Same request. Better card.
Most people looking for a Pushover alternative are not unhappy with the delivery — one HTTP request from a cron job is hard to beat. They are unhappy that everything arrives as a sentence. Here is the same alert, sent both ways.
curl -s \ --form-string "token=$APP_TOKEN" \ --form-string "user=$USER_KEY" \ --form-string "message=Revenue $14,892, up 12.4%" \ https://api.pushover.net/1/messages.json
curl -X POST https://getpanes.com/api/v1/feed/items \
-H "Authorization: Bearer mp_…" \
-H "Content-Type: application/json" \
-d '{
"type": "kpi",
"publisher": "Stripe",
"label": "Yesterday",
"data": {
"metric": "Revenue",
"value": "$14,892",
"delta": "+12.4%",
"deltaPos": true
}
}'One endpoint, one bearer token. The card renders itself.
Where each one wins.
| Panes | Pushover | |
|---|---|---|
| Message format | 16 typed card types — prices, charts, KPIs, headlines, weather, polls, code | Plain text, with a title and an optional link |
| Setup | API token, one HTTP request | API token and user key, one HTTP request |
| Price | Free to read · 100 panes/month free · $9.99/mo unlimited | One-off purchase per platform, then unlimited |
| Platform | iOS only today — no Android app yet | iOS, Android and desktop |
| MCP connector for Claude | Yes — add as a connector, Claude publishes straight to your feed | No |
| Shape of the feed | A finite stack you read once and clear | An endless notification list |
Three reasons, honestly.
The data survives the trip
A number you send as text arrives as text. Send it as a KPI and it arrives as a number with a delta, formatted the same way every time, legible at a glance from the lock screen.
Agents can publish to it
Panes is an MCP server. Claude and other agents connect once and post their own cards — a research digest, a build result, a summary — without you writing the integration.
It is designed to end
A notification list grows forever. A Panes feed is a finite stack: you read it, you clear it, and when it is empty you are done. Nothing is left waiting for you.
Before you switch.
- Is Panes free?
- Yes, to a point. Reading your feed is free forever and the free tier covers 100 published panes a month, which is plenty for a handful of scripts. Unlimited publishing is $9.99 a month.
- Can I use it with Claude?
- Yes. Panes is an MCP server, so you add it to Claude as a connector with a one-click login and Claude publishes cards to your feed directly — no glue code. Anything else that can make an HTTP request works the same way with an API token.
- Is there an Android app?
- Not yet. Panes is iOS-only today. The API is open, so you can publish to your feed from anywhere, but reading it currently needs an iPhone. If you are on Android, Pushover is the better choice right now.
- How do I migrate from Pushover?
- Swap the endpoint and the auth header. Pushover takes a form post with a token, a user key and a message string; Panes takes a JSON post with a bearer token, a type and a data object. If you only ever send plain text, use the news or quote type and you are done in one line.
Give your scripts a better card.
Free to read. 100 panes a month on the free tier. iOS.