Software Alternatives, Accelerators & Startups

KeyCDN VS Ably

Compare KeyCDN VS Ably and see what are their differences

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KeyCDN logo KeyCDN

KeyCDN is a high-performance Content Delivery Network (CDN). Lowest price globally at $0.04/GB with HTTP/2 Support and free Origin Shield.

Ably logo Ably

The realtime platform that just works. We power more WebSocket connections than any other pub/sub platform, serving over 2 billion devices monthly.
  • KeyCDN Landing page
    Landing page //
    2021-10-11
  • Ably Ably homepage
    Ably homepage //
    2024-08-05

We help teams deliver resilient AI UX and high-performance live experiences that stay fast and in sync worldwide. We provide the global realtime layer for AI agents, chat, notifications, live dashboards, and collaboration - engineered to handle peak demand without self-managed infrastructure.

Teams like HubSpot and Intercom use Ably to avoid the cost and complexity of building and operating realtime systems, while still getting predictable performance at serious scale, handling 2T+ API operations per month. Ablyโ€™s Pub/Sub, Chat, and AI Transport products are unified by design, with developer-friendly APIs and SDKs that integrate across your stack.

Ably

Website
ably.com
$ Details
freemium
Release Date
2016 January
Startup details
Country
United Kingdom
Founder(s)
Matthew O'Riordan, Dr. Paddy Byers
Employees
50 - 99

KeyCDN features and specs

  • Performance
    KeyCDN has a broad network with strategically placed POPs (Points of Presence) that ensures fast content delivery and low latency.
  • Cost-effective
    Offers competitive pricing compared to other CDN providers, making it attractive for small to medium-sized businesses.
  • Ease of Use
    User-friendly interface and straightforward setup make it easy for users to deploy and manage their CDN services.
  • Security Features
    Provides built-in security features such as DDoS protection, secure token links, and SSL support to safeguard content.
  • Real-time Analytics
    Offers comprehensive real-time analytics and reporting tools that provide valuable insights into content delivery performance and usage statistics.
  • Support for Various Integrations
    Supports integrations with popular CMS platforms, frameworks, and e-commerce solutions like WordPress, Magento, and WooCommerce.

Possible disadvantages of KeyCDN

  • Limited Advanced Features
    While it offers essential CDN functionalities, KeyCDN may lack some advanced features available in other top-tier CDNs such as extensive edge computing capabilities.
  • Smaller Network
    Compared to larger CDN providers like Cloudflare or Akamai, KeyCDN has a smaller network of POPs, which may affect global performance in fewer regions.
  • Customer Support
    Some users have reported slower response times and less comprehensive support compared to other premium CDNs.
  • Caching Customization
    Offers fewer customization options for caching policies and rules compared to some competing CDNs.
  • No WAF
    Does not offer a built-in Web Application Firewall (WAF), which means users will need a separate solution for advanced web application protection.

Ably features and specs

  • Scalability
    Ably is designed to handle a massive number of concurrent connections and messages, making it scalable for both small and large applications.
  • Real-time Messaging
    Ably provides robust real-time messaging capabilities with low latency, supporting use-cases like live chat, gaming, and real-time data streaming.
  • Global Presence
    Ably has a globally distributed network, ensuring low latency and high availability for users around the world.
  • Advanced Features
    It offers advanced features such as message history, presence, and push notifications, which can enhance the functionality of real-time applications.
  • Security
    Ably includes built-in security features such as TLS encryption, token-based authentication, and private channels to ensure secure communication.
  • Extensive Documentation
    The service provides extensive and well-organized documentation, making it easier for developers to integrate and utilize its features.
  • SDKs and Libraries
    Ably offers a wide range of SDKs and libraries for different programming languages and platforms, easing the development process.
  • Reliable Delivery
    It ensures reliable message delivery with features like message queuing and message de-duplication.

