StackShareStackShare
Follow on
StackShare

Discover and share technology stacks from companies around the world.

Follow on

© 2025 StackShare. All rights reserved.

Product

  • Stacks
  • Tools
  • Feed

Company

  • About
  • Contact

Legal

  • Privacy Policy
  • Terms of Service
  1. Stackups
  2. Utilities
  3. Messaging
  4. Communications SDK
  5. Chat by Stream vs Layer

Chat by Stream vs Layer

OverviewComparisonAlternatives

Overview

Layer
Layer
Stacks15
Followers39
Votes7
Chat by Stream
Chat by Stream
Stacks18
Followers54
Votes95

Chat by Stream vs Layer: What are the differences?

  1. Integration Options: Chat by Stream offers a wide range of integrations with popular platforms like Slack, GitHub, and Zapier, allowing seamless connectivity with existing tools. On the other hand, Layer provides more customizable integration options through its APIs, enabling developers to tailor the chat experience to specific requirements.

  2. Data Ownership: Chat by Stream ensures that all user data belongs to the client, giving full control over sensitive information and ensuring compliance with data protection regulations. In contrast, Layer retains more control over data by hosting conversations on their servers, potentially raising concerns about data security and ownership.

  3. Pricing Structure: Stream's Chat solution follows a transparent pricing model based on active users, with no hidden fees or overage charges. Layer, on the other hand, offers a more complex pricing structure that factors in additional features and customization options, making it challenging to estimate costs accurately.

  4. Message Delivery Speed: Chat by Stream boasts high message delivery speeds due to its reliable infrastructure and optimized processes, ensuring real-time communication with minimal delays. Layer may experience occasional delays in message delivery, especially during peak usage times, impacting the overall user experience.

  5. User Interface Customization: Layer provides extensive options for customizing the user interface, allowing businesses to create a unique chat experience that aligns with their branding and design preferences. In contrast, Stream's Chat solution offers a more standardized interface with limited customization options, focusing more on functionality than aesthetics.

  6. Community Support: Stream's Chat has a vibrant community of developers and users who actively contribute to ongoing development and provide helpful resources for troubleshooting and implementation. Layer, while offering robust documentation and support resources, may lack the same level of community engagement, leading to potentially slower resolution of issues or limited peer-to-peer learning opportunities.

In Summary, Chat by Stream and Layer differ in their integration options, data ownership policies, pricing structures, message delivery speeds, user interface customization capabilities, and community support, catering to distinct needs and preferences of businesses utilizing chat solutions.

Share your Stack

Help developers discover the tools you use. Get visibility for your team's tech choices and contribute to the community's knowledge.

View Docs
CLI (Node.js)
or
Manual

Detailed Comparison

Layer
Layer
Chat by Stream
Chat by Stream

Layer's asynchronous messaging fabric is capable of transporting payloads of any type. Get your users talking with chat, voice or video messaging. Pull them back in with push. Connect friends, colleagues or perfect strangers seamlessly.

Chat API and SDK. With a beautiful UI Kit, easy to use React Components and powerful API. Add Chat to any application in a matter of hours. The tech uses Go, RocksDB and Raft. By the creators of Stream, the API that powers activity feeds for more than 300 million users.

Send any message payload (photos, videos, location, json data, etc) up to 2GB;Build your UI quickly with sample UI components to get started;User-expected communication features work right out of the box (full message state tracking, typing indicators, read receipts);Pre-loading of content with background-synchronized state and metadata across devices;Push notifications across platforms and devices with full control over display and delivery;Handles offline mode and poor network conditions with network state management and performance handling
Reactions;Threads & Replies; Presence/who is online;Fulltext search on chat messages;Messages states; Typing Indicators;Message history;Powerful query support for channels and users;AI based moderation for spam and profanity;User Roles;@mentions;User invites;Mute users;Ban users;Flag Messages;Custom Messages;React Components;Push notifications;Webhooks;Unread message counts;Multi Region support;GDPR compliancy tools;HIPAA ready;Custom Slack Style Slash commands;Highly available infrastructure with Raft replication;Giphy integration;Url enrichment;Video Playback; CDN integrated;Fast response time; On premise;Fully customizable;Powerful CLI;Unlimited message retention;99.999% uptime SLA; 24/7 phone support; SAML login; 2FA for developer accounts;Emoticons;File uploads via select, drag and drop and clipboard; React Native Components;
Statistics
Stacks
15
Stacks
18
Followers
39
Followers
54
Votes
7
Votes
95
Pros & Cons
Pros
  • 6
    Open source ui atlas makes messaging easy
  • 1
    Easy setup
Pros
  • 15
    Reasonable Pricing
  • 14
    Threads
  • 13
    SDKs for React, RN, Android and iOS are better
  • 13
    Very fast and scalable
  • 13
    Reactions
Integrations
No integrations available
PHP
PHP
React Native
React Native
Python
Python
Ruby
Ruby
Swift
Swift
React
React
.NET
.NET
Java
Java

What are some alternatives to Layer, Chat by Stream?

SendBird

SendBird

SendBird is a Messaging SDK, Chat API, and fully managed chat infrastructure for your mobile apps and websites. Embeddable chat for iOS, Android, JavaScript, Unity, .NET.

Sinch

Sinch

Sinch makes it easy for developers to add voice, messaging and SMS to their apps with just a few lines of code. Enrich your apps with communications that your users will love.

ChannelizeIO

ChannelizeIO

Add In-App User-to-User Communication into Mobile Apps & Websites, with rich & engaging Text Chat, Video, and Audio Calling experiences, to Increase User Engagement and Enable new Revenue Streams.

Agora

Agora

Agora.io provides building blocks for you to add real-time voice and video communications through a simple and powerful SDK. You can integrate the Agora SDK to enable real-time communications in your own application quickly.

OpenTok

OpenTok

It adds the clarity and emotion of face-to-face communication to your brand whether you're developing for the web, iOS, or Android. We make the integration of high-quality live video a breeze so that you can focus on building a great product.

QuickBlox

QuickBlox

Add powerful communication features to your mobile app and data services for your backend<br>

Scringo

Scringo

Scringo offers a unique Community &amp; Messaging Platform that turns every app into an independent, dynamic &amp; fully functional social network.

TalkJS

TalkJS

TalkJS provides a chat API & Javascript SDK with a pre-built UI that allows developers to add chat between users on websites and apps in hours instead of months.

PopcornNotify

PopcornNotify

Popcorn Notify is designed to be an effortless method for sending emails and text messages from your code. Client libraries are simple to install and are available on pip and npm.

Enterprise SMS Gateway Software & CPaaS Platform

Enterprise SMS Gateway Software & CPaaS Platform

TeleOSS provides high-throughput SMS gateway software, SMPP/SIGTRAN support, and global messaging solutions.

Related Comparisons

Postman
Swagger UI

Postman vs Swagger UI

Mapbox
Google Maps

Google Maps vs Mapbox

Mapbox
Leaflet

Leaflet vs Mapbox vs OpenLayers

Twilio SendGrid
Mailgun

Mailgun vs Mandrill vs SendGrid

Runscope
Postman

Paw vs Postman vs Runscope