Slack is a messaging app for businesses that connects people to the information they need, transforming how organizations communicate. In this article, we discuss the top Slack Competitors and Alternatives.
Slack is an innovative communication platform that has revolutionized how teams collaborate and stay connected. Launched in 2013, Slack provides a centralized hub where team members can communicate, share files, and stay updated on project progress. With its intuitive interface and extensive integration options, Slack has quickly become the go-to tool for organizations of all sizes.
Slack offers many features designed to enhance communication and streamline collaboration. One of its main advantages is its real-time messaging system, which allows team members to communicate with each other instantly, eliminating the need for lengthy email chains. Slack lets users create channels, making organizing conversations by topic, team, or project easy. This ensures that important information is easily accessible and helps to reduce the clutter in users’ inboxes.
- Product Type: Messaging app for business
- Industry: Technology
- Founded Date: 2013
- Founders: Stewart Butterfield, Eric Costello, Cal Henderson, and Serguei Mourachov
- Headquarters: San Francisco, California, United States
- Area Served: Worldwide
- Current CEO: Stewart Butterfield
Table of Contents
The top Slack competitors are
1. Microsoft Teams
- Product Type: Collaboration software
- Industry: Technology
- Founded Date: March 14, 2017
- Founders: Microsoft Corporation
- Headquarters: Redmond, Washington, United States
- Area Served: Worldwide
- Current CEO: Satya Nadella
Microsoft Teams is a chat-based collaboration platform providing companies, schools, and organizations with communication tools that include team chat, voice and video calls, meetings, and file storage in a user-friendly format. Teams, a creation of Microsoft, profoundly integrates with the Office 365 suite, making it an attractive choice for organizations already reliant on this suite of products.
2. Google Chat
- Product Type: Collaboration software
- Industry: Technology
- Founded Date: April 24, 2018
- Founders: Google LLC
- Headquarters: Mountain View, California, United States
- Area Served: Worldwide
- Current CEO: Sundar Pichai
Google Chat is a communication software developed by Google as part of the G Suite. It allows direct messages, team chat rooms, and a group messaging function that facilitates efficient team communication. Since it’s part of Google Workspace, it integrates seamlessly with other Google applications, enabling a streamlined workflow.
3. Discord
- Product Type: Communication software
- Industry: Technology
- Founded Date: May 13, 2015
- Founders: Jason Citron, Stanislav Vishnevskiy
- Headquarters: San Francisco, California, United States
- Area Served: Worldwide
- Current CEO: Jason Citron
Discord is primarily a communication platform for gamers that provides voice, video chat, and text communication channels. Discord benefits from a friendly user interface and a flexible approach, with private servers for friends or public ones for larger communities. Despite its gaming focus, it’s becoming increasingly popular as a tool for community-led discussions and private team chats.
4. Flock
- Product Type: Collaboration software
- Industry: Technology
- Founded Date: 2014
- Founders: Bhavin Turakhia
- Headquarters: Mumbai, Maharashtra, India
- Area Served: Worldwide
- Current CEO: Bhavin Turakhia
Flock is a team messaging and collaboration app that brings all your work in one place. It enables a seamless flow of information between different team members, simplifying communication and enhancing productivity. Flock has features like to-do lists, reminders, and integrations with popular business apps, which may benefit a workflow setup.
5. Mattermost
- Product Type: Collaboration software
- Industry: Technology
- Founded Date: 2015
- Founders: Ian Tien, Corey Hulen
- Headquarters: Palo Alto, California, United States
- Area Served: Worldwide
- Current CEO: Ian Tien
Mattermost is an open-source, self-hosted chat service providing a Slack-like interface with extensive administrator control features. Its main selling point is information control, as it’s perfect for organizations concerned with keeping their internal communications completely private.
6. Rocket.Chat
- Product Type: Communication software
- Industry: Technology
- Founded Date: 2015
- Founders: Gabriel Engel
- Headquarters: Porto Alegre, Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil
- Area Served: Worldwide
- Current CEO: Gabriel Engel
Rocket.Chat is another open-source team chat software solution. It provides a seamless environment for team collaboration comparable to other famous team chat tools software. Still, it allows comprehensive control over data and privacy as it can be hosted on your servers.
7. Chanty
- Product Type: Collaboration software
- Industry: Technology
- Founded Date: 2017
- Founders: Dmytro Okunyev
- Headquarters: San Francisco, California, United States
- Area Served: Worldwide
- Current CEO: Dmytro Okunyev
Chanty is a team chat tool designed to boost productivity with its simplified interface and valuable features. It provides messaging and the ability to turn messages into tasks, offering practical project management functionality.
8. Twist
- Product Type: Collaboration software
- Industry: Technology
- Founded Date: 2017
- Founders: Amir Salihefendic
- Headquarters: Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
- Area Served: Worldwide
- Current CEO: Amir Salihefendic
Twist is a communication app from the team behind Todoist. It puts a premium on focused, mindful work, offering an interface that discourages real-time communication and interruptions, making it an excellent choice for remote teams and asynchronous communication.
