How to migrate from Twilio to Sinch

Twilio is a publicly traded customer engagement platform offering communications APIs for SMS, voice, email, and more. Sinch is a publicly traded cloud communications platform covering messaging, voice, and email APIs. On the messaging.dev Score, Twilio rates 88/100 and Sinch 92/100 — this guide walks through what actually changes at the API level when you move between them.

What changes when you move

Channels you gain, none you lose. Both platforms cover SMS, MMS, RCS, WhatsApp, voice, and email, so no channel disappears in the move. Sinch adds four channels Twilio’s dataset does not list: Viber, Facebook Messenger, Telegram, and Apple Messages for Business.

Compliance and residency are effectively a match. Both are aligned with GDPR, ISO 27001, SOC 2, and HIPAA, and both offer US and EU servers with data-residency choice. Sinch lists more additional regions (APAC, Australia, Brazil) versus Twilio’s Australia.

Pricing, credit, sandbox, docs. Both use pay-as-you-go pricing with volume and committed-use options. Sinch’s listed US SMS starting price is approximately $0.0075 per segment versus Twilio’s $0.0079 (both plus carrier fees). Both offer free developer credit, a self-serve sandbox, and high-quality docs — though Twilio specifies a $15 trial credit while Sinch’s amount is unspecified in the dataset.

SDKs and protocols. The two share Node.js, Python, PHP, Java, and C# SDKs. Twilio additionally ships Ruby and Go SDKs that Sinch does not — if your sending code uses those, you’ll move to the REST API or a different SDK. Sinch adds SMPP alongside REST and SMTP. Country coverage is 180 (Twilio) versus 150 (Sinch).

How the request format differs

Twilio’s quickstart:

curl -X POST 'https://api.twilio.com/2010-04-01/Accounts/ACXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX/Messages.json' \
  --data-urlencode 'To=+15551234567' \
  --data-urlencode 'From=+15005550006' \
  --data-urlencode 'Body=Hello from Twilio' \
  -u ACXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX:your_auth_token

Sinch’s quickstart:

curl -X POST 'https://us.sms.api.sinch.com/xms/v1/YOUR_SERVICE_PLAN_ID/batches' \
  -H 'Authorization: Bearer YOUR_API_TOKEN' \
  -H 'Content-Type: application/json' \
  -d '{"from":"+15005550006","to":["+15551234567"],"body":"Hello from Sinch"}'

Three things change:

• Endpoint. You move from https://api.twilio.com/2010-04-01/Accounts/{AccountSid}/Messages.json to https://us.sms.api.sinch.com/xms/v1/{service_plan_id}/batches. Twilio keys the path on your Account SID; Sinch keys it on a service plan ID.
• Authentication. Twilio uses HTTP Basic auth with the Account SID as username and the Auth Token as password (the -u flag). Sinch uses a Bearer token passed in the Authorization header.
• Payload. Twilio sends form-urlencoded fields; Sinch sends a JSON body (Content-Type: application/json). The recipient To=+15551234567 becomes "to":["+15551234567"] — note it is now a JSON array. The sender From becomes the "from" string, and Body becomes "body".

Migration checklist

1. Create a Sinch account and generate your API token and service plan ID from the dashboard (onboarding is self-serve). See how to start with Sinch for the full quickstart.
2. Map the request fields: To → to (array), From → from, Body → body, and move them from form-urlencoded parameters into a JSON body.
3. Swap the authentication: replace Basic auth (-u SID:token) with an Authorization: Bearer header, and set Content-Type: application/json.
4. Re-point your sending code to the Sinch batches endpoint, substituting your service plan ID into the path.
5. Re-test against Sinch’s sandbox (sandbox is available) before sending live traffic.
6. Update delivery callbacks and webhooks to consume Sinch’s delivery-report format instead of Twilio’s status callbacks.
7. Run both integrations in parallel, comparing delivery outcomes on live traffic.
8. Cut over once Sinch matches your baseline, then decommission the Twilio path.

Watch out for

• No Ruby or Go SDK. Twilio ships official Ruby and Go SDKs; Sinch does not. Code in those languages moves to REST or another SDK.
• Recipient becomes an array. to is a JSON array in Sinch, not a single string — a common source of 400s during migration.
• Unspecified trial credit. Sinch offers free developer credit, but the amount isn’t stated in the dataset, unlike Twilio’s $15.
• Fewer countries listed. Coverage is 150 versus Twilio’s 180 — confirm your destination markets are supported.

For a full side-by-side, see Sinch vs Twilio.