Telnyx or MessageBird: Which CPaaS Suits You Best?

Choosing a CPaaS provider for your business is no easy task. But when done right, these platforms can support omnichannel communication to help your business automate and streamline its communications.

With so many options for CPaaS providers, it can be difficult to understand which one is the best fit for your business and its communication needs. That’s why we laid out an in-depth comparison of Telnyx and Messagebird, two CPaaS providers with enterprise-grade carrier networks. We’ve outlined the differences in product features, network, numbers, price and API usability to provide you with the information you need to weigh these options and make an informed decision on who to partner with for your global communication needs.

Telnyx VS Messagebird Feature Comparison

Both Telnyx and Messagebird offer Elastic SIP Trunking, Programmable Voice and Messaging APIs to enable business communications. Here are some key differences between the two when it comes to pricing and features, across the four products.

Network Comparison

Every great CPaaS provider starts with a reliable network. While MessageBird and Telnyx both provide enterprise-grade carrier networks, there are a few key differences in their infrastructure and global distribution that greatly affect network reliability and call quality. Let’s take a look at how Telnyx and MessageBird’s networks compare, and the implications that these details may have on your business.

Key Network Reliability Features Explained:

Fully Owned Private Network

When customers use MessageBird, their calls are routed over the public internet, which makes data packets susceptible to many potential disruptions like packet loss, lag, and jitter, which ultimately diminish call quality.

At Telnyx, we’ve resolved this issue by building a private IP network, to pull your traffic off the public web and carry the media across our own fiber. This allows us to ensure that your packets are exposed to as few public hops as possible-- reducing the number of hops means less of the overhead transmission that diminishes call quality, and also provides ease in scaling your communications globally.

Multi-cloud

It’s no surprise that the hosted model of cloud based solutions offers flexibility and scalability, but here’s the catch: not all cloud based solutions are created equally. Let’s take MessageBird, whose network is built on just one cloud provider, which increases the risk of network failure. Meanwhile, the Telnyx network doesn’t rely too heavily on one cloud provider, and our points of presence leverage AWS, Google Cloud and Azure for added redundancy.

Global Points of Presence (PoPs)

Global PoPs help create a distributed network infrastructure so that your Voice traffic enters the network from nearby. More PoPs lead to better call quality because the distance between the end user and the internet backbone causes latency.

Both Telnyx and MessageBird have built PoPs around the globe to bring data closer to users and improve network resiliency, but you can see in the maps below that Telnyx PoPs greatly outnumber those of MessageBird. We’ve strategically architected and positioned our PoPs -- with more to come in South America, Asia, and Australia -- to keep routes direct and ensure high performance connectivity.

MessageBird's network in the US consists of three single-cloud PoPs.

Bottom Line: When it comes to network redundancy and reliability, Telnyx is a clear winner. Starting with the way we’ve built our private network, combined with our global distribution and multi-cloud infrastructure, we are a true internet service provider that delivers high-quality communications to our customers, regardless of platform or device.

Voice Comparison (VoIP)

MessageBird and Telnyx are popular providers of SIP trunking and voice API services to enable next-generation VoIP applications, but their products have some differences. The table below summarizes the key areas where these SIP trunking offerings differ, and the effect these differences have on your business:

Key VoIP Features Explained

Bring Your Own Carrier SIP trunks form a foundational part of any VoIP-enabled communications experience, but they are not a full-stack solution - they must be configured to work seamlessly with your communications infrastructure (like a PBX platform, softphone client or VoIP-enabled desk phone). Depending on your infrastructure and communications stack, these configurations can be extremely complex and lead to hundreds of hours of lost engineering and technical support time during setup and troubleshooting, not to mention frustration for your business from call failures.

While MessageBird largely leaves customers to figure out SIP trunking configurations for themselves (only offering a high-level guide to configure their trunks with PBX platform 3CX), Telnyx offers comprehensive Bring Your Own Carrier documentation, with in-depth and engineer-verified configuration guides for every popular communications platform. In addition, Telnyx offers guides on how to port your existing voice application from Twilio or Plivo to the Telnyx platform by changing just a few lines of code.

Encryption We take data privacy seriously, and that’s why our customers have the option to turn on end-to-end encryption for signaling and media. No encryption for SIP trunking with MessageBird can mean serious security implications for parties sharing information during a call.

Encrypting inbound and outbound calls can be configured easily in the Telnyx portal by editing settings in the SIP Connections tab.

Messaging Comparison (SMS API)

SMS has become the go-to mode of communication for many businesses in the past years, most notably for its high engagement and open rates. The versatility of SMS supports many use cases -- notifications, alerts, customer support, two factor authentication -- across several industries.

