Self-hosted alternatives to Discord
Want community voice and text chat without handing your data to Discord? These 30 open-source apps run on your own server. Cheapest estimated hosting starts at about $3.5/month.
| App | Health | Stars | License | Docker | RAM (est.) | From |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Fluxer direct | Actively maintained | 10.8k | AGPL-3.0 | ✓ | 2 GB | $10/mo |
| Rocket.Chat | Actively maintained | 46.4k | MIT | ✓ | 2 GB | $10/mo |
| Chatwoot | Actively maintained | 38.8k | ⊘ Proprietary | ✓ | 2 GB | $10/mo |
| Zulip | Actively maintained | 26.2k | Apache-2.0 | – | 2 GB | $10/mo |
| SimpleX Chat | Actively maintained | 19.6k | AGPL-3.0 | – | 2 GB | $10/mo |
| Apprise | Actively maintained | 17.7k | MIT | ✓ | 2 GB | $10/mo |
| Gotify | Actively maintained | 16.2k | MIT | ✓ | 2 GB | $10/mo |
| Element | Actively maintained | 13.6k | Apache-2.0 | – | 2 GB | $10/mo |
| Tinode | Actively maintained | 13.5k | GPL-3.0 | – | 2 GB | $10/mo |
| Centrifugo | Actively maintained | 10.9k | MIT | ✓ | 2 GB | $10/mo |
| Mumble | Actively maintained | 8.4k | BSD-3-Clause | – | 2 GB | $10/mo |
| Synapse | Actively maintained | 4.8k | Apache-2.0 | – | 2 GB | $10/mo |
| Asterisk | Actively maintained | 3.7k | GPL-2.0 | – | 512 MB | $3.5/mo |
| Kamailio | Actively maintained | 3k | GPL-2.0 | – | 512 MB | $3.5/mo |
| Tuwunel | Actively maintained | 2.7k | Apache-2.0 | ✓ | 2 GB | $10/mo |
| Stoat | Actively maintained | 2.7k | AGPL-3.0, MIT | – | 2 GB | $10/mo |
| AnyCable | Actively maintained | 2.4k | MIT | ✓ | 2 GB | $10/mo |
| Chitchatter | Actively maintained | 2.3k | GPL-2.0 | – | 2 GB | $10/mo |
| Live Helper Chat | Actively maintained | 2.3k | Apache-2.0 | – | 2 GB | $10/mo |
| Routr | Actively maintained | 1.7k | MIT | ✓ | 1 GB | $5/mo |
| openSIPS | Actively maintained | 1.5k | GPL-2.0 | – | 512 MB | $3.5/mo |
| Hyphanet | Actively maintained | 1.2k | GPL-2.0 | – | 2 GB | $10/mo |
| FusionPBX | Actively maintained | 1.1k | MPL-1.1 | – | 1 GB | $5/mo |
| Conduit | Actively maintained | 964 | Apache-2.0 | – | 2 GB | $10/mo |
| Tox | Maintained | 2.7k | GPL-3.0 | – | 2 GB | $10/mo |
| RetroShare | Maintained | 2k | GPL-2.0 | – | 2 GB | $10/mo |
| Shhh | Actively maintained | 420 | MIT | – | 2 GB | $10/mo |
| Notifo | Maintained | 883 | MIT | – | 2 GB | $10/mo |
| Flexisip | Actively maintained | 193 | AGPL-3.0 | ✓ | 512 MB | $3.5/mo |
| SAMA | Actively maintained | 161 | GPL-3.0 | ✓ | 2 GB | $10/mo |
The options in detail
1. Fluxer
Instant messaging and VoIP platform built for friends, groups, and communities (alternative to Discord).
Actively maintained Last activity 2026-11-03. Latest release fluxer-desktop-stable@2026.1103.403 (2026-11-03). Needs roughly 2 GB RAM. How to run it →
2. Rocket.Chat
Communications platform that puts data protection first (alternative to Gitter.im and Slack).
Actively maintained Last activity 2026-11-03. Latest release 9.0.0-rc.3 (2026-10-31). Needs roughly 2 GB RAM. How to run it →
3. Chatwoot
Customer communication platform (alternative to Intercom and Zendesk).
Actively maintained Last activity 2026-11-04. Latest release v4.19.1 (2026-10-24). Needs roughly 2 GB RAM. How to run it →
4. Zulip
Powerful group chat application.
Actively maintained Last activity 2026-11-03. Latest release 13.0-rc1 (2026-10-30). Needs roughly 2 GB RAM. How to run it →
5. SimpleX Chat
Most private and secure chat and applications platform - now with double ratchet E2E encryption.
Actively maintained Last activity 2026-10-21. Latest release v7.1.0-beta.9 (2026-11-02). Needs roughly 2 GB RAM. How to run it →
6. Apprise
Apprise allows you to send a notification to almost all of the most popular notification services available to us today such as: Telegram, Discord, Slack, Amazon SNS, Gotify, etc.
Actively maintained Last activity 2026-11-01. Latest release v2.1.0 (2026-10-24). Needs roughly 2 GB RAM. How to run it →
7. Gotify
Notification server with Android and CLI clients (alternative to PushBullet).
Actively maintained Last activity 2026-10-25. Latest release v3.1.1 (2026-09-15). Needs roughly 2 GB RAM. How to run it →
8. Element
Fully-featured Matrix client for Web, iOS & Android.
