
Ask HN: What software do you use for business 1:1 chat (NOT group/channel chat)? - tiffanyh
Maybe I&#x27;m dating myself here but there was a time within corporations where chat software was primarily used for 1:1 instant messages. Such things like XMPP, Skype, etc fit this bill really well.<p>Then over the last few years, a slew of new chat based apps popped up in the enterprise that were primarily focused on group&#x2F;channel chat (e.g. Slack, Zulip, etc.) as opposed to the 1:1 messaging model.<p>What would be good chat software today that focuses on 1:1 messages (not groups&#x2F;channels)?<p>[XMPP worked great for this but that doesn&#x27;t seem en vogue any more. And I find the focus that many of these &quot;modern&quot; chat app have on group&#x2F;channel distracting]
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s1t5
> What would be good chat software today that focuses on 1:1 messages (not
> groups/channels)?

The premise of the question is that direct messages are somehow different and
require a separate application. I don't think that's true. Slack and Teams do
an absolutely fine job at 1:1 messages.

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tiffanyh
I’d prefer a chat app which made it _harder_ to create a group/channel.

I’ve been apart of organizations that use Slack and the proliferation of
channels is insane because they are so easy to create.

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crazypython
Discord works well in practice for creating groups and channels. By default,
regular users cannot create channels. Like Slack, it has very fast search,
with no message limit. File and image upload work wonderfully and the
audio/video works every time.

For small-scale groups, Group DMs are fine, though, I would warn to try to use
Group DMs only for when more than two participants should get an urgent ping
on a message. (Users can "mute" group DMs so they don't get notified by them.)

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drpebcak
The problem with group DMs in slack is that they are almost always better off
as a channel - you can’t really add new people to a group DM. So you’re forced
to decide if you should make a channel or not right at the beginning.

Group DMs can also have usability problems, and they tend to clog up the UI of
slack. I currently have 5 or 6 group DMs going that all have at least one of
the same people in all of them, so now when I use the quick switcher I see all
of those. Some of them even have 2 of the same people in them - it makes it
really easy to select the wrong group.

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Jugurtha
I don't understand. 1:1 means two people. What's wrong with using "group chat"
with a group of two people?

I don't think even XMPP focused on 1:1 and even Slack uses XMPP (or at least
used XMPP in the earlier versions, as it started out as an internal
communications solution built as IRC + storing messages in database + search +
...)

Also, [https://meet.jit.si](https://meet.jit.si) ,
[https://jitsi.org](https://jitsi.org) They also use XMPP.

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giantg2
We use Teams. It's ok for 1:1 stuff. It all depends on the actions and
preferences of the user base. I try to use single recipient chats whenever
possible, but others like to create group descriptions.

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muzani
WhatsApp, Messenger, Telegram.

Preferably only Telegram, but I don't have a choice.

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tmaly
I use MS Teams for 1 on 1 as well as group chat and audio calls.

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ta17711771
Element/Riot (a Matrix client)

or Jitsi.

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w4tson
+1 for jitsi

