Picking a web push platform feels like a small decision. You paste a snippet, upload a file, send your first few notifications. Then six months go by, you have twenty thousand subscribers, and you realise the small decision was a big one: switching now means rebuilding part of your audience, redoing your automations and retraining your newsroom.
That is why the right questions are worth asking up front, while changing your mind still costs nothing. Pricing pages answer about half of them, and usually the less important half. The rest lives in footnotes, in the documentation, or in the reply you get when you email support a specific question.
Below are ten questions to put to any platform, ours included. For each one: why it matters, what a good answer sounds like, and what a red flag sounds like. Plus a one-line note on how Natom answers, so you can use us as a benchmark or rule us out with your eyes open. If you are still fuzzy on what web notifications actually are, it is worth starting with the basics and coming back.
1. Do you pay per subscriber or per send? And how are subscribers counted?
Why it matters. There are two pricing models. In the first you pay for how many people are subscribed, and then send as many pushes as you like. In the second you pay for how many notifications go out, or some mix of the two. For a site that publishes rarely, the gap is small. For a publisher sending several pushes a day, per-send pricing can multiply the bill at exactly the moment things are going well.
Per-subscriber pricing has its own trap, though: which subscribers get counted. Over time, a share of your list quietly stops existing. The reader switched phones, wiped their browser data, uninstalled the browser. That token will never receive anything again, but if the platform does not remove it, it stays in the count and you pay for it every month.
Good answer. "You pay for active subscribers, pushes are unlimited, and subscribers that stop responding are rechecked and removed."
Red flag. "We count every subscriber you have ever collected", or a vague reply about what happens to dead tokens. If your subscriber number only ever goes up and never down, something is not being cleaned.
Natom: unlimited pushes on every plan, you pay per subscriber, and the count is your active subscribers (subscriptions that are no longer valid get rechecked and removed).
If you want to run the numbers on real scenarios, see how much web push costs.
2. What happens when you go over your plan's limit?
Why it matters. Every plan has a ceiling. The day you cross it is rarely an ordinary day: it is the day a story brought in thousands of new subscribers, which is to say the day push matters most.
Some platforms cut you off instantly, with no warning, once you are over the limit. Others warn you and give you time to decide, and keep everything running in the meantime.
Good answer. "We warn you right away and you get a few days to change plan. You never lose subscribers, and everything resumes as soon as you upgrade."
Red flag. "Sending is suspended once you exceed the limit", or "you are moved to the next tier automatically and billed". The first leaves you silent at the worst moment. The second lets you discover the price change on your invoice.
Natom: an email notice and 5 days of grace in which everything works; then sending and new sign-ups pause until you upgrade. No automatic plan change, no subscribers lost.
3. Does the platform run ads or monetise your subscribers?
Why it matters. Some notification services grow up next to an advertising business, or bolt one on later. That model can be perfectly legitimate, but for a publisher it changes everything. Your subscribers are your audience, gathered on your domain on the strength of your reputation. If someone else can message them, or use their data to sell inventory, that audience is no longer entirely yours.
Ask it plainly: is the part that handles my notifications separate from any advertising product? And right after: is my subscribers' data used for anything other than delivering my pushes?
Good answer. "No. We do not sell ads, we never message your subscribers, and we do not use their data for anything else."
Red flag. Phrases like "monetise your audience" or "advertiser network", or a very generous free tier with no clear explanation of how it pays for itself. If the product is free and you cannot tell what you are paying with, ask.
Natom: the business model is a subscription based on subscriber count; Natom does not track reader browsing and does no profiling.
4. Privacy and GDPR: what gets tracked?
Why it matters. A push needs explicit browser permission, but that is not the end of the story. The platform's script runs on your pages. It might only handle the subscription, or it might collect browsing data, build profiles, and link behaviour across sites. Whatever it collects ends up in your privacy notice and on your list of responsibilities.
Good answer. A short, specific list of what is stored, for example: subscription token, browser, operating system, device, country, and the topics the reader picked. Plus a clear sentence on what is not done.
Red flag. Generic reassurance ("we are GDPR compliant") with no list of data, or features that depend on tracking browsing sold as standard.
