Softwr

Cybersecurity · head to head

Sardine vs Soketi

Sardine logo

Sardine

Cybersecurity

Device intelligence and behaviour biometrics for fraud and compliance

From
On request
Free plan
No
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

  • Only Soketi has a free tier, so it costs nothing to try first.
  • Each has a real cost: Sardine signal quality depends on the SDK being embedded in your own web and mobile clients, so fraud improvements become dependent on your app release cycle and any coverage gap is a blind spot.; 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: Sardine covers Device intelligence, Soketi covers Pusher protocol compatibility.
  • Prices and features above were last checked on 1 September 2026.

Where they differ

Only the attributes on which Sardine and Soketi actually diverge.

Attributes where Sardine and Soketi differ
AttributeSardineSoketi
Starting priceOn requestFree
Pricing modelquoteOpen source, no licence fee
Free tierNoYes
PlatformsWeb, iOS, AndroidLinux, macOS, Windows
CategoryCybersecurityDeveloper Tools

Identical on both: 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 Sardine

  • Device intelligence
  • Behaviour biometrics
  • Scam detection
  • Onboarding risk scoring
  • AML transaction monitoring
  • Dispute and chargeback handling
  • Rules editor

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.

Sardine

  • A neobank losing money to authorised push payment scams where the customer genuinely approved the transfernot Soketi
  • A crypto exchange trying to detect accounts being operated by remote access rather than by their ownernot Soketi
  • A fintech seeing synthetic identity signups that pass document verification but share device characteristicsnot Soketi
  • A lender wanting first party fraud signals at application time that a credit bureau file does not containnot Soketi

Soketi

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

Where each one falls short

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

Sardine

  • Signal quality depends on the SDK being embedded in your own web and mobile clients, so fraud improvements become dependent on your app release cycle and any coverage gap is a blind spot.
  • Behavioural and device telemetry collection needs a documented lawful basis under GDPR, and EU privacy reviews frequently delay rollouts that were scoped as engineering work.
  • Pricing is per session or per active user, so a consumer product with many low value sessions pays in proportion to traffic rather than to fraud exposure.
  • As a younger private company it lacks the enforcement-tested audit history that a bank examiner expects, which makes it a harder sell inside a regulated bank than inside a fintech.
  • It is strongest on session-time signals and weaker as a system of record for long horizon AML typologies, so larger institutions end up running it alongside a traditional monitoring platform rather than instead of one.

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

Sardine

On request
  • Sardine$undefined/year
    • Priced per user session or per monthly active user
    • Annual contract with volume commitment
    • SDK for web, iOS and Android

Soketi

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

Which should you pick?

Choose Sardine if

  • You need device intelligence.
  • You work on Web, iOS, Android.
  • You also want behaviour biometrics.
Sardine 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 Sardine or Soketi better?
Neither clearly leads. Sardine starts at On request and Soketi at Free, and user ratings are close enough to be indistinguishable. Choose on capability and platform support.
Which is cheaper, Sardine or Soketi?
Soketi has a free tier; the other does not. Paid plans start at On request for Sardine and Free for Soketi.
Does Sardine or Soketi run on more platforms?
Sardine runs on Web, iOS, Android. Soketi runs on Linux, macOS, Windows.
Can I use Soketi for free?
Yes. Soketi has a free tier, so you can try it without paying. Sardine starts at On request.
What is Sardine best used for?
Sardine is most often used for a neobank losing money to authorised push payment scams where the customer genuinely approved the transfer, a crypto exchange trying to detect accounts being operated by remote access rather than by their owner, a fintech seeing synthetic identity signups that pass document verification but share device characteristics, a lender wanting first party fraud signals at application time that a credit bureau file does not contain. Of those, a neobank losing money to authorised push payment scams where the customer genuinely approved the transfer and a crypto exchange trying to detect accounts being operated by remote access rather than by their owner are not what Soketi is typically brought in for.
What can Sardine do that Soketi cannot?
Sardine covers Device intelligence, Behaviour biometrics, Scam detection, Onboarding risk scoring. Soketi covers Pusher protocol compatibility, Presence and private channels, Horizontal scaling, App management backends.

Answered from the vendors’ own pages

Sardine: Does Sardine do document verification?

It focuses on device, behavioural and transaction signals, and integrates identity verification providers rather than being one. Treat it as complementary to a KYC vendor.

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.

Sardine: What does it need from us to work?

An SDK in your web and mobile applications plus transaction feeds. Without the client side collector you lose the signals that differentiate it.

Soketi: Do I need to change my client code?

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

Sardine: Is pricing published?

No. It is quoted, typically per session or per monthly active user with an annual volume commitment.

Soketi: What does it cost?

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

Soketi: What are people moving to?

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

Share

Related pages

More on Sardine

More on Soketi

Keep looking

Other head to heads