Possible disadvantages of Ably

  • Complexity
    Due to its wide range of advanced features, the initial learning curve can be steep for new users.
  • Cost
    For large-scale applications or extensive use of advanced features, the costs can add up, making it potentially expensive.
  • Vendor Lock-in
    Relying heavily on Ablyโ€™s platform-specific features may result in vendor lock-in, making it challenging to switch to other services in the future.
  • Dependence on Internet Connection
    As a cloud-based service, Ablyโ€™s performance is highly dependent on the quality and reliability of the internet connection.
  • Third-party Integration
    While Ably offers various integration options, integrating certain third-party services may require additional custom development or may not be as seamless.

Analysis of KeyCDN

Overall verdict

  • Overall, KeyCDN is a strong choice for businesses and individuals looking to enhance their website's performance and reliability. It offers a solid balance of affordability, speed, and features.

Why this product is good

  • KeyCDN is considered a good option for a content delivery network (CDN) due to its competitive pricing, high performance, and ease of use. It offers a global network of strategically placed servers, which reduces latency and improves load times for users worldwide. Additionally, KeyCDN provides features like a user-friendly dashboard, real-time analytics, and security measures such as DDoS protection and free SSL certificates.

Recommended for

    KeyCDN is recommended for small to medium-sized businesses, e-commerce sites, bloggers, and web developers who need an efficient and cost-effective CDN solution. Its simplicity and robust support make it an excellent choice for those who want a straightforward setup without sacrificing performance.

Analysis of Ably

Overall verdict

  • Ably is a reliable and efficient real-time messaging platform, well-suited for applications requiring high performance and scalability. It is generally well-regarded within the developer community for its ease of use and robust feature set.

Why this product is good

  • Features
    Ably provides a comprehensive suite of features such as pub/sub messaging, presence, and history.
  • Security
    It implements robust security practices including TLS encryption, token-based authentication, and private channels.
  • Integration
    Supports numerous protocols and provides SDKs for various programming languages, making it easy to integrate with different systems.
  • Reliability
    Ably offers high availability and low latency, ensuring messages are delivered in real-time.
  • Scalability
    The platform can handle millions of active connections and is designed for horizontal scaling.

Recommended for

  • developers building real-time applications like chat apps, dashboards, or multiplayer games
  • businesses in need of a scalable solution for live updates and notifications
  • teams looking for a platform with strong security and compliance credentials
  • organizations requiring integration with existing development workflows and tools

KeyCDN videos

Full Site Cache for KeyCDN - A WordPress plugin

More videos:

  • Tutorial - How to Speed Up WordPress Website With CDN Service (KeyCDN)

Ably videos

How to build a collaborative environment around your product

More videos:

  • Demo - How to build an avatar stack with Ably Spaces
  • Demo - Ably 101: Serverless WebSockets at scale

Category Popularity

0-100% (relative to KeyCDN and Ably)
CDN
100 100%
0% 0
Developer Tools
0 0%
100% 100
Cloud Computing
100 100%
0% 0
Realtime Backend / API
0 0%
100% 100

User comments

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Reviews

These are some of the external sources and on-site user reviews we've used to compare KeyCDN and Ably

KeyCDN Reviews

  1. Tony Lein
    ยท Working at FAQ Ally ยท
    KeyCDN - Helpful Tool

    KeyCDN is refreshing because it doesnโ€™t overcomplicate things. Itโ€™s easy to set up, the interface actually makes sense, and youโ€™re not buried in confusing options or enterprise-only features. The pricing is just as straightforward โ€” clear, affordable, and predictable, without hidden fees or surprise costs. It feels built for real people and real teams who just want a fast, reliable CDN without the hassle.

