A private Slack alternative with predictable pricing.
Same channels, threads, and DMs your team already knows — minus the oversized SaaS bill, the 90-day memory wall, and server-side key custody. Voice, video, and meetings included at every tier. Even the free one.
Slack defined modern team chat. TheChatApp keeps the familiar workflow while adding self-hosting, clearer data ownership, bundled voice, video, and meetings, and lower long-term cost. The Free tier keeps full message history instead of turning past conversations into an upgrade lever.
Feature-by-feature
Don't take our word for it — self-host it free and see for yourself.
Pricing at common team sizes
Annual billing. Cloud is per billed user; self-hosted is a server licence with optional maintenance.
The bill, over time
5 years, 50 users, with SSO. Cumulative list-price spend. Both lines plotted in €; competitor converted at $1 ≈ €0.92.
List prices, annual billing. Discounts, negotiated terms, and FX drift may vary.
Why teams choose TheChatApp
- →Your 15th hire doesn't trigger a tier cliff. Cloud pricing is per user, and self-hosted pricing is by server edition. Grow without flinching.
- →Voice, video, meetings, and calendar — all built in. No Zoom subscription. No Google Meet add-on. One bill, one app, everything works.
- →The Free tier remembers everything. No 90-day memory wall. No 'upgrade to read last quarter's incident thread.'
- →Notifications that deliver directly. Mention acknowledgements. A priority system that surfaces what actually matters.
- →Encrypted end-to-end by default. We don't read your messages, don't scan them, and don't train AI on them.
- →Your data leaves when you do. Self-host export, GDPR export, and full message history reduce switching friction and lock-in.
- →Self-host on hardware you already own, or use a small VPS for a lightweight always-on deployment.
- →GDPR-native. Built in the EU, hosted in the EU. Not patched in after the fines.
Frequently asked questions
Is TheChatApp really a Slack alternative?
Yes. Channels, threads, DMs, mentions, files, voice, video, search — the whole team-chat workflow Slack made famous. We cut the high SaaS pricing tax, the 90-day memory wall, the server-side key custody, and the notifications that freeze and dump. Plus voice, video, and meetings are built in — no separate Zoom or Google Meet subscription.
How much cheaper is TheChatApp than Slack, really?
At 10 users on annual billing, Cloud Team is €300/year vs Slack Pro at roughly $870/year — about 3× cheaper. At 50 users, Cloud Business is €2,500/year vs $4,350/year — roughly 1.7× cheaper. At 50 users with SSO, €2,799/year vs $9,000/year for Slack Business+ — about 3.2× cheaper. And that's just Slack. Most Slack teams also pay for Zoom or Google Meet for real meetings — add Zoom Pro ($7,998/year at 50 users) and you're looking at $16,998/year vs our €2,799. Cloud is fair per-user pricing; self-hosted remains capacity-priced if you want predictable server-edition ownership.
What hardware do I need to self-host TheChatApp?
TheChatApp self-host is a lightweight .NET server with a small Go SFU sidecar for meetings. A mid-range laptop or small VPS can support many small-team deployments. For larger teams, size the server around active users, media usage, storage, backups, and expected meeting load.
Does TheChatApp actually encrypt messages end-to-end?
Yes — end-to-end by default, for every channel and every DM. In our zero-knowledge mode, the server holds no long-term keys — it can't decrypt your messages even if someone got access to the disk. Slack stores your messages server-side and can read them. That's a structural difference, not a marketing one.
Do you train AI on my chat?
No. We don't train our own models on your messages. We don't ship your content to a third-party model provider. Our search runs locally on your device — your laptop does the thinking, not our servers. It's not a setting you need to find and flip. It's the architecture.
What does 'GDPR-native' actually mean?
It means the compliance requirements shaped the architecture, not the other way around. EU-based company, EU-hosted cloud, privacy-compliant by default, data subject requests wired into the product (self-service export, deletion, rectification), DPA signable without a sales call. Slack is a US company subject to US surveillance law. That's fine for some teams. Not fine for others.
Can I self-host the way I would with Mattermost?
Yes. First-class self-hosted server, one-time license with optional annual maintenance. Messages, files, audit logs — all on your infrastructure. Slack is cloud-only. Their cloud. Their rules.
Can I actually leave if I want to? What about my data?
Yes. Self-host means your data is already on your infrastructure — export it anytime. On cloud, GDPR export gives you a full machine-readable archive of your messages, files, and metadata. No paywall on your own history. No 'contact sales to get your data.' Slack locks history behind tier upgrades and has no self-host escape hatch. We think your chat history is yours, not a retention lever.
Why should I trust a smaller vendor over Slack?
You don't have to. Self-host the whole thing. Keep your data on your infrastructure. If we vanished tomorrow, your server keeps running — the license is one-time, not a subscription to our existence. On cloud, you can export all your data at any time — full GDPR export, no paywall, no sales call. Either way, your data is always yours to take. That's the actual point: sovereignty, not savings.
See how TheChatApp fits your team
Try the Free tier on your own server, or start a managed Cloud workspace in minutes.
Comparison drawn from publicly available pricing and documentation as of April 2026. Slack pricing fetched from slack.com/pricing; feature capabilities verified against Slack's documentation and published AI/ML data-use policies. Re-verify vendor pricing before quoting in procurement.
Also available: Slack · Microsoft Teams · Mattermost · Rocket.Chat