9. River
- Product Type: Collaboration software
- Industry: Technology
- Founded Date: 2015
- Founders: Pat Sullivan, Leif Hartwig
- Headquarters: Scottsdale, Arizona, United States
- Area Served: Worldwide
- Current CEO: Pat Sullivan
Ryver integrates team communication and task management into one robust platform. It allows for the unlimited creation of chats, posts, and tasks, helping teams to stay organized. It excels at converting conversations into trackable tasks, which can be a game-changer for project and task management.
10. Cisco Webex Teams
- Product Type: Collaboration software
- Industry: Technology
- Founded Date: 2018
- Founders: Cisco Systems, Inc.
- Headquarters: San Jose, California, United States
- Area Served: Worldwide
- Current CEO: Chuck Robbins
Cisco Webex Teams combines the key features of a team messaging app, a video conferencing tool, and whiteboarding software into one solution. Coming from a trusted communications technology provider like Cisco, it ensures high-quality video and good security.
11. Zoom
- Product Type: Communication software
- Industry: Technology
- Founded Date: 2011
- Founders: Eric Yuan
- Headquarters: San Jose, California, United States
- Area Served: Worldwide
- Current CEO: Eric Yuan
Zoom is mainly a video conferencing service that became popular due to its simplicity and the high-quality video it provides. Zoom also offers chat tools that let teams stay connected and efficiently collaborate. Often preferred for webinars, video calls, large meetings, and lectures, it’s become a staple of remote work.
12. Troop Messenger
- Product Type: Collaboration software
- Industry: Technology
- Founded Date: 2017
- Founders: Sudhir Naidu
- Headquarters: Hyderabad, Telangana, India
- Area Served: Worldwide
- Current CEO: Sudhir Naidu
Troop Messenger is a secure and compact office team communication app packed with all the features to make workplace communication easy. Its quick onboarding process allows for smooth one-to-one and group conversations that can be saved for future reference. Its built-in data security measures make it a secure medium for exchanging official information and files.
13. TypeTalk
- Product Type: Communication software
- Industry: Technology
- Founded Date: 2015
- Founders: Nulab Inc.
- Headquarters: Fukuoka, Japan
- Area Served: Worldwide
- Current CEO: Masanori Hashimoto
TypeTalk is a team communication and collaboration tool developed by Nulab that offers mobile and desktop apps. It supports real-time messaging and file sharing and integrates with popular services, including Google Drive and Dropbox. These features provide easy, anytime access to work, assisting to keep teams in sync.
14. ClickUp
- Product Type: Project management software
- Industry: Technology
- Founded Date: 2017
- Founders: Zeb Evans
- Headquarters: San Diego, California, United States
- Area Served: Worldwide
- Current CEO: Zeb Evans
ClickUp is widely known as a project management tool but also supplies robust communication features. It provides individual, team, and company-wide chat facilities. As a part of a more extensive productivity suite, it helps users tie projects and tasks directly to chats, leading to seamless project execution.
15. Fleep
- Product Type: Communication software
- Industry: Technology
- Founded Date: 2012
- Founders: Henn Ruukel, Andres Keevallik
- Headquarters: Tallinn, Estonia
- Area Served: Worldwide
- Current CEO: Henn Ruukel
Fleep is a flexible messenger that combines messaging, file storage, and conversation tasks. It bridges the gap between email and instant messaging via messenger, making it possible to communicate with any other Fleep user or team, regardless of their affiliation to your team or company.
16. Element
- Product Type: Communication software
- Industry: Technology
- Founded Date: 2014
- Founders: Amandine Le Pape, Alexandre Lefebvre
- Headquarters: Berlin, Germany
- Area Served: Worldwide
- Current CEO: Amandine Le Pape
Element is an open-source messaging app emphasizing decentralization, privacy, and security. As a Slack alternative, Element provides complete control over data and conversations. It is built on Matrix, an open network for secure, decentralized communication, making it ideal for groups who prioritize privacy.
17. Wire
- Product Type: Communication software
- Industry: Technology
- Founded Date: 2014
- Founders: Janus Friis, Jonathan Christensen
- Headquarters: Berlin, Germany
- Area Served: Worldwide
- Current CEO: Morten Brøgger
Wire is an encrypted messaging app focusing on privacy and data security. Designed to meet the needs of businesses, non-profits, and government organizations, Wire offers a simple interface while ensuring that all communications are securely encrypted.
18. Blink
- Product Type: Home Security Cameras
- Industry: Home Security
- Founded Date: 2014
- Founders: Peter Besen, Don Shulsinger
- Headquarters: Andover, Massachusetts, United States
- Area Served: Worldwide
- Current CEO: Peter Besen
Blink is a mobile-first communication app intended for remote and non-desk teams. It offers a central feed to share updates and information and secure messaging capabilities. The aim is to boost productivity, particularly for those who might feel marginalized by less mobile-friendly platforms.