Natom: does not track reader browsing; it stores the token, browser, system and device, country and chosen topics. No profiling.
For the full regulatory picture there is a dedicated guide on web push and GDPR.
5. How easy is setup? Is there a WordPress plugin?
Why it matters. Technically every platform asks for the same two things: a JavaScript snippet on your pages and a service worker file at the root of your domain (there is a separate explainer on why it has to live there). The difference is how much work is left to you afterwards, every single day.
On WordPress the real question is not "is there a plugin?" but "what does the plugin do?". A plugin that only drops in the snippet saves you five minutes once. A plugin that lets you send the push from the post editor saves you five minutes every day.
Good answer. "The plugin installs the snippet and service worker, lets you send the push from the post, and works on custom content types too." And it comes with every plan, not only the expensive ones.
Red flag. A plugin locked to the top tiers, or a setup that makes you hand-edit your theme again every time it updates.
Natom: the Natom Push plugin, available on every plan, installs the snippet and service worker, sends from the editor with the featured image, and works on any public content type you enable, WooCommerce products included.
The step-by-step is in web push on WordPress.
6. Can readers choose their topics?
Why it matters. The most common reason people unsubscribe is not one bad push. It is the feeling of getting things they do not care about. If your site covers several subjects, the sports reader does not want politics, and the other way round.
Platforms handle this in two ways. In the first, you decide who gets what, based on segments you build. In the second, the reader chooses, on a preferences screen. The second is more respectful and usually works better, because readers know what they signed up for.
Good answer. "Right after subscribing, the reader picks topics, and can change them any time from a link." Even better if the platform states that the reader's choice is never quietly altered.
Red flag. Preferences exist but the reader has no way back to them, or segmentation is publisher side only and built on tracked behaviour.
Natom: the reader picks categories or tags after accepting and changes them from the Manage notifications link; their choice rules, and anyone who does not choose gets everything.
7. What can you automate: RSS, drafts, scheduling, recurring pushes?
Why it matters. A newsroom publishing ten stories a day cannot hand-write ten pushes. But full automation has the opposite risk: a push at three in the morning, five notifications in an hour, minor stories blasted to everyone.
Four things to ask. RSS: can every new article become a push, and can I choose between sending automatically and getting a draft to review? Guardrails: is there a daily cap, are there quiet hours, can I filter by category? Scheduling: can I set a date and time for any push? Recurring: can I set up a fixed push, every day at the same time, in the right time zone?
Good answer. All four, with the option to choose automatic or manual case by case.
Red flag. RSS that only sends automatically, with no caps or quiet hours. Or automations that exist only through the API, meaning only if you have a developer.
Natom: RSS in automatic mode (daily cap, quiet hours, category filter) or draft mode already routed by category, plus scheduling for any push and recurring pushes with a time zone. Scheduling and RSS start on the Starter plan.
8. Do the stats count real impressions or just pushes "sent"?
Why it matters. "Sent" means the platform handed the notification to the browser's push service. It does not mean the reader saw it. The phone may be off, the token may have expired, the system may have bundled the notification away. A CTR calculated on sent pushes and one calculated on displayed pushes tell two different stories, and if you are comparing platforms you need to know which one you are reading.
Good answer. Separate numbers for every campaign: sent, impressions (notifications actually shown), clicks, CTR. Plus subscriber growth, prompt acceptance rate, and breakdowns by country, browser and device. If any figure is estimated, the platform says so.
Red flag. A single number labelled "delivered" with no explanation of what it measures, or full stats only on paid plans.
Natom: sent, impressions, clicks and CTR for every campaign, on the Free plan too; above 5,000 subscribers impressions are estimated from a sample, and we say so.
9. How is delivery handled: priority, TTL, iOS?
Why it matters. Two identical pushes can arrive very differently depending on how they are sent. Priority decides whether an Android phone with the screen off surfaces the notification now or holds it back. TTL (time to live) decides how long a notification waits if the device is offline: this morning's news delivered tomorrow is worse than not delivered at all.
