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Cloud · head to head

Railway vs Soketi

Railway logo

Railway

Cloud

Ship software instantly

From
Free
Free plan
Yes
Full reviewWebsite
Soketi logo

Soketi

Developer Tools

Self-hosted, Pusher-compatible WebSockets server with a stalled maintenance record

From
Free
Free plan
Yes
Full reviewWebsite

The short version

  • Each has a real cost: Railway plan fees are usage credits rather than allowances, so the $5 Hobby and $20 Pro fees are spent on compute and anything beyond is billed on top; Soketi maintenance has effectively stalled: the maintainer has said time is severely limited, releases are infrequent, and the community has been discussing whether the project is abandoned, which means security fixes may not arrive.
  • They diverge on capability: Railway covers Git integration, Soketi covers Pusher protocol compatibility.
  • Prices and features above were last checked on 31 August 2026.

Where they differ

Only the attributes on which Railway and Soketi actually diverge.

Attributes where Railway and Soketi differ
AttributeRailwaySoketi
Pricing modelusage-basedOpen source, no licence fee
PlatformsWeb, Api, DockerLinux, macOS, Windows
CategoryCloudDeveloper Tools
Founded2021Unknown

Identical on both: starting price (Free), free tier (Yes), user rating (Not yet rated).

What each one covers

Drawn from each product's published feature list. An absence here means we hold no record of it - not that the product lacks it.

Only in Railway

  • Git integration
  • Zero-config deployment
  • PostgreSQL
  • MySQL
  • Redis
  • Environment variables
  • Custom domains
  • Monitoring

Only in Soketi

  • Pusher protocol compatibility
  • Presence and private channels
  • Horizontal scaling
  • App management backends
  • Webhooks
  • Prometheus metrics

What people use each for

The jobs each tool is most often brought in to do.

Railway

  • Deploying applications and databases without managing serversnot Soketi
  • Running preview environments and services straight from a repositorynot Soketi

Soketi

  • A Laravel application that already uses Echo and wants to stop paying a hosted realtime providernot Railway
  • Realtime notifications or presence indicators where data must not leave your own infrastructure for compliance reasonsnot Railway
  • A local or CI environment that needs a Pusher-compatible server without hitting a paid accountnot Railway
  • A high-connection-count application where hosted per-connection pricing has become the largest line in the infrastructure billnot Railway

Where each one falls short

Documented limitations, not opinions. Every one is a constraint you would hit in normal use.

Railway

  • Plan fees are usage credits rather than allowances, so the $5 Hobby and $20 Pro fees are spent on compute and anything beyond is billed on top
  • The free plan carries $1 of monthly credit and caps a service at 1 vCPU and 0.5 GB
  • Compute is metered per second for both memory and CPU, so cost tracks uptime rather than traffic and an idle service still bills
  • Egress is $0.05 per GB on top of compute
  • The Pro fee is per workspace rather than per user or per project

Soketi

  • Maintenance has effectively stalled: the maintainer has said time is severely limited, releases are infrequent, and the community has been discussing whether the project is abandoned, which means security fixes may not arrive.
  • Dependency drift on Node and uWebSockets.js will eventually force you to fork or migrate, and that cost is unbudgeted at the point you adopt it.
  • There is no commercial support to buy, so a production incident at three in the morning is entirely your problem with no escalation path.
  • Scaling beyond a single node needs Redis and careful configuration, and getting presence channels correct across nodes is a genuine source of subtle bugs.
  • It implements the Pusher protocol rather than tracking it, so any protocol feature Pusher adds later will not appear, and the compatibility guarantee slowly decays.

Pricing, plan by plan

Railway

Free
  • FreeFree
    • $5 credit/month
    • Community support
    • Unlimited projects
  • Pro$20/month
    • Private repos
    • Priority support
    • Advanced monitoring

Soketi

Free
  • SoketiFree
    • MIT licensed
    • Unlimited connections subject to your own hardware
    • No vendor billing

Which should you pick?

Choose Railway if

  • You need git integration.
  • You want to start without paying.
  • You work on Web, Api, Docker.
  • You also want zero-config deployment.
Railway review

Choose Soketi if

  • You need pusher protocol compatibility.
  • You want to start without paying.
  • You work on Linux, macOS, Windows.
  • You also want presence and private channels.
Soketi review

Questions people ask

Is Railway or Soketi better?
Neither clearly leads. Railway starts at Free and Soketi at Free, and user ratings are close enough to be indistinguishable. Choose on capability and platform support.
Which is cheaper, Railway or Soketi?
Railway starts at Free and Soketi at Free.
Does Railway or Soketi run on more platforms?
Railway runs on Web, Api, Docker. Soketi runs on Linux, macOS, Windows.
Can I use Railway for free?
Both have a free tier, so you can try either at no cost before committing.
What is Railway best used for?
Railway is most often used for deploying applications and databases without managing servers, running preview environments and services straight from a repository. Of those, deploying applications and databases without managing servers and running preview environments and services straight from a repository are not what Soketi is typically brought in for.
What can Railway do that Soketi cannot?
Railway covers Git integration, Zero-config deployment, PostgreSQL, MySQL. Soketi covers Pusher protocol compatibility, Presence and private channels, Horizontal scaling, App management backends.

Answered from the vendors’ own pages

Railway: How much does Railway cost?

Railway's Hobby plan is $5 per month and includes $5 of monthly usage credit. Pro is $20 per month per workspace with $20 of credit included. Enterprise is quoted. Usage beyond the included credit is billed per second.

Source
Soketi: Is Soketi still maintained?

Barely. The maintainer has stated that available time is very limited and releases have been sparse; treat it as community-maintained.

Railway: Does Railway have a free tier?

Yes, two. A one-time Free Trial gives $5 of credit valid for 30 days, and an ongoing Free plan includes $1 per month with 1 vCPU and 0.5 GB per service, 1 replica and 3 days of log history.

Source
Soketi: Do I need to change my client code?

No. Pusher client SDKs and Laravel Echo work by changing the host, port and credentials.

Railway: What are Railway's resource limits per plan?

The Free plan allows 1 vCPU and 0.5 GB per service with 1 replica. Hobby raises that to 48 vCPU and 48 GB with 6 replicas. Pro allows 1,000 vCPU and 1 TB per service with 42 replicas and 30 days of log history.

Source
Soketi: What does it cost?

Nothing in licence fees. It is MIT licensed; you pay for the server it runs on.

Railway: How does Railway bill usage above the included credit?

Railway charges memory at $0.00000386 per GB per second and CPU at $0.00000772 per vCPU per second, with storage volumes at $0.00000006 per GB per second, plus separate egress and object storage fees.

Source
Soketi: What are people moving to?

Laravel Reverb for Laravel applications, and Sockudo, a Rust reimplementation, for others.

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