New usage metrics and more self serve tiers for easy push notification scaling with Beams

We’ve been making some changes to give Pusher Beams a big upgrade through 2020. You might have seen our announcements for recent feature releases including:

• Key rotation with no downtime for additional security
• A new interactive Quick Start guide in the dashboard
• Debug publisher updates from the dashboard port
• Web browser notifications with Beams

This week, we changed the way we measure Beams usage. We’ve seen huge uptake in usage this year, especially with the addition of web notifications. Beams is the perfect solution for users who need a fully managed service which can scale their notifications hassle-free with fully transparent delivery. We want to help our users to understand their user base growth so they can successfully take advantage of the full scope of Beams.

What’s changing?

Calculating usage

Beams usage was previously based on the number of Monthly Active Devices. As of today, we calculate Beams usage by taking the sum of concurrent Subscribers across all of a users’ Beams instances.

What are subscribers?
In short, a Beams Subscriber is a device registered to receive Beams notifications from your instance(s).

All push notification gateways provide a secret token for each device (Android device, iOS device, web browser) you want to publish to. When you start the SDK (by calling the .start method) the device will register its token with Beams. Each of these devices is a counted as a “subscriber”.

Why has this metric changed?
1. This correlates more strongly with the app usage metrics visible in the App/Play store dashboards, meaning users can align our plan metrics with the total install base, making it easier to estimate usage changes.

2. We can also display this in a more meaningful way in the Pusher dashboard, so you can plan usage changes with confidence.

3. This sets the scene for a single invoicing system for both Pusher Beams and Channels. If you haven’t been using the two products together, find out why they are a perfect complement for realtime communication development here.

We’ve been in touch to let all users know exactly what the new metrics will mean for them. If you have any questions, feel free to reach out to our customer support team.

New plans for easier growth

Secondly, we’ve added two new self-serve tiers to the Beams pricing plans. The Startup plan ($29) and the new growth-level Business plan ($199). Customers on the old $399 plan, previously named Business, will now be considered Premium.

These tiers make it much easier to start scaling your Beams usage. Check out the limits for the new plans on our pricing page.

Automated limits

We’re also introducing automated limits messages on Beams. We’ll now send you an automated email each day you pass your usage limits, so users can keep track of how you’re scaling, and will know when they’re ready to level up.

We’ve created some resources for Beams users to make the most of these changes:

• Check out this guide on how to easily prune inactive subscribers so that you can avoid being charge for subscribers who aren’t receiving notifications.

If you’re interested in starting out with Beams push notifications, take a look at our use cases and sign up to start building for free today!