Novu vs Knock
Open-source self-host versus polished hosted product.
What matters for growth and lifecycle teams
Growth work lives or dies on targeting and measurement. What matters is whether behavioral triggers can be built without engineering time, whether the event stream supports attribution past the open, and whether deliverability holds when broadcast volume shares a reputation with product email.
| Priority | Novu | Knock |
|---|---|---|
| Scheduling | Yes | Yes |
| Event stream | Yes | Yes |
| Deliverability | BYO provider. | Inherits the deliverability of the provider you BYO (Postmark, SendGrid, Resend). |
| Operating since | 2021 | 2021 |
| Suppressions API | Yes | Yes |
| Best published rate per 1,000 | Tiers not published in comparable form | Tiers not published in comparable form |
| Multi-tenant | Yes | Yes |
| Free tier | 30,000 events/mo on cloud, free self-hosted | 10,000 notifications/mo |
| Starts at | $250/mo (Business cloud) | $249/mo (Starter) |
For lifecycle and activation work running behavior-triggered journeys, broadcasts, and winback campaigns measured on revenue, the two are level on every priority that can be scored here, so the choice comes down to price and to which product your team would rather operate. On free tier, Novu offers 30,000 events/mo on cloud, free self-hosted against 10,000 notifications/mo from Knock. That ordering reflects this audience. Weigh the same table differently and the answer changes.
Side by side
| Feature | Novu | Knock |
|---|---|---|
| Deliverability | BYO provider. | Inherits the deliverability of the provider you BYO (Postmark, SendGrid, Resend). |
| Multi-tenant | Yes | Yes |
| Free tier | 30,000 events/mo on cloud, free self-hosted | 10,000 notifications/mo |
| Starts at | $250/mo (Business cloud) | $249/mo (Starter) |
| Tagline | Open-source notification infrastructure. | Notification infrastructure with workflow engine. |
| Pricing model | volume | volume |
| API | Yes | Yes |
| SMTP | No | No |
| SDKs | node, python, go, php, java, dotnet | node, python, go, ruby, php, elixir, java, dotnet |
| Templates | rich | rich |
| React Email | Yes | Yes |
| Webhooks | Yes | Yes |
| Inbound | No | No |
| Idempotency | Yes | Yes |
| Dedicated IP | No | No |
| DX score | 8/10 | 9/10 |
| Best for | Teams that want self-hostable notification infrastructure. | Teams that need multi-channel product notifications with preferences. |
Novu
- ›Open source, MIT-licensed
- ›Self-hostable
- ›Active community
- ›Self-hosting takes effort
- ›Cloud pricing competitive only above 1M events/mo
Knock
- ›Strong workflow engine
- ›In-app feed component
- ›Deep SDK coverage
- ›Idempotency keys
- ›Pricier than running your own; entry plan is steep
- ›Bring your own delivery provider