OneSignal vs Pushwoosh
An independent, review-free comparison compiled by the SaaSTracker editorial team. Both products are profiled in full, and neither can pay for placement here.
Still shortlisting? Browse the best in Notification Infrastructure for every option we track, with award winners called out.
The short answer
Both sides assessedOneSignal compared with Pushwoosh
Pushwoosh is the closest push-first alternative, free only up to 1,000 MAU but then $7 per 1,000 MAU on its push-only offer or $13 on Omnichannel, with RFM segmentation, unlimited journeys, a year of event history, and Huawei and Amazon delivery on every plan; OneSignal keeps the more generous free push tier, while Pushwoosh gives more segmentation and journey depth per dollar once you pay.
Pushwoosh compared with OneSignal
OneSignal is the default free push tool, with unlimited mobile push on its free plan and a Growth plan from $19 a month plus usage. Pushwoosh's free tier is smaller at 1,000 MAU, but its paid plans include RFM segmentation, unlimited journeys, a year of event history, and Huawei and Amazon delivery on every plan. Pick OneSignal for the most generous free push; pick Pushwoosh when segmentation and journey depth matter and you want one per-MAU price with nothing gated.
Choose OneSignal if
Consumer mobile apps, marketplaces, media sites, and web publishers whose primary channel is push notifications, especially teams that want serious push infrastructure and a workable email and in-app layer for free or for tens of dollars a month rather than hundreds.
Choose Pushwoosh if
Consumer mobile apps and content or ecommerce websites (games, media, delivery, fintech, subscription apps) that want mobile and web push, in-app messages, and lifecycle journeys on one predictable per-MAU bill, with a genuinely usable free tier up to 1,000 monthly active users.
Side by side
17 attributes| Attribute | OneSignal | Pushwoosh |
|---|---|---|
| Category | Notifications | Notifications |
| Starting price | $0 (Free), then $19 per month plus usage (Growth) | $0 up to 1,000 MAU, then $7 per 1,000 MAU (Push only, limited offer) or $13 per 1,000 MAU (Omnichannel) |
| Pricing model | Per-channel usage metering rather than a single contact-count meter: mobile push billed per monthly active user, web push per subscriber, email per thousand sends, with a small platform fee on Growth and quoted annual contracts above it. | Pay-as-you-go, metered on monthly active users (anyone messaged on any channel in the month, deduplicated by user ID). Free up to 1,000 MAU. Three self-serve plans differ only by channel: Push only, Omnichannel, and Email only. No feature gating between plans. Custom plan once the estimated bill exceeds $3,000 a month. No annual toggle is published. |
| Free plan | Unlimited mobile push sends, web push up to 10,000 subscribers per send, 10,000 email sends per month, and one active in-app message, with no expiry. | Free while the project stays within 1,000 monthly active users, with every feature included and no credit card required. |
| Free trial | No fixed trial; the permanently free plan is the evaluation path | No |
| Best for | Consumer mobile apps, marketplaces, media sites, and web publishers whose primary channel is push notifications, especially teams that want serious push infrastructure and a workable email and in-app layer for free or for tens of dollars a month rather than hundreds. | Consumer mobile apps and content or ecommerce websites (games, media, delivery, fintech, subscription apps) that want mobile and web push, in-app messages, and lifecycle journeys on one predictable per-MAU bill, with a genuinely usable free tier up to 1,000 monthly active users. |
| Setup time | Under an hour for web push (a script tag) and a few hours for a mobile app, most of which is spent on APNs certificates and Firebase configuration rather than on OneSignal itself. Journeys can be running the same day. | The vendor says the SDK integrates in about 15 minutes and a typical production rollout, including importing users and gathering push subscribers, takes 2 to 10 days. Web push can go live with a snippet, npm package, or Google Tag Manager plus a hosted service worker. |
| Learning curve | Low for push and in-app, moderate for Journeys. The tag model is easy to grasp but easy to abuse, and teams who tag indiscriminately end up with segmentation logic nobody can audit six months later. Agree a tag naming convention before you start. | Moderate. Sending a campaign is quick, but the Customer Journey Builder, RFM segments, Liquid templates, and event taxonomy take a few weeks to use well. Marketers can run most of it without code once developers have instrumented events. |
| Platforms | Web app, Android SDK, iOS SDK, Flutter, React Native, Expo, Unity, Web push script, REST API | iOS, Android (FCM, Huawei HMS, Amazon ADM), Web push (Chrome, Safari, Firefox, Edge, Opera, Samsung Internet), iOS and iPadOS PWAs (Safari 16.4+), Flutter, React Native, Unity, Cordova, Expo, MAUI .NET, OutSystems SDKs, Web dashboard |
| Compliance | SOC 2, GDPR, CCPA | ISO 27001:2022, SOC 2 Type 2, HIPAA, GDPR and ePrivacy, EU-U.S. Data Privacy Framework (with UK extension and Swiss DPF) |
| Founded | 2014 | 2014 |
| Headquarters | San Mateo, California, United States | Fairfax, Virginia, United States (contact address in the website privacy policy); fully distributed team |
| Ownership | Venture-backed | Not disclosed on the vendor site |
| Free tier volume | Unlimited mobile push sends, 10,000 web push subscribers and 10,000 email sends per month | Up to 1,000 monthly active users, all features, no card |
| First paid tier | $19 per month (Growth) plus per-channel usage | $7 per 1,000 MAU (Push only, limited offer); $13 per 1,000 MAU (Omnichannel) |
| Pricing shape | Metered per channel by audience size rather than by total sends | Pay-as-you-go per monthly active user, unlimited push and in-app; no annual option published |
| Self-hosting | Not offered; managed cloud only | Not self-serve; private cloud and on-premise options through enterprise sales |
Strengths and limitations
OneSignal
Strengths
- The best push implementation in this category by a wide margin, covering mobile, web, rich media, per-platform payload control, confirmed delivery reporting, and iOS Live Activities.