Actively maintained Last activity 2026-11-02. Latest release v1.12.33 (2026-10-27). Needs roughly 2 GB RAM. How to run it →
9. Tinode
Instant messaging platform. Backend in Go. Clients: Swift iOS, Java Android, JS webapp, scriptable command line; chatbots.
Actively maintained Last activity 2026-09-27. Latest release v0.25.3 (2026-07-04). Needs roughly 2 GB RAM. How to run it →
10. Centrifugo
Language-agnostic real-time messaging (Websocket or SockJS) server.
Actively maintained Last activity 2026-11-02. Latest release v6.10.2 (2026-10-23). Needs roughly 2 GB RAM. How to run it →
11. Mumble
Low-latency, high quality voice/text chat software.
Actively maintained Last activity 2026-10-30. Latest release v1.6.0-alpha2 (2026-10-25). Needs roughly 2 GB RAM. How to run it →
12. Synapse
Server for Matrix, an open standard for decentralized persistent communication.
Actively maintained Last activity 2026-11-02. Latest release v1.164.2 (2026-11-02). Needs roughly 2 GB RAM. How to run it →
13. Asterisk
Easy to use but advanced IP PBX system, VoIP gateway and conference server.
Actively maintained Last activity 2026-11-02. Latest release 24.0.0-rc4 (2026-10-29). Needs roughly 512 MB RAM. How to run it →
14. Kamailio
Modular SIP server (registrar/proxy/router/etc).
Actively maintained Last activity 2026-11-03. Latest release 6.1.5 (2026-10-15). Needs roughly 512 MB RAM. How to run it →
15. Tuwunel
High-performance and feature-rich chat server for Matrix, and the successor to conduwuit (fork of Conduit).
Actively maintained Last activity 2026-11-02. Latest release v1.9.4 (2026-10-10). Needs roughly 2 GB RAM. How to run it →
16. Stoat
User-first chat platform built with modern web technologies.
Actively maintained Last activity 2026-10-07. Latest release v1.1.4 (2025-11-24). Needs roughly 2 GB RAM. How to run it →
17. AnyCable
Realtime server for reliable two-way communication over WebSockets, Server-sent events, etc.
Actively maintained Last activity 2026-11-02. Latest release v1.6.20 (2026-10-21). Needs roughly 2 GB RAM. How to run it →
18. Chitchatter
Peer-to-peer chat app that is serverless, decentralized, and ephemeral.
Actively maintained Last activity 2026-11-02. Needs roughly 2 GB RAM. How to run it →
19. Live Helper Chat
Live Support chat for your website.
Actively maintained Last activity 2026-10-31. Latest release 4.97v (2026-10-23). Needs roughly 2 GB RAM. How to run it →
20. Routr
Lightweight SIP proxy, location server, and registrar for a reliable and scalable SIP infrastructure.
Actively maintained Last activity 2026-10-30. Latest release v2.31.6 (2026-10-30). Needs roughly 1 GB RAM. How to run it →
21. openSIPS
SIP proxy/server for voice, video, IM, presence and any other SIP extensions.
Actively maintained Last activity 2026-11-02. Needs roughly 512 MB RAM. How to run it →
22. Hyphanet
Anonymously share files, browse and publish freesites (web sites accessible only through Hyphanet) and chat on forums.
Actively maintained Last activity 2026-09-19. Latest release build01507 (2026-09-04). Needs roughly 2 GB RAM. How to run it →
23. FusionPBX
Web interface for multi-platform voice switch called FreeSWITCH.
Actively maintained Last activity 2026-11-02. Latest release 5.6.5 (2026-09-21). Needs roughly 1 GB RAM. How to run it →
24. Conduit
Simple, fast, and reliable chat server powered by Matrix.
Actively maintained Last activity 2026-10-18. Latest release v0.10.15 (2026-09-30). Needs roughly 2 GB RAM. How to run it →
25. Tox
Distributed, secure messenger with audio and video chat capabilities.
Maintained Last activity 2026-11-02. Latest release nightly (2025-01-27). Needs roughly 2 GB RAM. How to run it →
27. Shhh
Keep secrets out of emails or chat logs, share them using secure links with passphrase and expiration dates.
Actively maintained Last activity 2026-09-17. Latest release 3.2.4 (2026-01-22). Needs roughly 2 GB RAM. How to run it →
28. Notifo
Multichannel notification server with support for Email, Mobile Push, Web Push, SMS, messaging and a javascript plugin.
Maintained Last activity 2026-09-20. Latest release 1.3.0 (2022-11-30). Needs roughly 2 GB RAM. How to run it →
29. Flexisip
Complete, modular and scalable SIP server, includes a push gateway, to deliver SIP incoming calls or text messages on mobile device platforms where push notifications are required to receive information when the app is not active in the foreground.
Actively maintained Last activity 2026-10-29. Needs roughly 512 MB RAM. How to run it →
30. SAMA
Next-Gen self-hosted chat server and clients.
Actively maintained Last activity 2026-09-10. Latest release 0.37.2 (2026-09-10). Needs roughly 2 GB RAM. How to run it →
Why self-host instead of Discord?
- Own your data — it lives on a server you control, with backups you decide on.
- Predictable cost — a small VPS often replaces per-seat pricing for a whole team or family.
- No lock-in — open-source licenses let you keep running the software even if a vendor disappears.
The trade-off: you are responsible for updates, backups and security. Pick an app marked Actively maintained and with Docker support for the easiest ride.
Browse related categories
Other alternatives guides
Discord is a trademark of its owner; this site is not affiliated with it. Listings come from the community-maintained awesome-selfhosted list.