Pricing overview
OneSignal employs a usage-based pricing structure that combines subscriber counts with feature access across various tiers. The model is designed to accommodate different scales of operation, from individual developers and small businesses utilizing the free tier to large enterprises requiring extensive features and high message volumes. Pricing factors include the number of active subscribers, the volume of messages sent (across push, in-app, email, and SMS), and the inclusion of advanced functionalities such as A/B testing, advanced segmentation, multi-channel orchestration, and premium support OneSignal pricing plans. The platform's core offering focuses on delivering push notifications, in-app messages, email, and SMS, with costs varying based on the specific channels and associated usage.
As a multi-channel communication platform, OneSignal's pricing accounts for the complexity and scale of user engagement strategies. For instance, while push notifications are a foundational service, integrating email and SMS channels often falls under higher-tier plans or incurs additional usage charges. The platform aims to provide transparent pricing, detailing what is included at each subscription level and outlining potential overage costs for exceeding specified limits. This structure allows users to select a plan that aligns with their current operational needs and scale their subscription as their audience grows or their communication requirements become more sophisticated.
Plans and tiers
OneSignal organizes its services into several distinct plans, each tailored to different user needs and offering a progressive set of features and higher usage limits. The primary plans include a Free tier, Growth, Professional, and Enterprise. Each paid plan builds upon the previous one, adding more advanced capabilities and increasing the base limits for subscribers and message volume.
The Growth plan, starting at $99 per month, is positioned for growing businesses that require more than the free tier offers. It typically includes a higher subscriber limit, increased message volume, and access to features like A/B testing, advanced analytics, and multi-channel messaging capabilities beyond basic push notifications. This tier is suitable for companies looking to optimize their engagement strategies and gain deeper insights into user behavior.
The Professional plan is designed for larger organizations and typically includes even higher subscriber and message limits, along with more sophisticated features. These might include advanced audience segmentation, personalized messaging, and dedicated support options. The exact pricing for this tier is often custom or significantly higher than the Growth plan, reflecting the enhanced capabilities and scale it supports.
The Enterprise plan is the highest tier, custom-quoted for large-scale operations with specific requirements for performance, security, and integration. This plan usually includes unlimited subscribers, very high message volumes, priority support, custom integrations, dedicated account management, and enhanced security features. It caters to businesses that operate at a global scale and require a highly customized and robust communication infrastructure.
A comparison of the key plans and their typical inclusions is provided below:
| Plan | Starting Price (approx.) | Key Limits / Inclusions | Best For |
|---|---|---|---|
| Free | $0 | Up to 10,000 subscribers, 50,000 pushes/month, basic analytics | Small projects, startups, testing, individual developers |
| Growth | $99/month | Increased subscriber limits (e.g., 25,000), higher message volume, A/B testing, advanced analytics, email & SMS add-ons | Growing businesses, optimizing engagement, multi-channel basics |
| Professional | Custom / Varies | Higher subscriber limits (e.g., 50,000+), advanced segmentation, personalization, premium support, increased email & SMS volume | Mid-sized to large enterprises, complex engagement strategies |
| Enterprise | Custom Quote | Unlimited subscribers, highest message volume, custom integrations, dedicated support, enhanced security, custom SLAs | Large-scale global operations, highly specific requirements |
Free tier and limits
OneSignal provides a free tier that allows users to access fundamental features for push notifications without any upfront cost. This tier is designed to support individual developers, small projects, and startups in their initial stages of user engagement. The free plan includes support for up to 10,000 active subscribers across all channels (web push, mobile push, in-app messaging, email, and SMS) and permits sending up to 50,000 push notifications per month. It also provides basic analytics to monitor campaign performance and user engagement metrics.
Key limitations of the free tier include the subscriber and message volume caps. Exceeding these limits typically requires an upgrade to a paid plan. Additionally, certain advanced features are not available in the free tier. These often include A/B testing, advanced audience segmentation based on custom data, multi-language support, and access to premium support channels. While the free tier offers a solid foundation for basic communication needs, organizations with growing user bases or more complex engagement strategies will likely need to transition to a paid subscription to unlock full functionality and scale.
The free tier serves as an entry point, allowing users to evaluate the platform's capabilities and integrate its SDKs into their applications or websites. This approach aligns with many API providers, such as Twilio, which offers a free trial or a limited free tier to allow developers to experiment with their services before committing to a paid plan Twilio pricing model. For OneSignal, the free tier is a practical option for proof-of-concept projects or applications with a small, stable user base.
