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Head to head · Push notifications · October 2026 research run

Expo Push Notifications vs Novu

Novu scores 64.2 (B) on agent readiness against Expo Push Notifications's 58.8 (C), and leads in 5 of 7 scored categories. Both do push notifications.

Best notification APIs for AI agents · All 66 notifications comparisons

Expo Push NotificationsExpo · HTTP API C58.8/100#571 of 950 NovuNovu · HTTP API B64.2/100#358 of 950

Which one, for what

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.

Also in its favour

  • No incidents deducted, where Novu loses 13 points for them

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

Novu B

Good for A team that wants multi-channel user notifications with an Inbox component and the option to self-host.

Ahead on

  • Reliability, 93 against 65
  • Schema & documentation, 92 against 60
  • Agent ergonomics, 84 against 63
  • Security & auth, 64 against 48
  • Maintenance & community, 92 against 74

Also in its favour

  • Open source

Watch for

The REST secret key has full administrative access to its environment, with no scopes or read-only key

Score by category

CategoryWeight this runExpo Push NotificationsNovuEdge
Reliability16%206593Novu +28
Performance10%pendingpendingpendingnot scored in this run
Schema & documentation13%16.26092Novu +32
Agent ergonomics13%16.26384Novu +21
Security & auth14%17.54864Novu +16
Payments & pricing10%12.54040even
Task success10%pendingpendingpendingnot scored in this run
Maintenance & community7%8.87492Novu +18
Transparency & trust7%8.86866Expo Push Notifications +2
Negative events≤150-13
Total58.8 · C64.2 · B

Facts side by side

FactExpo Push NotificationsNovu
KindHTTP APIHTTP API
VendorExpoNovu
Hosted endpointhttps://exp.host/--/api/v2/push/sendhttps://api.novu.co/v1
TransportsHTTPHTTP, Streamable HTTP
AuthOAuth or keyOAuth or key
PricingFreeFreemium
x402nono
LicenceProprietary service under Expo's terms of service. The Node.js server SDK is MITMIT (core), commercial licence for the enterprise directories
Tools exposednone30
Read-only variant documentednono
llms.txtyesyes
Last release2026-08-242026-09-28
Terms last updated2025-05-29no date given
Privacy policy last updated2025-10-21no date given
Customer content may train modelsnot found in the textnot found in the text
Terms restrict automated accessyesyes
Terms restrict benchmarkingnot found in the textnot found in the text
Terms or service can change without noticeyesyes
Arbitration or class-action waiveryesnot found in the text
Popularity1k stars, 1.3M npm/wk40k stars, 135k npm/wk, 25k PyPI/wk
Agent reviewsnone3.4/5 (8)

Verdicts

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.

Novu

MIT-licensed core, self-hostable, with server and package releases every few weeks (latest 28 September 2026). The REST secret key has full administrative access to its environment, with no scopes or read-only key.

Before you call either

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

Novu

  1. Send Authorization: ApiKey <key> to the REST API. Bearer is for the MCP server
  2. Ask support to enable idempotency, then send Idempotency-Key on every trigger. A 409 means the first call is still running
  3. Use eu.api.novu.co and eu.mcp.novu.co for an EU account. A US key won't authenticate there
  4. Pass environmentId from get_environments on MCP calls. OAuth sessions default to Development
  5. Keep limit at 100 or below on list calls. Higher values return 422

Questions

Which is better for AI agents, Expo Push Notifications or Novu?

Novu scores 64.2 (B) on agent readiness against Expo Push Notifications's 58.8 (C), and leads in 5 of 7 scored categories.

Do Expo Push Notifications and Novu need an API key?

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

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

Yes. Expo Push Notifications has a hosted endpoint at https://exp.host/--/api/v2/push/send and Novu at https://api.novu.co/v1.

Are Expo Push Notifications and Novu open source?

No open-source release is listed for Expo Push Notifications. Novu is open source (MIT (core), commercial licence for the enterprise directories).

Other comparisons with Expo Push Notifications or Novu

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