- A permanently free plan with unlimited mobile push, which removes the budget conversation entirely for early-stage consumer apps.
- Per-channel usage metering means a big dormant contact database costs nothing, the opposite of profile-based platforms where dead contacts are billable.
- First-party SDKs for Android, iOS, Flutter, React Native, Expo, and Unity that handle the permission and certificate plumbing teams usually get wrong.
Limitations
- SMS and RCS are locked behind an annual quoted Professional contract, so the cheapest self-serve path to SMS is a different vendor entirely.
- Segmentation is tag, session, and device based rather than a full behavioral event store, so sequence-dependent targeting is harder here than in Customer.io or Vero.
- No native account or company object, which makes B2B SaaS lifecycle logic awkward and rules the platform out for anyone whose messaging is organization-shaped.
- Email is a competent secondary channel, not a strong one; template tooling and list management are thinner than in email-first products.
Pushwoosh
Strengths
- One transparent meter (monthly active users) with no feature gating: journeys, segmentation, A/B testing, analytics, API, and the AI copilot are on every plan, including the free one.
- Broad device reach from a single integration, including Huawei HMS and Amazon ADM alongside APNs and FCM, plus web push on every major browser and iOS PWAs.
- Deep segmentation for this price range: real-time behavioral segments, RFM, geo targeting, and one year of event history by default.
- A REST API with dashboard parity, event streaming out, inbound webhooks in, and a hosted MCP server for AI agents.
Limitations
- Marketing-oriented rather than developer-first: there is no published equivalent of the embeddable in-app notification feed and user preference centre that define Knock, Novu, or Courier.
- No annual billing option is published, and the $7 push-only rate is a time-limited offer.
- SMS and WhatsApp are billed by providers on top of the plan, so the true Omnichannel cost depends on channel mix.
- The free tier stops at 1,000 MAU, far below OneSignal's free mobile push allowance.
Pricing compared
OneSignal
Per-channel usage metering rather than a single contact-count meter: mobile push billed per monthly active user, web push per subscriber, email per thousand sends, with a small platform fee on Growth and quoted annual contracts above it.
- Free$0
- Growth$19
- ProfessionalCustom
- EnterpriseCustom
Judged per dollar, OneSignal is the cheapest serious multi-channel platform a small company can buy, and by some distance. Unlimited mobile push at $0 is not a loss leader trick, it is the product, and Growth at $19 plus a per-MAU rate keeps a 5,000-user app under $100 a month with email, in-app, and Journeys included. What you are not buying is a data platform: segmentation is tag and session based rather than a real behavioral event store, there is no account model, and email is a channel rather than a deliverability practice. The value is exceptional if push is your primary channel and merely fine if it is your third.
Pushwoosh
Pay-as-you-go, metered on monthly active users (anyone messaged on any channel in the month, deduplicated by user ID). Free up to 1,000 MAU. Three self-serve plans differ only by channel: Push only, Omnichannel, and Email only. No feature gating between plans. Custom plan once the estimated bill exceeds $3,000 a month. No annual toggle is published.
- Free$0
- Push only$7
- Omnichannel$13
- Email only$5
- CustomCustom
For consumer apps, Pushwoosh is strong value. The free tier is small at 1,000 MAU but complete, and the per-MAU price includes journeys, RFM segmentation, a year of event history, and the API, which competitors often reserve for higher tiers. At 10,000 MAU the push-only plan is $63 a month and Omnichannel is roughly twice that, which undercuts most engagement suites. The value weakens in two places: when SMS and WhatsApp volume matters, because those costs sit outside the plan, and for B2B SaaS teams whose real need is an in-product notification feed and preference centre, where a developer-first router gives more for the money.
