Alternatives
Products that do what Together, a no-signup chat and universal comment/discussion tool (beta) does
Hi HN, For years I’ve missed the feeling of an always-on chatroom without the silos and social overhead of Discord. So I built Together: a single-room, no-signup group chat that you join with one click. No channels, no rules (yet), no onboarding flow. Everyone lands in the same place and can start talking in under a second. Why I made it - Forums and blog comments are great but slow; Discord/Slack feel heavy for casual drop-ins if you aren’t already a member of a community. - I wanted the simplest possible space where ~100 people could idle, share shower thoughts, and keep the…
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2017 · hashtags.chat
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2015 · github.com
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Create a chat, copy the URL, paste it wherever you want. Perfect for those that would like to continue a discussion on a social network without having to sign up for anything. http://beta.mss.gs/#!/page/home
2012 · beta.mss.gs
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This is something fun I’ve been hacking on recently: ridiculously simple group chat. Go to http://faces.io and then get your friends to do the same. That’s it! :-D Currently works best in Chrome. It’s definitely beta status at best. Audio can get weird—be ready to mute. ;-) Let me know what you think!
2014
- 10GS
This weekend I finally shipped Gryt, a project I’ve been building since 2022 — an open-source, self-hostable Discord-style app focused on reliable voice chat + text. I’m the creator. I started it after getting fed up with Discord disconnects/paywalls and wanted something self-hosted and auditable. I started on this in 2022 and had an early proof-of-concept working back then (auth + friends list), but I quickly realized WebRTC voice isn’t something you can duct-tape together. I spent a big chunk of the next couple years learning the stack (ICE/DTLS-SRTP, NAT traversal, SFU design),…
Feb 2026 · gryt.chat
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I created a pet project to see if it is of use and interesting to people. The idea is on-demand real-time chat rooms for trending topics and for personal use. You can go to the main page at www.urshoutbox.com to create your own room then share it across your social networks/email, etc. I created a hacker news specific "shoutbox" at http://www.urshoutbox.com/bLmYAL/hacker-news . If nobody is in there, please be patient and (I hope) people will join soon to start talking. The idea is to have trending topics on facebook/twitter/etc and have chat rooms to get…
2014 · urshoutbox.com
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2015 · rocket.chat
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2012 · chatstep.com
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I'm running several voice-only virtual coffee events on the Discord server in the URL, only for today. The rules are pretty simple: 1. Wait for the "event" to start (see times at the end) 2. If there are no tables with 1 participant, join any one. 3. If there is a table with 1 participant, join that one. 4. When the event ends, all the voice channels are deleted and you have to wait till the next event starts. I initially wanted to build my own web app but then I realised it would be so much easier to just leverage Discord's infrastructure. I also built a bot in a couple hundred lines of Go…
2023 · discord.com
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2019 · gossipr.io
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Hey HN, I've been a long time HN reader and here is my first contribution. Hoodsup.me is a chat-based matchmaking app built on top of your Facebook social graph. It matchmakes you with people who are geographically close to you and with whom you share common points. You can optionally activate your webcam to talk face-to-face with your partner. Think of it as a Sonar meets a genital-free Chatroulette. I would love to get some feedback. It's only optimized for WebKit for now. No signup is required so just stop by and say hi! :) Clickable link: <a…
2011 · hoodsup.me
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I always find myself frustrated by how many steps I have to take to video chat with someone online. There's always too much software to download and install, and too many accounts to remember. The high-end, high-price Cisco conferencing systems I've used are especially fragile. So I built Vidless in a weekend for myself, and I hope you find it useful too. Just create a room and share the link, and you'll be chatting in seconds. You can invite several people (I haven't really tested a max yet), and chats on Vidless are always private. Enjoy!
2012 · vidless.com
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2018 · karmabot.chat
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Hey everyone! I built a little side project called OpenQuest over the last three weeks, and I'm looking for some feedback to see if it's worth taking further. The idea is simple: it's a place to create a chat room where you can connect with people (a maximum of 8) who have the same goal as you, for a short time (7 days for now). Think of it as a way to stay motivated, hold each other accountable, or simply work together with new people on something specific. Some examples can be: - Following a programming course - Reading a book - Getting back to the gym - Cleaning up your home - Shopping…
2024 · openquest.app
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2021 · github.com
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2021 · heahy.com
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TLDR: I built a "quick and dirty " private social network for my friends, posted on Reddit and HN, got some interest so now have built it properly along with my brother. site link: https://intimost.com/login/ demo creds: [email protected] Demo123! Full version: I needed a social network where I can just send updates and nothing else. So I built it, my friends liked and now I have built it "for the world". Everything is private by default. - Text-only updates - No likes. Only views to acknowledge a post - [in development] Comments are private between the poster and…
Oct 2025
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Today my friends and I are launching a project we've been hacking on for the past few years. It's friendly web based group chat (with apps for Mac, Windows, and iOS) that's not limited to a single business. It basically offers the power of XMPP with a simple UI. chatsimply.com Please check it out and let me know what you think!
2014
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