Stream vs. Vonage
Compare Video APIs across quality, scale, reliability, price, and what each vendor offers beyond video.
- 4Kvs. 1080pMaximum resolution
- 100K+vs. 15,000Participants in one live session
- $1.50vs. $4.10Price per 1,000 participant minutes, HD
- 99.999%vs. 99.99%Uptime SLA
The short answer.
Stream is the stronger choice for video apps that need to scale, and for teams that want chat, activity feeds, and AI moderation from the same vendor. Its video API runs at up to 4K, supports 100K+ viewers per call, and costs $1.50 per 1,000 participant minutes at HD, well under half of Vonage's $4.10 flat rate. Media servers run in 13+ countries on six continents, Vision Agents adds real-time voice and video AI agents, and Agent Skills let AI coding agents build with Stream. Enterprise plans include a 99.999% uptime SLA.
Vonage may make more sense if you need desktop SDKs for Windows or Linux, regional media zones in APAC, or video alongside traditional voice and SMS telco APIs from a telecom provider. Its In-App Messaging product was discontinued, it has no activity feeds product, and its moderation tools are participant controls only.
Side-by-side.
Who builds with each platform.
Stream's logos span 2,000+ global apps, with video customers ranging from large community apps like Patreon and Care.com to app ecosystems like Lokal with 100M+ downloads.
Logos are from Vonage's Video API landing page as of October 2026. "None listed" means no logo in that industry is shown.
Chat, video, feeds, and moderation from one vendor.
Video apps often add chat alongside the call, a community feed, and moderation of what people say and show. Stream covers all four. Vonage covers video, with basic in-call text through signaling, so full chat, feeds, and AI moderation would come from other providers.
Video quality and performance.
Both platforms run WebRTC through a media server and adapt quality to each viewer's network. Here's a look at the differences.
"Using Stream allows us a stable platform and prevents folks from needing to use or download an additional app like Zoom or FaceTime."
"It was just a delight to hook up the SDK. It was incredibly easy to achieve a very high quality of video; we were impressed."
Integration and developer experience.
You'll find server SDKs, sample apps, and webhooks with both Stream and Vonage. However, how a call is modeled and what comes with it for chat and phone differ.
"The docs were super helpful. They were structured in a way that made it easy to understand what was required at each step."
"Stream's documentation and support were instrumental in our smooth transition."
Customization.
Both platforms let you change most of the call experience. Stream gives you components to modify, and Vonage gives you lower-level hooks plus a few purpose-built tools.
"Stream was willing to listen to our tech stack and understand what we needed."
Developer support and AI tooling.
Stream's support and tooling start earlier in the plan ladder, while Vonage's 24/7 coverage and designated engineer are available on plans that start at $1,650 per month.
"I use AI a lot when building, and between that and Stream's docs, I could figure out what I needed without having to jump through hoops or spend days on Stack Overflow."
Pricing.
Both vendors bill by usage. Stream's pay-as-you-go plan charges per participant minute at the highest quality a user publishes or receives, and Enterprise adds volume discounts and a 99.999% SLA. Vonage charges $0.0041 per participant minute at any resolution, with no pricing tiers for core video; advanced features are per-minute add-ons or monthly subscriptions.
Vonage calls
$4.10
per 1,000 participant minutes
Any resolution; covers up to 25 active publishers
Vonage recording
$36.30
per 1,000 minutes
HD composed archives
Stream calls
$1.50
per 1,000 participant minutes
At HD; $0.30 for audio only
Stream recording
$6.00
per 1,000 minutes
At HD, billed by call minute
Prices verified October 2026 from Vonage's website.
Free credits.
Stream gives $100 in credits every month on every plan. Vonage gives a one-time trial of 75,000 participant minutes, plus 25,000 for advanced features, valid for 12 months.
Add-ons.
Stream bills add-ons per use: noise cancellation is $0.30 and RTMP is $15.00 per 1,000 minutes. Vonage adds monthly subscriptions on top of per-use fees: Advanced Insights API $550, Enterprise Environment $1,100, and encryption options from $550.
Example: recorded HD calls.
Say you run 300 one-hour calls a month with 5 participants each, recorded in HD, with everything billed at HD. That's 90,000 participant minutes and 18,000 recorded minutes. On Stream, calls cost $135 and recording costs $108; after the $100 monthly credit, the total is $143. On Vonage, calls cost $369 and HD composed recording costs about $653, for a total of about $1,022.
- $143 Calls at $1.50 and HD recording at $6.00 per 1,000 minutes, less the $100 monthly credit
- $369 Calls, $4.10 per 1,000 participant minutes
- $653 HD composed recording, $36.30 per 1,000 minutes
Full HD: if participants tip into Full HD, the same example costs about $278 on Stream, about a quarter of Vonage's $1,022.
Migrating Vonage to Stream.
Vonage discontinued In-App Messaging on April 30, 2026. If your app's chat ran on Vonage's Client SDK and Conversation API, Stream Chat covers the same features, and Stream offers free migration support for 30 days.
What carries over
How it works
Map conversations to channels
Create a Stream channel for each Vonage conversation
Rebuild the chat screen
Use Stream's UI components or build your own on the SDK
Import your history
Optional: Import conversations with the Stream CLI
Switch over
Ship the update with Stream Chat
Video
There's no data to export, because Vonage sessions don't persist between calls. The work is in your code. Stream's video audit skill lets your coding agent read your Vonage Video integration and report what moving would involve: every integration point by file and line with its Stream equivalent, the behavior changes a find-and-replace would miss, what drives your cost, and a phased plan that includes running both platforms while mobile users update. It also runs general checks, such as token security, error handling, and reconnects.
The skill is plain markdown with no scripts, and its instructions limit the agent to reading your files and writing one report. Web apps get a full audit; iOS, Android, and React Native get a platform-level analysis.
To try it, copy the skill into your agent's skills folder and ask: "Audit the video integration in this project."
Frequently asked questions.
Yes. Vonage discontinued In-App Messaging in April 2026, and Stream offers free migration support for teams moving from another chat provider, including bi-directional webhook sync, data import and export assistance, and engineering help for a zero-downtime switch.
Teams moving from Vonage Video can rebuild calls on Stream Video's SDKs, which cover video calls, audio rooms, and livestreaming, and keep chat and video on the same users and authentication. Talk to our team about your migration.
Stream's video API is HIPAA-ready: Stream signs a Business Associate Agreement (BAA) for video, available by contacting Stream's sales team, and its chat and video APIs can be covered under a single BAA.
With Stream, you can add end-to-end encryption to calls at no extra charge and save recordings and transcripts to your own cloud storage. Your app becomes HIPAA-compliant when it's configured correctly and paired with your own policies, risk assessments, and staff training.
Stream keeps large audiences in real time. Stream Video delivers livestreams over WebRTC with sub-500 ms latency to more than 100,000 concurrent viewers, and its published benchmark held 0% packet loss and 4 ms jitter on a 1080p stream at that scale.
Vonage supports up to 15,000 real-time viewers; beyond that, viewers move to HLS at 15-20 seconds of delay or Low-Latency HLS at 4-6 seconds. For events where viewers chat, react, or ask questions live, that delay means the audience falls out of sync with the stage.
Try Stream free.
$100 in video credits every month, on every plan.
Stream.io, Inc. references third-party trademarks only to identify vendors for factual comparison, consistent with nominative fair use. All trademarks remain the property of their owners. Pricing and features checked October 2026 from each vendor's public pages. Spot something out of date? Email compare@getstream.io.