firebase-realtime-io

Now supports TypeScript and CJS both now with ESM!

A tiny wrapper that turns Firebase Realtime Database into a simple Socket.IO-like real-time messaging API. It uses Firebase events (onChildAdded, push, set) internally.

Note: This package is not made by Firebase and is not an official Firebase product.

LICENSE (MIT)

MIT License

Copyright (c) 2025 Izhan

Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy of this software and associated documentation files (the "Software"), to deal in the Software without restriction, including without limitation the rights to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute, sublicense, and/or sell copies of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is furnished to do so, subject to the following conditions:

The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included in all copies or substantial portions of the Software.

THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE AUTHORS OR COPYRIGHT HOLDERS BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM, OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN THE SOFTWARE.

Installation

npm install firebase-realtime-io firebase

or with yarn

yarn add firebase-realtime-io firebase

Usage

1. Import Firebase and firebase-realtime-io

import { initializeApp } from "firebase/app";
import { createFirebaseIO } from "firebase-realtime-io"; // This requires firebase

2. Initialize Firebase

const app = initializeApp({
  apiKey: "YOUR_API_KEY",
  authDomain: "YOUR_AUTH_DOMAIN",
  databaseURL: "YOUR_DATABASE_URL",
  projectId: "YOUR_PROJECT_ID",
  storageBucket: "YOUR_BUCKET",
  messagingSenderId: "YOUR_SENDER_ID",
  appId: "YOUR_APP_ID"
});

3. Create the realtime IO instance

const io = await createFirebaseIO({ app });

4. Example: Send a message

io.emit("chat", { text: "hello world" });

5. Example: Receive messages

io.on("chat", (data) => {
  console.log("Received:", data);
});