Touchstream ↔ UnifyCast
Looking for a Touchstream alternative?
Both are built for OTT operations teams, but they start from different ideas. Don't choose without knowing the difference.
When you should choose them
We wrote this page to help you decide, not to win the comparison. In the cases below, the honest answer is them.
If your workflow is AWS end to end
They have native integrations for Elemental, MediaLive and MediaPackage, and purchasing runs through AWS Marketplace. In that chain, setup really is fast.
If you want global vantage points with nothing to install
They offer around 100 ready geographic monitoring points. With us you place the points yourself — you keep control, but the work is also yours.
If CDN log analytics and ISP/ASN visibility are the priority
CDN MetricStream and ISP Insights do exactly that, and we have no equivalent. Last-mile ASN breakdown is a problem they genuinely solve well.
If you want a shared data table with your CDNs
They have data-sharing arrangements with CDN providers, so you and the CDN look at the same screen. That takes relationships and isn't easy to copy.
Line-by-line comparison
| Touchstream | UnifyCast | |
|---|---|---|
| Where it runs | Cloud (SaaS) | Your own servers |
| Where the data sits | The vendor's infrastructure | Inside your organisation |
| Billing | AWS Marketplace | Corporate invoicing |
| Video quality analysis | No decoding — encoder CMSD data or inference from metadata | Decodes frames: freeze, black, silence, EBU R128, blockiness |
| Transport (UDP/SRT, TS) | Integration with your existing probes | Direct measurement: TR 101 290 P1/P2/P3, MDI/IAT/MLR |
| Supported formats | HLS / HSS / DASH | HLS / DASH / UDP / SRT |
| Vantage points per stream | Up to 5 PoPs | No limit — extra points are free |
| Social live streams | — | YouTube, X, Twitch |
| VOD quality control | — | Yes |
| Notification channels | Email, SMS, Slack, PagerDuty, Webhook | Email, Slack, Telegram, Webhook, PagerDuty, SNMP, recording |
The three clearest differences
Measurement, or inference?
Touchstream presents not decoding video as a deliberate choice: quality data comes either from the encoder's own declaration (CMSD) or is inferred from monitoring metadata. That is cheap and scales fast. But if the encoder's output differs from what it declares, nobody sees the difference. We decode the frame and look.
Does data leave your organisation?
Touchstream is cloud-based and billing runs through your AWS account. If you operate under public-broadcasting rules, data-protection constraints or a security policy that forbids outbound data, that alone decides it. UnifyCast runs entirely on your infrastructure and needs no internet connection.
Which way does multi-CDN push your cost?
Touchstream counts licences as channels × formats × CDNs; their own example is 20 channels × 2 formats × 2 CDNs = 80 licences. So cost multiplies as you adopt multi-CDN. For us a CDN is not a multiplier: measuring from two CDNs is two services, but adding another vantage point is free.
How licences are counted
Touchstream
Channels × formats × CDNs. Their own example: 20 channels × 2 formats × 2 CDNs = 80 licences.
UnifyCast
Per concurrently monitored service. Extra vantage points, rendition depth, probe count and user count are free.
Sources and accuracy
Information about Touchstream is taken from public product pages on touchstream.media and AWS Marketplace FAQs (August 2026). Products evolve; if you find something inaccurate here, tell us and we'll correct it.