    ๐Ÿ‘ Pros:    Affordable price|Easy to use

The 7 Best Content-Delivery-Network Providers
KeyCDN is not a CDN provider from Germany, but it's close: The provider is based in Switzerland. The focus is on speed, a broad infrastructure, security and 24/7 support. KeyCDN's content delivery network is accessible on six continents and should be set up in a few minutes to swiftly send your content to your users all over the world - except Antarctica. KeyCDN is capable...
Source: omr.com
10 Top Cloudflare Alternatives for Your Website
Customization is the key to having a personalized experience. In this regard, KeyCDN is a touch better than Cloudflare. Therefore, you can configure the essential components, add it to any CMS or custom application to get the preferred result. If not optimized perfectly, images can drastically slow down content delivery. Keeping this crucial aspect in mind, KeyCDN offers a...
Source: beebom.com
5 Best Free CDN Solutions for WordPress to Speed Up Your Site
KeyCDN โ€“ KeyCDN is an easy-to-implement CDN that starts at just $0.04 per GB. Theyโ€™re the same people beyond plugins like Cache Enabler and the Optimus image optimizer plugin, so KeyCDN works great with both those plugins.
Source: wplift.com
11 Best CDN Providers To Speed Up A Website
Other KeyCDN features include the intuitive dashboard; HTTP/2 for faster delivery; GZip compression for faster data accessibility; real time reportings; extensive security (with DDoS protection, shared or custom SSL, secure token etc); origin shield and much more.
Source: mofluid.com
The best CDN providers of 2018 to speed up any website
More experienced users will appreciate options like Origin Shield โ€“ this allows you to specify a KeyCDN server to be the source for updates rather than the origin, reducing your server load. You're able to manipulate headers, cache or strip cookies, or set up a custom robots.txt. Once the service is running, a capable set of reporting tools enable watching CDN performance in...

Ably Reviews

We have no reviews of Ably yet.
Be the first one to post

Social recommendations and mentions

Based on our record, Ably seems to be a lot more popular than KeyCDN. While we know about 26 links to Ably, we've tracked only 2 mentions of KeyCDN. We are tracking product recommendations and mentions on various public social media platforms and blogs. They can help you identify which product is more popular and what people think of it.

KeyCDN mentions (2)

Ably mentions (26)

  • AWS us-east-1 outage: How Ablyโ€™s multi-region architecture held up
    During this weekโ€™s AWS us-east-1 outage, Ably maintained full service continuity with no customer impact. This was our multi-region architecture working exactly as designed; error rates were negligibly low and unchanged throughout. Any additional round trip latency was limited to 12ms, which is below the typical variance in any client-to-endpoint connection, and well below our 40โ€“50ms global median; this is... - Source: dev.to / 9 months ago
  • Real-Time Sync Alternatives: Vaultrice vs. localStorage, DIY, Firebase, Pusher
    Services like Pusher and Ably are experts in real-time messaging. They provide robust APIs for pub/sub channels, allowing you to broadcast events to clients reliably. - Source: dev.to / 11 months ago
  • CometChat Alternatives โ€“ Comparing the Top 10 Competitors
    Ably is a real-time infrastructure platform that focuses on delivering low-latency, reliable messaging across global distributed systems. It's designed for developers building event-driven applications, including chat, but also supports broader use cases like live dashboards, GPS tracking, and collaborative tools. - Source: dev.to / about 1 year ago
  • Real-Time Authorization in a Chat Application with Permit.io and WebSockets
    For our web socket-based application, weโ€™ll be using Next.js and Ably, a service that allows us to easily integrate and manage real-time capabilities in our apps powered by web socket. - Source: dev.to / over 1 year ago
  • Curiosity: Using Ably.io Realtime Messaging as a Lightweight Database
    Ably offers various solutions for developers, with their most popular being realtime messaging based on the pub/sub model. When you publish a message to a channel, all devices connected to that channel receive it instantly. - Source: dev.to / over 1 year ago
View more

What are some alternatives?

When comparing KeyCDN and Ably, you can also consider the following products

CloudFlare - Cloudflare is a global network designed to make everything you connect to the Internet secure, private, fast, and reliable.

Pusher - Pusher is a hosted API for quickly, easily and securely adding scalable realtime functionality via WebSockets to web and mobile apps.

Amazon CloudFront - Amazon CloudFront is a content delivery web service.

Socket.io - Realtime application framework (Node.JS server)

CDN77 - Content Delivery Network - website speed acceleration with CDN77. 28+ PoPs, Pay-as-you-go prices, no commitments.

PubNub - PubNub is a real-time messaging system for web and mobile apps that can handle API for all platforms and push messages to any device anywhere in the world in a fraction of a second without having to worry about proxies, firewalls or mobile drop-offs.