Ask HN: Are there any full featured chat/messaging as a service solutions?
I am making a mobile app and want to have a chat/messaging feature where users can directly chat with me (in order for them to ask questions about a product) in real time. I would also like to have file exchange support (to send imgs, PDFs, etc) within the chat.. I know it maybe a stretch but are there are third party solutions that offer this feature?? So far the closest thing that is https://pusher.com/chatkit and they seem to offer a Rich Media Messaging feature to send files back and forth, my only problem is that they have a free plan and their next cheapest plan starts out at 500 bucks a month!
Hi Alan, when we built Pusher Chatkit we took into consideration developers like you who are looking to introduce their first chat functionality into an app. As you noted we include a very generous free tier (1,000 Monthly Unique Identified Users, and all core features of our business plan) to cover implementing and scaling up a chat experience. It's good to note that users are only considered active if they have authenticated and established a session.
Use cases can be varied, so if you have something particular in mind where you need to scale more incrementally I would suggest reaching out to our sales team so we can find the right solution for you.
https://pusher.com/enterprise#sales-form-partial
You can also find tutorials on implementing Pusher Chatkit here: https://pusher.com/tutorials?q=chatkit