Messagebird and Telnyx both offer SMS API in their core product lines which allow customers to configure and build messaging into their applications, but there are some key differences in the APIs. Let’ take a closer look at the feature offerings for Telnyx and MessageBird:

Key SMS Features Explained

Opt-out Messaging With regulatory bodies like TCPA and GDPR enforcing laws to protect customers from unwanted SMS, it’s important to stay on top of compliance. The GDPR states that businesses
must include opt-out links or keywords in every piece of communication, and the fines for violating this regulation comes with a hefty price tag. With MessageBird, API users must build an automatic opt-out flow to give customers the ability to unsubscribe from messages.

Comparatively, Telnyx SMS API makes it easier to comply with opt-out laws by automatically recognizing stop-words and keywords. When Telnyx identifies a stop word, the person's phone number is added to the opt-out list and you will no longer be able to send messages to that number. Any further messages from your account that are sent to a number on the opt-out list will not be processed. Simple differences like this, early on in the user journey can make a huge impact in avoiding GDPR and TCPA violations down the line.

Deliverability

In any SMS or MMS application, deliverability (i.e. the percentage of your sent messages that are actually delivered to their intended recipient) is of utmost importance. If your message deliverability is low, your messages aren't reaching your recipients.

With this in mind, it’s critical that your SMS provider takes proactive steps to provide the highest possible deliverability. While there are steps that you can take as a customer to maximize your deliverability, your provider’s tools can unlock massive amounts of message throughput while keeping your deliverability high.

Telnyx offers a comprehensive suite of tools to maximize your deliverability, including:

• Number Pool to use multiple numbers in an outbound campaign. Using one number to send a high volume of messages can trigger spam filters on underlying SMS carriers, severely reducing deliverability.
• Geomatch to match the area code of the sending number to the recipient number in a number pooling campaign, to increase open rates and further boost deliverability.
• Sticky Sender to ensure messages sent to a customer’s number in a number pooling campaign come from a single sending number - this allows your customer to have a single stream of communication with your business and boosts message engagement.
• Number Lookup tools, to identify and remove any landline or non-SMS-enabled numbers from a campaign recipient list.
• Short Codes pre-approved by underlying SMS carriers for high-throughput texting without the risk of spam filtering.
• Primary and Secondary Webhook URLs to avoid losing inbound messages.
• Delivery Receipts (DLRs) on detailed message detail records (MDRs) to find failed messages and identify low-deliverability patterns.

MessageBird offers far fewer features to ensure the deliverability of your messages. The features that they do offer, like Sticky Sender - which uses the same Sender phone number each time a specific recipient receives an SMS from your web application -- is limited to a few destinations.

Bottom Line: The Telnyx SMS API comes with a comprehensive set of easy programmable tools, to make sure that your messages are delivered the first time, every time. In addition, our smart features like automatic opt-out keywords helps customers stay on top of SMS regulations.

Voice API Comparison

As important as it is to have crystal clear calls with no lag, sometimes these qualities are not enough to help you build exactly what you need to deliver value to your customers. This is why both MessageBird and Telnyx offer out-of-the-box features with their Voice API, to make it easier to create powerful voice applications to enable effective communication for every use case. Let’s take a look at what these features are, and how MessageBird and Telnyx support them.

Key Voice API Features Explained

Conference Call Conference calls are a useful tool, especially in the wake of COVID when previously in person meetings have been moved virtually. Customers with MessageBird unfortunately don’t have access to this feature on their Voice API. With Telnyx, users can integrate conference calling on their applications with ease through the API or portal, with the ability to embed advanced options like mute/unmute, hold/unhold, or placing users in a specific conference.

Caller ID Caller ID significantly improves call connect rates. With MessageBird, your phone number will be displayed to the phone of the individual you are calling (on an outbound call) but the Caller ID Name -- the name associated with your number -- will not be displayed.

Luckily with Telnyx, both Caller ID and Caller ID Name can be activated instantly on the Mission Control Portal, both for inbound and outbound calls. This makes it easier to keep track of communications with your customers.

Bottom Line: With Telnyx Voice API features, you have access to useful, built in tools to get the most out of your communications, all on top of a reliable and resilient network.

Numbers Comparison

Before you start sending or receiving calls and messages, it’s important to have healthy and functional numbers. There are a host of factors that can make the process of searching for, buying, and provisioning numbers easier for users, so let’s take a look at how MessageBird and Telnyx compare in this category.

Key Numbers Features Explained

Number Search Messagebird and Telnyx customers both have the option to search and buy numbers directly from their customer portals, and the two fare pretty equally when comparing the availability of Voice capable numbers. However, when it comes to SMS enabled numbers, Telnyx’s inventory is much larger because we don’t rely on aggregators to provide our numbers.

