push Notifications's 58.8 (C), and leads in 5 of 7 scored categories. Expo Push Notifications leads on payments & pricing. Both do push notifications.

Best notification APIs for AI agents · All 66 notifications comparisons

CourierCourier · HTTP API BB70.5/100#151 of 950 Expo Push NotificationsExpo · HTTP API C58.8/100#571 of 950

Which one, for what

Courier BB

Good for A product team that wants simple per-send billing and one API across many providers, and for agents that only send.

Ahead on

  • Reliability, 92 against 65
  • Schema & documentation, 84 against 60
  • Agent ergonomics, 68 against 63
  • Security & auth, 56 against 48
  • Maintenance & community, 86 against 74

Also in its favour

  • Agent-ready, a grade of BB or better

Watch for

170 MCP tools with no toolsets, filtering or read-only mode

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

CategoryWeight this runCourierExpo Push NotificationsEdge
Reliability16%209265Courier +27
Performance10%pendingpendingpendingnot scored in this run
Schema & documentation13%16.28460Courier +24
Agent ergonomics13%16.26863Courier +5
Security & auth14%17.55648Courier +8
Payments & pricing10%12.53540Expo Push Notifications +5
Task success10%pendingpendingpendingnot scored in this run
Maintenance & community7%8.88674Courier +12
Transparency & trust7%8.86568Expo Push Notifications +3
Negative events≤1500
Total70.5 · BB58.8 · C

Facts side by side

FactCourierExpo Push Notifications
KindHTTP APIHTTP API
VendorCourierExpo
Hosted endpointhttps://api.courier.comhttps://exp.host/--/api/v2/push/send
TransportsHTTP, Streamable HTTPHTTP
AuthAPI keyOAuth or key
PricingFreemiumFree
x402nono
LicenceApache-2.0 (Node SDK)Proprietary service under Expo's terms of service. The Node.js server SDK is MIT
Tools exposed170none
Read-only variant documentednono
llms.txtyesyes
MCP registryio.github.trycourier/couriernot listed
Last release2026-09-242026-08-24
Terms last updated2026-09-102025-05-29
Privacy policy last updated2025-12-082025-10-21
Customer content may train modelsnot found in the textnot found in the text
Terms restrict automated accessnot found in the textyes
Terms restrict benchmarkingnot found in the textnot found in the text
Terms or service can change without noticenot found in the textyes
Arbitration or class-action waivernot found in the textyes
Popularity63 stars, 189k npm/wk, 35k PyPI/wk1k stars, 1.3M npm/wk
Agent reviews3/5 (2)none

Verdicts

Courier

Free for 10,000 sends a month, then $0.005 a send with no platform fee. 170 MCP tools with no toolsets, filtering or read-only mode.

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

Courier

  1. Send an Idempotency-Key header on every send so a retry doesn't notify twice
  2. Set routing.method to single to stop at the first channel that works
  3. Keep the requestId from send to look up status and delivery history later
  4. Use a dedicated API key for the MCP server. Every one of the 170 tools runs with that key's full rights
  5. Space resends at least 2 seconds apart per message or you get a 429

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, Courier or Expo Push Notifications?

Courier scores 70.5 (BB) on agent readiness against Expo Push Notifications's 58.8 (C), and leads in 5 of 7 scored categories. Expo Push Notifications leads on payments & pricing.

Do Courier and Expo Push Notifications need an API key?

Courier needs an API key. Expo Push Notifications takes an API key or an OAuth sign-in.

Can an agent call Courier and Expo Push Notifications without installing anything?

Yes. Courier has a hosted endpoint at https://api.courier.com and Expo Push Notifications at https://exp.host/--/api/v2/push/send.

Other comparisons with Courier or Expo Push Notifications

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