What are some discord alternatives that we can suggest to our friends? (lemmy.world)

submitted 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago) by FirmDistribution@lemmy.world to c/asklemmy@lemmy.world

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With the recent news about discord asking for face or ID scan, what other alternatives are there that we can recommend to our less tech-savvy friends?

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[-] hexagonwin@lemmy.today 3 points 3 weeks ago

Looked around for a while now, these are the alternatives I found.

Zulip: More like a Slack alternative for an organization/team/group, can be self hosted, seems to be pretty mature and well made. Has good client apps. No screen sharing/voice chat.
Stoat: Seems to be mostly similar to Discord, doesn't seem mature though, self hosting documentation doesn't seem refined, could be okay if you use their server, not sure about mobile apps
Spacebar: 1:1 Discord clone, voice chat features seem to be incomplete but seems pretty good otherwise, I tried to install their server but it doesn't run for me..
Matrix: Feature complete, but kinda buggy, may work well enough for some but my friends complained for poor UX
Mattermost: Gotta self host or pay, there seems to be some weird limitation: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46861331 and https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46594673
IRC: maybe not for non-techies, but IRCv3 has some "modern" features and Goguma(Android)/TheLounge(Web) looks quite decent
XMPP: Seems like it should be good, but I'm having trouble setting it up so can't tell
Tailchat: UI looks just like Discord, but I just heard of it now so haven't tried

[-] naught@sh.itjust.works 1 points 3 weeks ago

Ive spent hours configuring stoat and spacebar and I have to say they are absolutely not ready for self hosting. They also lack vital features my friends and I use, like high quality screensharing or video.

I'm trying my hand at matrix, but it's rife with problems too. If you want high throughput video, you need to set up Jitsi alongside. I haven't been having a good time.

[-] KiwiTB@lemmy.world 1 points 3 weeks ago

https://github.com/spacebarchat/spacebarchat

https://stoat.chat/

Matrix is a disaster, avoid it.

[-] IronKrill@lemmy.ca 1 points 3 weeks ago

What's been your main issues with Matrix? I'm testing it now and the setup is awful, but the actual messaging etc seems to work fine. I'd like to catch any issues I'll have early so I don't commit to it if I shouldn't.

[-] KiwiTB@lemmy.world 1 points 3 weeks ago

There are a ton of detailed write ups which will do a better job than I can here. Just search matrix sucks, or why matrix sucks and you'll find articles about the problems with is implementation, protocol and more.

[-] defaultusername@lemmy.dbzer0.com 0 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago)

I've been using Matrix for over a decade. It has its problems with stability, but it's getting better over time, especially with the newer Matrix 2.0 and Element X clients.

Open source (clients and server)
Federated
Self hostable
Optional E2EE for rooms, and I believe by default for PMs/DMs, along with forward secrecy
Integration and bridging with other services, although it's not as seamless as I would like
Has group calling/VC, but I don't use that enough to judge how good it is. Should also be able to integrate with Jitsi Meet as an alternative.
Supports Spaces similar to Discord "servers", but not as seamless as Discord. Each room (equivalent to a Discord channel) is its own separate thing.

If an alternative isn't open source and doesn't support federation and E2EE, I wouldn't even consider it.

[-] redsand@infosec.pub 1 points 3 weeks ago

https://simplex.chat/

Enjoy fellow cipherpunk

this post was submitted on 10 Feb 2026

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