Let’s take a deeper look at how the number buying process on Messagebird and Telnyx platforms work.

While Messagebird’s dropdown menu for number capabilities only lists SMS and Voice, Telnyx’s search function includes a detailed selection for options including SMS, Voice, Fax, MMS, and Emergency, and offers the option of excluding previously held numbers.

Having the option to specify upfront, the type of numbers that meet your business needs and criteria, allows customers to save time while searching for and buying numbers. Below is a look at Telnyx’s advanced number search option, which gives even further selection options like the ability to choose vanity numbers or consecutive numbers.

Number Porting

Porting numbers between carriers can be a difficult, time intensive process that requires collecting paperwork and waiting around for approval. This accurately describes what the number porting process looks like with Messagebird; costs for porting a Voice number are assessed on a case by case basis which makes it difficult to assess cost beforehand. Additionally, porting Voice numbers with MessageBird takes about one month. The steps for porting from an outside carrier differs between voice numbers, SMS numbers, US/CA numbers and toll-free, and each kind of number requires a different set of paperwork, making the process ever more confusing.

Meanwhile at Telnyx, we created FastPort® to streamline the process to deliver a hassle free number porting experience. Through our user friendly portal or APIs, you can bulk port all of your phone numbers in a few clicks; our automated self service porting also provides real-time data validation and on-demand activation, meaning there’s no waiting period to get your porting process approved. We provide complete transparency from start to finish by giving you the control to schedule your ports ahead of time, edit your requests, and track number status in realtime.

Less time spent porting means you can get building sooner to integrate SMS into your applications. There’s good news on the cost front, too. Telnyx does not charge for port-in fees for US and Canadian numbers, and there is no change when you port-in your numbers that are eligible for FastPort® -- a win-win situation!

Hosted SMS/MMS Hosted SMS allows you to enable SMS/MMS services on numbers that have existing voice services from another provider. The numbers that could also be for landlines that traditionally have never had SMS capabilities. Messagebird doesn’t offer hosted SMS capabilities, making it difficult for customers to add SMS capabilities to their existing numbers. With Telnyx, businesses can place new hosted SMS orders, either through the Mission Control Portal or API, allowing for quick SMS integration to previously voice-only numbers.

Bottom Line: It’s important to have a wide range of numbers to choose from to fit your SMS and Voice needs. With MessageBird, the inventory of global SMS enabled numbers are far more restrictive than with Telnyx. In addition to giving you more options to choose from, our advanced search function makes it easy to search for specific numbers so that you can buy, provision, and start building. Whether it’s buying or porting, we’ve streamlined the process to give you maximum control and flexibility to get things done.

Price Comparison

Price is a key factor in every business decision; especially as your business scales, small differences in costs can start to add up -- let’s compare Telnyx and MessageBird prices across messaging and SIP trunking.

Messaging Pricing

SIP Trunking Pricing

Other Pricing

Bottom Line: MessageBird relies on aggregators for phone numbers and core communications functionality, resulting in higher markups. Because Telnyx maintains complete control over its network and phone numbers, we’re able to cut out the middleman and pass those savings directly to our customers.

Why Developers Choose Telnyx Over MessageBird

Our Simple REST API The Telnyx API and Mission Control Portal was built with developers in mind. Our platform gives you the most control and configurability over your communications, and we’ve made it easy for you to start building in minutes. Our SDKs -- in Python, Java, Node, Ruby, .NET and PHP with more on the way -- and migration tools like Twexit API and TexML are just a few examples of the tools we’ve created to cut down integration time so you can get to market faster.

Developer Friendly Resources With our extensive developer docs, video tutorials, and Slack community of developers, we’ve made it easier for you to find the answers you need without searching too far. And, we offer 24/7 unparalleled support, for when you need it.

Global Reliability Our purpose-built global IP network and licensed carrier status in 25+ countries mean you can build your voice applications to be global first - without needing to worry about local regulations. And, our partnerships with Tier-1 carriers worldwide mean your calls will connect first time, every time. Our global reliability means you’re free to focus on developing creative solutions to fit your communication needs.

Ready to make the switch? Sign up for a Telnyx account today. Or, speak with one of our experts to discuss migration.

Developers Thoughts on Telnyx's Response to Customer Feedback (Reddit)

https://www.reddit.com/r/VOIP/comments/f9yfvf/followup_telnyx_please_implement_two_factor/

Crowd Sourced Reviews: MessageBird vs. Telnyx (G2) https://www.g2.com/compare/messagebird-vs-telnyx