Ask HN: What is your recommended stack for real time chat?

Communication Group Chat & Notifications Chat SDK

The Lounge Landing Page
1

The Lounge

The Lounge is a web IRC client that you host on your own server.
Pricing:
- Open Source
#Group Chat & Notifications #Messaging #Communication 38 social mentions
Prosody Landing Page
2

Prosody

Prosody is a modern flexible communications server for Jabber/XMPP written in Lua.
Pricing:
- Open Source
My choice, because it's the stack I know very well, would be Prosody ( https://prosody.im/ - I'm one of the devs) and a web client such as Converse.js ( https://conversejs.org/ ). XMPP is highly extensible, Prosody is highly modular, which make them a good foundation for building on top of. That said, the right stack is generally the one that matches your requirements, and (if this isn't primarily a learning exercise) whatever you're most familiar with. The hardest part of building a Discord or Slack-like in 2022 is actually not the technical stuff. There are many comprehensive open-source products already out there that compete with these companies, such as Mattermost, RocketChat and Element.

#Group Chat & Notifications #Communication #Chat 15 social mentions
Converse.JS Landing Page
3

Converse.JS

A free and open-source chat client for your website
Pricing:
- Open Source
My choice, because it's the stack I know very well, would be Prosody ( https://prosody.im/ - I'm one of the devs) and a web client such as Converse.js ( https://conversejs.org/ ). XMPP is highly extensible, Prosody is highly modular, which make them a good foundation for building on top of. That said, the right stack is generally the one that matches your requirements, and (if this isn't primarily a learning exercise) whatever you're most familiar with. The hardest part of building a Discord or Slack-like in 2022 is actually not the technical stuff. There are many comprehensive open-source products already out there that compete with these companies, such as Mattermost, RocketChat and Element.

#Customer Support #Communication #Team Collaboration 9 social mentions
SendBird Landing Page

4

SendBird

SendBird is messaging-as-a-service.

Depending on your use case I'd definitely look at Sendbird (YC W16): https://sendbird.com/.

#Chat SDK #Communication #Voice And Messaging API 13 social mentions
TalkJS Landing Page

5

TalkJS

TalkJS is a messaging API enabling users to add buyer-seller chat to their online marketplace or platform.

Shameless plug, I'm co-founder and CTO of https://talkjs.com, a chat API with pre-built UIs and notifications. Our product is designed for exactly this sort of stuff. Let me know if you want a tour!

#Communication #Messaging #Cpaas 32 social mentions