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Cybersecurity · head to head

Signicat vs Soketi

Signicat logo

Signicat

Cybersecurity

European digital identity hub connecting national eID schemes

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: Signicat national eID scheme fees are passed through on top of Signicat's own charge, so a single-country business almost always pays less by integrating with the scheme directly.; 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: Signicat covers eID scheme brokering, Soketi covers Pusher protocol compatibility.
  • Prices and features above were last checked on 1 September 2026.

Where they differ

Only the attributes on which Signicat and Soketi actually diverge.

Attributes where Signicat and Soketi differ
AttributeSignicatSoketi
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 Signicat

  • eID scheme brokering
  • Qualified electronic signatures
  • Document verification
  • AML screening
  • Authentication
  • Digital onboarding flows
  • eIDAS compliance

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.

Signicat

  • A lender expanding from Norway into Sweden, Denmark and the Netherlands without four separate eID integrationsnot Soketi
  • An insurer needing eIDAS qualified signatures on policy documents that will hold up in a European courtnot Soketi
  • A bank that wants customers to onboard with their existing national bank ID rather than photographing a passportnot Soketi
  • A public sector body needing cross-border recognition of notified eID schemes under eIDASnot Soketi

Soketi

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

Where each one falls short

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

Signicat

  • National eID scheme fees are passed through on top of Signicat's own charge, so a single-country business almost always pays less by integrating with the scheme directly.
  • Value is concentrated in Northern and Western Europe, and coverage in Southern and Eastern Europe is thinner, so a pan-European rollout still hits gaps requiring document fallback.
  • Pricing is per transaction and quoted, and because scheme rates vary by country the cost per onboarded customer differs materially between markets in ways that complicate unit economics.
  • Each eID scheme connection typically carries its own setup fee and approval process, so adding a country is a project with a lead time rather than a configuration change.
  • Availability is tied to the national schemes, meaning an outage at BankID or MitID stops your onboarding entirely and there is no vendor-side mitigation for it.

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

Signicat

On request
  • Signicat Platform$undefined/year
    • Priced per transaction with national scheme fees passed through
    • Signature and verification products licensed separately
    • Setup fee per eID scheme connected

Soketi

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

Which should you pick?

Choose Signicat if

  • You need eid scheme brokering.
  • You work on Web, iOS, Android.
  • You also want qualified electronic signatures.
Signicat 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 Signicat or Soketi better?
Neither clearly leads. Signicat 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, Signicat or Soketi?
Soketi has a free tier; the other does not. Paid plans start at On request for Signicat and Free for Soketi.
Does Signicat or Soketi run on more platforms?
Signicat 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. Signicat starts at On request.
What is Signicat best used for?
Signicat is most often used for a lender expanding from norway into sweden, denmark and the netherlands without four separate eid integrations, an insurer needing eidas qualified signatures on policy documents that will hold up in a european court, a bank that wants customers to onboard with their existing national bank id rather than photographing a passport, a public sector body needing cross-border recognition of notified eid schemes under eidas. Of those, a lender expanding from norway into sweden, denmark and the netherlands without four separate eid integrations and an insurer needing eidas qualified signatures on policy documents that will hold up in a european court are not what Soketi is typically brought in for.
What can Signicat do that Soketi cannot?
Signicat covers eID scheme brokering, Qualified electronic signatures, Document verification, AML screening. Soketi covers Pusher protocol compatibility, Presence and private channels, Horizontal scaling, App management backends.

Answered from the vendors’ own pages

Signicat: Is this an alternative to a document verification vendor?

Only where national eID exists. In markets with a mature bank ID scheme it is better; elsewhere you fall back to document checks, which Signicat also provides.

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.

Signicat: Do we still pay the eID schemes?

Yes. Scheme fees are passed through in addition to Signicat charges. Ask for the split when comparing to a direct integration.

Soketi: Do I need to change my client code?

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

Signicat: Are signatures legally qualified?

Signicat supports eIDAS qualified electronic signatures, which carry the highest legal standing in the EU, as well as advanced signatures.

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.

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