Since Kinvey posted this here: I can't stand the pricing model of Kinvey, at all.
Charging 'per active user' where an 'active user' is defined as a user who makes a single request per month is insane. Nearly every other provider charges on a volume request basis (i.e, 8 million calls per month). I use BaaS platforms in some of my apps, and I can't think of a single scenario for me where Kinvey is cheaper. And I guess this would be fine if there was some clear advantage for using Kinvey, but I just don't see it!
Thank you for the feedback. I work at Kinvey and if I may - Here are a few situations where our pricing would be very favorable to you as a developer. Generally, I really like our user-based success pricing for 3 major reasons:
1) We don't succeed (make money, in this case) unless your app is successful.
2) It is difficult for me to imagine a real-world situation where you wind up paying more for Kinvey than you would have other providers at that same usage level, but I am open to hearing them from your experience. At the point of major scale in your app you'd also be blowing well past the highest API usage tiers of the other folks.
3) We offer all you can eat API calls, push messaging, contributors, API versioning, etc. on every tier. You will never need to think about how many push notifications you're sending, pay more to add a contributor to your app, pay for API versioning, etc.
Some examples:
1) You're writing a native Android or iOS application. You pay nothing until you release your app and have over 200 users use your app in a single month. It doesn't matter how many API calls those users make, how many push notifications they're sent, etc.
2) You write a native Android or iOS application, and your app gets 300 users in its first month, but something happens and only 150 of those users come back in month two. You paid us $30 in the first month, and then nothing in month two. If you release a new feature and users return, you may begin paying us again.
3) You develop a native app, and it's a good hit - You get 1,000 users in the first month. We're $30, and you don't think about how much they use the app or its various features. Let's say that through the normal use of your app, the average user runs 200 API calls in that month. Price out 2,000,000 API calls on the other providers - It's almost always going to be more than $30. Sometimes a lot more. Sometimes it's about the same.
4) You're developing a non-native (HTML5/JS most likely) app. You pay by API call volume on generous tiers. All of our features (including push, 3rd party data integration, API versioning, etc.) are available no matter how little you pay. Our prices on the API call volume plans are lower than other providers that I've seen. I just reviewed the 8 million call number you mentioned above for us and four other providers, and we offered the lowest price by a significant amount (usually ~$50), which says nothing about feature availability.
With our competitors that I've reviewed, you are in a monthly plan that you must pay, and if you exceed your plan's allotments on any numbers, you may pay heavy overage fees or be forced into a dramatically more expensive tier. There are simply no overage fees or other surprises on Kinvey. (We hate them, too.) If you're a native app developer, you think about exactly two numbers: Users and storage (and only that if your app needs more than 2 GB of storage, which not all apps will.)
Just so I understand - What other BaaS platforms are you using today? By your plural it sounds like you are using different ones for some apps, and I'd love to learn more about how you came to that. You can also reach me at bwhalley@kinvey.com if you'd like to discuss more. Thanks!
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[ 3.8 ms ] story [ 22.0 ms ] threadCharging 'per active user' where an 'active user' is defined as a user who makes a single request per month is insane. Nearly every other provider charges on a volume request basis (i.e, 8 million calls per month). I use BaaS platforms in some of my apps, and I can't think of a single scenario for me where Kinvey is cheaper. And I guess this would be fine if there was some clear advantage for using Kinvey, but I just don't see it!
Thank you for the feedback. I work at Kinvey and if I may - Here are a few situations where our pricing would be very favorable to you as a developer. Generally, I really like our user-based success pricing for 3 major reasons:
1) We don't succeed (make money, in this case) unless your app is successful. 2) It is difficult for me to imagine a real-world situation where you wind up paying more for Kinvey than you would have other providers at that same usage level, but I am open to hearing them from your experience. At the point of major scale in your app you'd also be blowing well past the highest API usage tiers of the other folks. 3) We offer all you can eat API calls, push messaging, contributors, API versioning, etc. on every tier. You will never need to think about how many push notifications you're sending, pay more to add a contributor to your app, pay for API versioning, etc.
Some examples: 1) You're writing a native Android or iOS application. You pay nothing until you release your app and have over 200 users use your app in a single month. It doesn't matter how many API calls those users make, how many push notifications they're sent, etc.
2) You write a native Android or iOS application, and your app gets 300 users in its first month, but something happens and only 150 of those users come back in month two. You paid us $30 in the first month, and then nothing in month two. If you release a new feature and users return, you may begin paying us again.
3) You develop a native app, and it's a good hit - You get 1,000 users in the first month. We're $30, and you don't think about how much they use the app or its various features. Let's say that through the normal use of your app, the average user runs 200 API calls in that month. Price out 2,000,000 API calls on the other providers - It's almost always going to be more than $30. Sometimes a lot more. Sometimes it's about the same.
4) You're developing a non-native (HTML5/JS most likely) app. You pay by API call volume on generous tiers. All of our features (including push, 3rd party data integration, API versioning, etc.) are available no matter how little you pay. Our prices on the API call volume plans are lower than other providers that I've seen. I just reviewed the 8 million call number you mentioned above for us and four other providers, and we offered the lowest price by a significant amount (usually ~$50), which says nothing about feature availability.
With our competitors that I've reviewed, you are in a monthly plan that you must pay, and if you exceed your plan's allotments on any numbers, you may pay heavy overage fees or be forced into a dramatically more expensive tier. There are simply no overage fees or other surprises on Kinvey. (We hate them, too.) If you're a native app developer, you think about exactly two numbers: Users and storage (and only that if your app needs more than 2 GB of storage, which not all apps will.)
Just so I understand - What other BaaS platforms are you using today? By your plural it sounds like you are using different ones for some apps, and I'd love to learn more about how you came to that. You can also reach me at bwhalley@kinvey.com if you'd like to discuss more. Thanks!