🚀 Novu | Open-Source Notification Infrastructure
Source: Dev.to
Overview
Building notification systems from scratch is time‑consuming, complex, and repetitive. Every modern application needs emails, SMS, push notifications, in‑app inboxes, and real‑time updates — but maintaining all of this independently is a nightmare.
Novu is a powerful open‑source notification infrastructure that unifies email, SMS, push, chat, and in‑app notifications under a single API — complete with workflow automation, real‑time delivery, and embeddable UI components.
Key Features
- ✅ Unified Notification API – Send email, SMS, push, chat & in‑app messages via one API
- ✅ Embeddable Notification Center – Drop‑in real‑time inbox UI with read/unread status
- ✅ Workflow & Routing Engine – Channel priority, fallbacks & conditional logic
- ✅ Digest & Scheduling System – Batch notifications to reduce noise
- ✅ User Preferences Management – Full control over channels & frequency
- ✅ Real‑Time Updates – WebSocket‑powered instant delivery
- ✅ Open‑Source & Self‑Hostable – MIT‑licensed, deploy anywhere
Tech Stack & Architecture
Backend
- 💻 Node.js + TypeScript – Core backend
- 🧩 Express / NestJS – API framework
- 📦 MongoDB – Notification storage
- ⚡ Redis + BullMQ – Queues & background jobs
- 🔌 WebSocket / Socket.io – Real‑time delivery
- 📨 Handlebars – Email templating
Frontend
- 🎨 React – Dashboard & inbox UI
- 💠 Tailwind CSS / CSS Modules – Styling
- 📘 Storybook – UI component development
DevOps & Infrastructure
- 🐳 Docker & Docker Compose
- 🔁 CI/CD Pipelines
- 🌐 REST + WebSocket Architecture
Supported Provider Integrations
- Email: SendGrid, Mailgun, AWS SES, Postmark, SMTP
- SMS: Twilio, Vonage, Plivo, SNS
- Push: Firebase Cloud Messaging, Expo, APNS, Pushpad
- Chat: Slack, Discord, Microsoft Teams
Why Use Novu?
- 🔹 Eliminate duplicate notification logic
- 🔹 Standardize workflows across channels
- 🔹 Save massive development time
- 🔹 Scale notifications reliably
- 🔹 Use ready‑made UI components
GitHub Repo & Documentation
https://reactjsguru.com/repos/mastering-modern-notification-systems-with-novu?utm_source=devto&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=repo_post (maintained by NovuHQ)
💬 Would you build your own notification system or rely on an open‑source infrastructure like Novu? Let’s discuss!