Novu

Novu is an open source communication infrastructure platform, positioned as an alternative to OneSignal and Courier, that gives products and AI agents a single API and conversation model for reaching users across channels. It covers two related use cases: multi-channel notification delivery for products (Inbox, Email, SMS, Push, Chat), and Agent Communication Infrastructure (ACI), which connects existing agents to platforms like Slack, Microsoft Teams, Telegram, and WhatsApp. Both share the same workflow engine and provider integrations, so a team that adopts Novu for product notifications does not need a separate system when it later builds an agent that also needs to talk to users. The project has been recognized publicly, including a Golden Kitty Award on Product Hunt and a top spot on Hacker News.

Key features

• Unified notification API: A single API sends notifications across Inbox/In-App, Email, SMS, Push, and Chat instead of integrating a separate provider SDK per channel.
• Embeddable Inbox component: A real-time <Inbox /> React component adds an in-app notification center without building the UI from scratch, with React Native, Vue, and Angular SDKs planned.
• Workflow engine with digests: Notification workflows support branching and per-channel conditions, and a digest engine batches multiple notifications into a single message rather than spamming users with one alert per event.
• No-code email editor: Transactional and marketing emails can be composed through a visual editor rather than hand-coded templates, reducing the need for a developer to ship every copy change.
• Agent Communication Infrastructure (ACI): Connects any existing agent, built with Claude Managed Agents, AI SDK, LangGraph, or a custom stack, to Slack, Microsoft Teams, Telegram, WhatsApp, email, and an in-app inbox through one bidirectional conversation model.
• Broad provider coverage: 19 email providers alone are supported, including Amazon SES, Braze, Brevo, Mailgun, Mailjet, MailerSend, and custom SMTP, alongside separate provider lists for SMS, push, and chat.
• User-controlled preferences: An embeddable preferences component lets end users manage which channels and notification types they receive without contacting support.

How it works

Novu normalizes inbound messages from every connected channel into one conversation shape, routes them to the application's workflow or agent, and sends replies back out through the originating channel, so integration happens once instead of per-platform. For ACI specifically, this means an agent built once can appear as a teammate in Slack, Telegram, or email without the developer writing a webhook handler for each surface, and the same conversation threading and reactions behavior carries across channels. Preferences and per-user channel settings are exposed through the same embeddable preferences component so end users can manage their own notification settings without a support ticket.

Getting started

Novu Connect (npx novu@latest connect) demonstrates ACI by wiring an existing Claude Managed Agent into Slack, Telegram, or Email in under two minutes according to the project. For the product notification use case, creating a free account on the Novu dashboard and following the setup instructions there is the standard entry point, after which the @novu/react and @novu/js SDKs handle the embeddable Inbox on the frontend.