Then there is iOS. On iPhone, web push only works once the reader has added the site to the Home Screen, from iOS 16.4 onwards. That is Apple's rule, not the platform's, and nobody can get around it. A serious platform tells you up front.
Good answer. "High priority, a TTL is set, and on iPhone it works once the site is added to the Home Screen, here is how."
Red flag. Promises of "100% guaranteed delivery" or "works on every iPhone out of the box". Nobody can guarantee total delivery: devices switched off for weeks and expired tokens are a fact of life.
Natom: high priority so pushes arrive even with the screen off on Android, a TTL so they are delivered when the device comes back online, and the iPhone details are in web push on iOS.
10. If you leave one day, who owns the subscribers?
Why it matters. Nobody asks this at the start and everybody asks it at the end. The browser grants notification permission to your domain, not to the platform. But subscription tokens are tied to the keys of the platform that collected them, and they cannot always be carried over as they are.
So ask two things. First: if I leave, can I export my data? Second: if I am coming from another service, what do I need to do to keep my audience, and will readers see the browser prompt again?
Good answer. A written migration guide, for moving in and moving out, honest about what transfers and what needs to be collected again.
Red flag. "We import all your subscribers in one click" with no explanation of how, or total silence on leaving. A platform that makes it easy to get in and hard to get out is telling you something.
Natom: there is a migration guide; permission belongs to the domain, so readers do not see the browser prompt again, and the guide explains step by step how to re-collect or migrate your old service's subscribers.
How to use these questions
No platform needs to ace all ten. What you need is to know which ones matter to you. A personal blog will care mostly about price and simplicity (questions 1, 2 and 5). A publisher with many sections will look hard at reader preferences, automation and stats (6, 7 and 8), and for them question 3 is not a detail, it is a deal breaker. A shop will focus on setup and delivery (5 and 9).
One practical tip: ask your questions in writing, by email to support, and keep the replies. A written answer is worth more than any marketing page, and a year from now you will remember exactly what you were told. If your site is a news outlet or a blog with lots of daily posts, there are more criteria in push for publishers.
The printable checklist
| # | Topic | What to ask |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Pricing | Per subscriber or per send? Are only active subscribers counted? Are dead ones removed? |
| 2 | Limit | Over the ceiling, do pushes stop or keep going? |
| 3 | Ads | Does the platform sell ads or use my subscribers for anything else? |
| 4 | Privacy | Exact list of stored data. Is browsing tracked? |
| 5 | Setup | What does the WordPress plugin do? Is it on every plan? |
| 6 | Preferences | Can readers pick topics and change them later? |
| 7 | Automation | RSS auto or draft, caps, quiet hours, scheduling, recurring? |
| 8 | Stats | Are sent and impressions separate numbers? What is estimated? |
| 9 | Delivery | Priority, TTL, what happens on iPhone? |
| 10 | Exit | Migration guide in and out? What has to be re-collected? |
Frequently asked questions
Is a free platform fine to start with? Yes, as long as you understand how it pays for itself. A free plan with a clear subscriber cap is a normal way to try things out. A completely free service with no limits and no explanation deserves question 3. Natom's Free plan covers up to 1,000 subscribers, no card required.
Is it better to pay per subscriber or per send? It depends on how much you send. If you send a handful of pushes a month, the two models come out about even. If you send several a day, per-subscriber pricing with unlimited pushes is usually more predictable, because the bill does not grow with your newsroom's output.
Can I switch platforms without losing subscribers? Browser permission stays with your domain, so readers will not see the prompt again. But your old service's subscribers still have to be re-collected or migrated following a procedure. Be wary of anyone promising an instant transfer without explaining how.
Does web push work on iPhone? Yes, from iOS 16.4, but only if the reader has added the site to the Home Screen. That is Apple's rule and it applies to every platform.
How many of these questions do I really need to ask? All ten fit in a ten-minute email. Then weigh the answers against your site: for a publisher, ads, preferences and automation matter most; for a small blog, price and setup.
How do I check that the stats are reliable? Ask for the definition of every number. If the platform separates sent from impressions and tells you which figures are estimated, you can compare it with others. If all you get is "delivered", ask exactly what that means.