Editorial verdict on each
OneSignal
OneSignal is the correct first choice for any small company whose primary channel is push. Nothing else in this category gives away unlimited mobile push, and nothing else handles APNs, FCM, web push, and Live Activities with this much per-platform care. Growth at $19 plus $0.012 per monthly active user keeps a real consumer app under $100 a month with Journeys, in-app messaging, and email included, and the per-channel meter means a large dormant install base costs you nothing. The limits are equally clear: segmentation is tags and sessions rather than a behavioral event store, there is no account model for B2B, email is adequate rather than good, and SMS demands an annual quoted contract. Buy it for push, keep it for in-app and email, and pair it with something else if your lifecycle logic is really about product events or company records.
Read the full OneSignal profilePushwoosh
Pushwoosh is a mature, reasonably priced choice for consumer apps and websites that want push at the center of their lifecycle messaging. Its best qualities are the single MAU meter with nothing gated, delivery reach that includes Huawei and Amazon devices, and segmentation depth (RFM, real-time behavior, a year of event history) that usually costs more elsewhere. At 10,000 monthly active users the push-only plan is $63 a month, and even Omnichannel is modest by engagement-suite standards. Know what it is not: it is not a developer-first notification router with an embeddable feed and preference centre for a SaaS product, there is no annual pricing, the $7 rate is a limited-time offer, and SMS and WhatsApp costs sit outside the plan. Start on the free tier, lock the push-only rate before December 31 if push is your main channel, and look to Knock, Novu, or Courier instead if your notifications live inside a B2B product.
Read the full Pushwoosh profileOneSignal profile last reviewed 2026-09-07; Pushwoosh last reviewed 2026-09-27. Pricing is compiled from public sources and can change without notice. See our methodology.
The best in Notification Infrastructure
9 trackedNotification infrastructure platforms sit between an application and its delivery providers, turning one API call into orchestrated in-app, email, push, SMS, and chat notifications with batching, digests, preference centres, and per-tenant routing, so product teams stop rebuilding that logic in application code.
Batching, preference centres, and multi-tenancy are first-class rather than roadmap items, and workflows-as-code with environments and rollback makes a notification change a normal deploy.
$30 a month for 30,000 workflow runs, or nothing at all self-hosted, against a category whose next cheapest real plan is $110 and whose leader jumps from free to $250.
Founded in 2022 on roughly $1M, SuprSend shipped nine channels on the free tier, CLI environment promotion, an MCP server, and an Agent SDK while larger rivals were still writing about them.
The delivery planner turns cross-channel escalation into configuration: try in-app, fall back to email only if it goes unread, set as a rule rather than written as application code.
A visual designer that previews every channel on one canvas, and a bill that is $0.005 a send with no seats or channel fees, let a non-developer own the message end to end.
Frequently asked questions
6 questionsWhat is the difference between OneSignal and Pushwoosh?
Pushwoosh is the closest push-first alternative, free only up to 1,000 MAU but then $7 per 1,000 MAU on its push-only offer or $13 on Omnichannel, with RFM segmentation, unlimited journeys, a year of event history, and Huawei and Amazon delivery on every plan; OneSignal keeps the more generous free push tier, while Pushwoosh gives more segmentation and journey depth per dollar once you pay.
Is OneSignal or Pushwoosh cheaper?
OneSignal starts at $0 (Free), then $19 per month plus usage (Growth). Pushwoosh starts at $0 up to 1,000 MAU, then $7 per 1,000 MAU (Push only, limited offer) or $13 per 1,000 MAU (Omnichannel). The billing models differ, so the entry price is rarely the whole cost. OneSignal pricing model: Per-channel usage metering rather than a single contact-count meter: mobile push billed per monthly active user, web push per subscriber, email per thousand sends, with a small platform fee on Growth and quoted annual contracts above it. Pushwoosh pricing model: Pay-as-you-go, metered on monthly active users (anyone messaged on any channel in the month, deduplicated by user ID). Free up to 1,000 MAU. Three self-serve plans differ only by channel: Push only, Omnichannel, and Email only.
Does OneSignal or Pushwoosh have a free plan?
OneSignal has a free plan. Unlimited mobile push sends, web push up to 10,000 subscribers per send, 10,000 email sends per month, and one active in-app message, with no expiry. Trial terms: No fixed trial; the permanently free plan is the evaluation path. Pushwoosh has a free plan. Free while the project stays within 1,000 monthly active users, with every feature included and no credit card required.
Who should choose OneSignal?
Consumer mobile apps, marketplaces, media sites, and web publishers whose primary channel is push notifications, especially teams that want serious push infrastructure and a workable email and in-app layer for free or for tens of dollars a month rather than hundreds.
Who should choose Pushwoosh?
Consumer mobile apps and content or ecommerce websites (games, media, delivery, fintech, subscription apps) that want mobile and web push, in-app messages, and lifecycle journeys on one predictable per-MAU bill, with a genuinely usable free tier up to 1,000 monthly active users.
What are the best alternatives to OneSignal and Pushwoosh?
SaaSTracker profiles 9 products in Notification Infrastructure. The Summer 2026 awards in the category went to Knock (Category Leader), Novu (Best Value), SuprSend (Momentum). Every profile is compiled from primary sources, so a shortlist can be built from pricing, limitations, and fit rather than from star ratings.
