Crystal Blockchain vs Subgraphs vs Streams Comparison | Builder's Guide

Comparison Summary

Crystal Blockchain, Subgraphs and Streams each address unique challenges in the web3 ecosystem, offering complementary strengths for builders. Crystal Blockchain provides AI-powered blockchain intelligence for crypto compliance, investigations, and risk management. The Graph is a decentralized indexing protocol that organizes blockchain data and makes it easily accessible via GraphQL. Quicknode provides fast, reliable, and scalable blockchain infrastructure and developer tools to build and scale onchain applications. Together, these tools serve different but overlapping user needs, making them valuable components in a modern web3 development stack.

	Crystal Blockchain // Web3 Data Tools // Web3 Security Tools // Analytics Tools	Subgraphs // Web3 Developer Tools // Indexing Tools // Web3 Data Tools	Streams // Web3 Developer Tools // Infrastructure Tools // RPC Node Providers // Web3 Data Tools
At a Glance
Composability
Cross-Chain
Customizability
Developer Support
Ease of Integration
Performance
Key Features
Core Capabilities	Verified Entity Database, Multi-Product Ecosystem, Professional Services	Subgraphs, Substreams, Token API	Core RPC API, Streams - Real-Time and Historical Data, Dedicated Clusters, Yellowstone gRPC for Solana, Webhooks and IPFS Gateways
Chain Support	—	+46	+30
Best For	Financial Institutions, DeFi Developers	DeFi Developers, NFT Platform Developers	Infrastructure Developers, DeFi Developers
Pricing
Free Tier	Enterprise	Hosted Service	Free
Paid Features	—	1 paid tiers	2 paid tiers
Custom Plans	Enterprise plans	—	Enterprise plans

Crystal Blockchain

// Web3 Data Tools // Web3 Security Tools // Analytics Tools

Subgraphs

// Web3 Developer Tools // Indexing Tools // Web3 Data Tools

Streams

// Web3 Developer Tools // Infrastructure Tools // RPC Node Providers // Web3 Data Tools

At a Glance

Composability

Cross-Chain

Customizability

Developer Support

Ease of Integration