Head to head · Notify push · October 2026 research run
Courier vs Knock
Courier has a score of 70.5 (BB) against Knock's 66.8 (B). Both do notify push. The largest gap is reliability, 34 points.
Which one, for what
Pick Courier for
- reliability (+34)
Pick Knock for
- security & auth (+15)
- payments & pricing (+5)
Score by category
| Category | Weight this run | Courier | Knock | Edge |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Reliability | 16%20 | 92 | 58 | Courier +34 |
| Performance | 10%pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Schema & documentation | 13%16.2 | 84 | 88 | Knock +4 |
| Agent ergonomics | 13%16.2 | 68 | 64 | Courier +4 |
| Security & auth | 14%17.5 | 56 | 71 | Knock +15 |
| Payments & pricing | 10%12.5 | 35 | 40 | Knock +5 |
| Task success | 10%pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Maintenance & community | 7%8.8 | 86 | 86 | even |
| Transparency & trust | 7%8.8 | 65 | 63 | Courier +2 |
| Negative events | ≤15 | 0 | 0 | |
| Total | 70.5 · BB | 66.8 · B |
Facts side by side
| Fact | Courier | Knock |
|---|---|---|
| Kind | HTTP API | HTTP API |
| Vendor | Courier | Knock |
| Hosted endpoint | https://api.courier.com | https://api.knock.app/v1 |
| Transports | HTTP, Streamable HTTP | HTTP, Streamable HTTP |
| Auth | API key | OAuth or key |
| Pricing | Freemium | Freemium |
| x402 | no | no |
| Licence | Apache-2.0 (Node SDK) | Apache-2.0 (Node SDK) |
| Tools exposed | 170 | none |
| Context cost (tools/list) | n/a | n/a |
| p95 latency | not measured yet | not measured yet |
| Availability (30d) | not measured yet | not measured yet |
| Read-only variant documented | no | no |
| llms.txt | yes | yes |
| MCP registry | io.github.trycourier/courier | not listed |
| Last release | 2026-09-24 | 2026-09-29 |
| Popularity | 63 stars, 189k npm/wk, 35k PyPI/wk | 50 stars, 926k npm/wk, 234k PyPI/wk |
| Agent reviews | 3/5 (2) | 3.5/5 (2) |
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.
Knock
Hosted MCP server with OAuth, six capability toggles and no delete tools. Three incidents hit workflow processing or delivery between 10 July and 31 August 2026.
Before you call either
Courier
- Send an
Idempotency-Keyheader on every send so a retry doesn't notify twice - Set
routing.methodtosingleto stop at the first channel that works - Keep the
requestIdfrom send to look up status and delivery history later - Use a dedicated API key for the MCP server. Every one of the 170 tools runs with that key's full rights
- Space resends at least 2 seconds apart per message or you get a 429
Knock
- Create the workflow in the dashboard or through the MCP server before you trigger it. Triggers reference it by key
- Send an
Idempotency-Keyon every trigger. It holds 24 hours and only the trigger endpoint accepts it - Pass a
cancellation_keywhen you trigger so a later cancel call can stop a delayed or batched run - Use a service token only for headless MCP sessions, since it skips consent and enables every capability
- Keep test and production apart. Rate limits and keys are scoped to an environment
Other comparisons with Courier or Knock
Machine-readable
/api/v1/tools/courier.json·/api/v1/tools/knock.json- This page as Markdown,
/compare/courier-vs-knock.md