Real-world cost examples
Understanding OneSignal's pricing in practical terms requires considering various scenarios based on subscriber count, message volume, and desired features. Here are a few real-world cost examples:
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Small Startup (Free Tier): A new mobile game developer launching their first app might start with the free tier. With 5,000 subscribers and sending 20,000 push notifications per month for new level releases and daily rewards, their monthly cost would be $0. They leverage basic analytics but do not require advanced segmentation or A/B testing initially. This fits within the 10,000 subscriber and 50,000 push notification limits.
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Growing E-commerce Site (Growth Plan): An e-commerce business with 20,000 active web push subscribers and a need to send targeted promotional offers, abandoned cart reminders, and shipping updates. They send approximately 100,000 messages per month and want to A/B test different call-to-actions. Exceeding the free tier's subscriber limit, they would likely opt for the Growth plan. At a base of $99/month, they would pay for the plan, plus potential overage fees if they significantly exceed the Growth plan's message volume or subscriber count, or if they add email/SMS channels which might incur additional costs beyond the base plan. Their estimated monthly cost would be around $99-$150, depending on exact usage and add-ons.
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Mid-sized Media Publisher (Professional Plan): A media company with 75,000 mobile app users and 50,000 web subscribers (total 125,000 unique subscribers) sends daily news alerts, breaking news, and personalized content recommendations. They send millions of notifications monthly across push and email channels, require advanced segmentation to target specific reader interests, and need premium support. This scale and feature requirement would necessitate the Professional plan. Pricing would be custom, likely several hundred to over a thousand dollars per month, based on the exact subscriber count, message volume, and specific feature bundles chosen.
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Large Enterprise Application (Enterprise Plan): A global financial services application with millions of users requires high-volume transactional notifications, critical security alerts, and multi-channel marketing campaigns across push, in-app, email, and SMS. They need custom integrations with their CRM, dedicated account management, enterprise-grade security, and guaranteed uptime SLAs. This scenario mandates the Enterprise plan, which is custom-quoted. Monthly costs would be in the thousands of dollars, reflecting the extensive infrastructure, dedicated resources, and bespoke solutions provided.
These examples illustrate how costs can vary significantly based on the scale of the user base, the intensity of messaging, and the demand for advanced features like A/B testing, segmentation, and multi-channel orchestration.
How the pricing compares
When evaluating OneSignal's pricing, it's useful to compare its model against alternatives in the market, such as Firebase Cloud Messaging (FCM), Braze, and Iterable. Each platform offers different pricing strategies that cater to various market segments and operational requirements.
Firebase Cloud Messaging (FCM), offered by Google, provides a free messaging solution for sending notifications across Android, iOS, and web platforms Firebase Cloud Messaging overview. Unlike OneSignal, FCM itself does not charge for sending messages. Its cost is primarily associated with other Firebase services used alongside it, such as database storage or cloud functions. This makes FCM a highly cost-effective option for developers who only need basic notification delivery and are comfortable building their own backend logic for audience management, segmentation, and analytics. OneSignal, in contrast, bundles these features into its paid plans, offering a more complete out-of-the-box solution for engagement. For a simple push notification setup, FCM can be cheaper than OneSignal's paid tiers, but it requires more development effort to replicate OneSignal's advanced features.
Braze and Iterable are enterprise-grade customer engagement platforms that offer a much broader suite of features beyond just notifications, including comprehensive customer journey orchestration, advanced personalization, and robust analytics. Their pricing models are typically significantly higher than OneSignal's paid plans, often starting in the thousands of dollars per month. These platforms are designed for large enterprises with complex marketing automation needs and substantial budgets. While OneSignal offers multi-channel capabilities in its higher tiers, Braze and Iterable provide deeper integration across marketing, sales, and support channels, justifying their higher price point for organizations that require a unified customer engagement platform. For businesses primarily focused on efficient notification delivery and basic multi-channel messaging, OneSignal generally presents a more affordable and accessible solution compared to these full-suite alternatives.
In summary, OneSignal occupies a middle ground, offering more features and ease of use than a purely free solution like FCM, but at a significantly lower price point and with a more focused feature set compared to comprehensive enterprise platforms like Braze and Iterable. Its tiered structure allows for scalability, making it suitable for a range of users from small projects to growing businesses that need more than just basic notification delivery but may not require the extensive and costly features of a full-fledged customer engagement suite.