Sendbird
Depends
Confidence: Medium
Buy if you're a funded product team embedding chat, voice, or AI support agents at serious scale.
Comparison
Sendbird vs Rocket.Chat
Sendbird and Rocket.Chat both land on Depends.
Rocket.Chat
Depends
Confidence: Medium
Buy if you're a government, defense, or regulated organization needing air-gapped, sovereign messaging with RBAC and E2EE.
| Compare | Sendbird | Rocket.Chat |
|---|---|---|
| Verdict | Depends | Depends |
| Best for | Apps embedding in-app chat at scale | Government and defense agencies |
| Who it's not for | MVPs and hobby projects . heavy SDK, sales-led pricing | Small teams wanting a simple Slack replacement |
| Privacy | Public security program (security docs, ISO mentions, vulnerability submission form); a few third-party package flags exist.⁹ | Strong posture: end-to-end encryption, RBAC, air-gapped deployment, WCAG 2.1 AA conformance; one published CVE. |
| Support quality | No usable evidence in sources | No evidence in sources reviewed |
| Public sentiment | Users average 4.5/5 on G2 and generally praise the chat APIs, while some developers criticize pricing and prefer rivals' documentation.¹ | Users average ~4.3/5, praising solid chat, channels, and document sharing while criticizing search and Slack-parity gaps. |
| Biggest gotcha | Malicious-package flags exist for Sendbird-related npm packages . verify official SDKs only.⁹ | Most tier pricing is hidden behind 'contact sales' . no public numbers in sources14 |
Pick Sendbird when
- Apps embedding in-app chat at scale
- Enterprises adding AI support agents
- Teams wanting chat + voice via one SDK
- Funded startups with dedicated engineers
When Sendbird is not a fit
- MVPs and hobby projects . heavy SDK, sales-led pricing
- No-code or small teams without developers
- Anyone needing just a simple live-chat widget
- Cost-sensitive teams at high MAU . rivals undercut
Pick Rocket.Chat when
- Government and defense agencies
- Critical infrastructure and healthcare
- Teams replacing Skype for Business Server
- Orgs needing on-prem or air-gapped deployment
When Rocket.Chat is not a fit
- Small teams wanting a simple Slack replacement
- Non-technical teams with no admin or ops capacity
- Anyone who needs polished search or huddles
- Companies without compliance or data-sovereignty requirements
Sources
review
- Sendbird Pricing (2026): A Complete Breakdowncometchat.comreview
- Chat API pricing planssendbird.comofficial
- Sendbird's Starter plan for 25K MAUgetstream.ioreview
review
- Sendbird raises $100M at a $1B+ valuationtechcrunch.comnews
review
- Reddit's new chat is based on Matrixreddit.comnews
- Malicious Package in com.sendbird.callssecurity.snyk.iosecurity
- Malicious Code In Sendbird-moderation-dashboardsca.analysiscenter.veracode.comsecurity
- The Untold SendBird Misconfigurationsmedium.comsecurity
- Sendbird customer storiessendbird.comofficial
- Rocket.Chat homepagerocket.chatofficial
- Rocket.Chat product security pagerocket.chatofficial
- RocketChat/Rocket.Chat on GitHubgithub.comofficial
- Introducing Secure CommsOS (blog)rocket.chatofficial