Knock is developer-first messaging infrastructure that provides APIs and SDKs for engineering teams to build custom notification systems. Appcues is a product adoption platform designed for product teams to create in-app guides, collect user feedback, and analyze product usage.

Knock focuses on transactional product notifications and programmatic messaging workflows across multiple channels, while Appcues specializes in in-app product tours, tooltips, and product analytics.

While Appcues can send in-app messages, it's primarily built for product adoption and user onboarding flows. Developers often find Appcues's workflow builder limiting for complex notification logic, whereas Knock provides programmatic control through APIs and code-based workflows designed specifically for transactional product and customer messaging use cases.

Yes, Knock provides native in-app messaging components and SDKs that enable you to build custom in-app experiences. Unlike Appcues, which provides pre-built guides and tooltips, Knock gives you complete control over the design and functionality of your in-app messaging, allowing you to build priority inboxes, multiple feeds, and toast notifications that match your product's design system.

Unlike Appcues, which prioritizes ease of use for product and marketing teams, Knock is purpose-built for developers, so initial setup requires some technical involvement.

From there, non-technical users can easily create messaging workflows, manage notification templates, edit and send one-time messages, ship in-app messaging, and view analytics without any developer involvement.

Appcues offers extensive product analytics for feature usage and user engagement. Knock also provides extensive engagement analytics across channels, plus end-to-end observability for delivery tracking, message debugging, and API logs.

Knock is built as infrastructure to handle billions of notifications with guaranteed delivery and idempotency. While Appcues can handle large volumes, it's optimized for in-app guides and product tours rather than real-time, event-driven notifications at scale.

Appcues primarily focuses on in-app messaging and guides, while Knock supports email, push, SMS, in-app notifications, and chat apps like Slack and Microsoft Teams. Only Knock allows integration flexibility with 25+ messaging providers, allowing teams to take advantage of unique benefits of individual services.

For example, AWS-native companies can save costs by using Amazon SES to send transactional emails or use Twilio's infrastructure to reach 180+ countries via SMS.

Unlike Appcues, Knock also provides native integrations with chat apps, like Slack, Microsoft Teams, and WhatsApp, plus webhooks for custom channels. Knock's channel management is API-driven, while Appcues uses a visual interface.

Yes, many companies use both platforms. It's common to see engineering teams using Knock to handle transactional messaging (alerts, updates, collaboration messages) while product teams use Appcues to manage in-app guides and product tours.

However, this separation can lead to inconsistent messaging over time, and using two systems ends up costing more than just using Knock to handle all product and customer messaging.

Knock typically offers more cost-effective pricing for engineering teams building notification systems. While Appcues requires tiered subscriptions based on seats and features, Knock provides transparent usage-based pricing starting at $0 for the first 10,000 notifications, making it accessible for startups and growing companies, with volume discounts for larger enterprise organizations.

All plans include unlimited data ingestion and unlimited channels with no onboarding or service fees, and overages are only incurred by volume of sent messages.

Both platforms offer enterprise compliance features. Knock provides SOC 2 Type 2 certification and supports GDPR/CCPA requirements. Appcues offers similar compliance but typically requires enterprise contracts.

Knock's infrastructure approach gives engineering teams more control over data handling.

Knock is designed for rapid implementation by developers, with most teams shipping notifications within hours using pre-built components. Appcues typically requires weeks of migration, configuration, and training for product teams.

If your engineering team needs to ship quickly, Knock's developer experience provides faster time-to-value.

Most engineering teams migrate from Appcues to Knock within 2-4 weeks, depending on notification complexity. Knock's responsive support team help accelerate the process.

The investment pays off quickly through improved developer productivity and reduced maintenance.