19. ProofHub
- Product Type: Project Management Software
- Industry: Software
- Founded Date: 2011
- Founders: Sandeep Kashyap
- Headquarters: Clifton, New Jersey, United States
- Area Served: Worldwide
- Current CEO: Sandeep Kashyap
ProofHub is a comprehensive project management platform that uses built-in team collaboration tools. Besides chat features beyond chat, ProofHub includes tasks like task management, note-taking, and time tracking. AllTheseements combine to create a unified workspace where team communication and collaboration can flourish.
20. Missive
- Product Type: Email and Team Chat Software
- Industry: Software
- Founded Date: 2018
- Founders: Antoine Lefeuvre, Romain Sagean
- Headquarters: Montreal, Quebec, Canada
- Area Served: Worldwide
- Current CEO: Antoine Lefeuvre
Missive is a collaborative email and threaded group chat for businesses. It stands apart from shared inboxes and collaborates around email. You can also directly embed other communication tools like Trello, Todoist, Asana, and Google Calendar into your conversations.
21. Hive
- Product Type: Project Management Software
- Industry: Software
- Founded Date: 2015
- Founders: John Furneaux, Eric Typaldos
- Headquarters: New York, United States
- Area Served: Worldwide
- Current CEO: John Furneaux
Hive is a project management tool providing flexible project views, task management, and a centralized chat feature for real-time communication. It allows easy collaboration and project tracking, ensuring your team stays coordinated regardless of the size or complexity of your project.
22. Zoho Cliq
- Product Type: Team Chat Software
- Industry: Software
- Founded Date: 1996
- Founders: Sridhar Vembu, Tony Thomas
- Headquarters: Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India
- Area Served: Worldwide
- Current CEO: Sridhar Vembu
Zoho Cliq is an accessible business communication software that allows organized conversations, automated tasks, and workflows in a single, easy-to-use platform. If you are already embedded in Zoho’s suite of apps, Cliq could tighten up your internal communications without any added complexity.
23. Symphony
- Product Type: Team Chat Software
- Industry: Software
- Founded Date: 2014
- Founders: David Gurle
- Headquarters: Palo Alto, California, United States
- Area Served: Worldwide
- Current CEO: David Gurle
Symphony is a secure, cloud-based communication platform consolidating digital interactions in one central hub. Their primary focus is to provide a space for secure collaboration and conversation, ensuring that sensitive data stays safe.
24. Facebook Workplace
- Product Type: Team Collaboration Software
- Industry: Software
- Founded Date: 2016
- Founders: Mark Zuckerberg
- Headquarters: Menlo Park, California, United States
- Area Served: Worldwide
- Current CEO: Mark Zuckerberg
Facebook Workplace is a communication platform created by Facebook that resembles their familiar social media interface but caters specifically to businesses. It offers features like news feeds, groups, and live audio and video calls and broadcasting, aiming to improve collaboration and productivity through a user-friendly, Facebook-like interface.
25. Asana
- Product Type: Project Management Software
- Industry: Software
- Founded Date: 2008
- Founders: Dustin Moskovitz, Justin Rosenstein
- Headquarters: San Francisco, California, United States
- Area Served: Worldwide
- Current CEO: Dustin Moskovitz
Asana is a project management tool that, while not primarily a communication platform, offers collaboration features for teams. Tasks, comments, and file attachments can be directly linked to related tasks or discussions, fostering clear-cut and contextual communication between team members throughout the project lifecycle.
26. Trello
- Product Type: Project Management Software
- Industry: Software
- Founded Date: 2011
- Founders: Joel Spolsky, Michael Pryor
- Headquarters: New York, United States
- Area Served: Worldwide
- Current CEO: Michael Pryor
Trello is a visual project management team collaboration tool that uses boards, lists, and cards to facilitate team organization and smooth communication. Although it doesn’t have built-in chat functions, Trello allows members to collaborate through comments, file attachments, and checklists, all tied to individual cards representing specific tasks or ideas.
27. Miro
- Product Type: Online Whiteboard Software
- Industry: Software
- Founded Date: 2011
- Founders: Andrey Khusid, Oleg Shardin
- Headquarters: San Francisco, California, United States
- Area Served: Worldwide
- Current CEO: Andrey Khusid
Miro is an online collaborative whiteboard platform that enables teams to work together in real-time, mapping out ideas and processes visually. This approach to team communication encourages brainstorming, creativity, and problem-solving through screen sharing and interactive diagrams, templates, and drawings.
28. Quip
- Product Type: Team Collaboration Software
- Industry: Software
- Founded Date: 2012
- Founders: Bret Taylor, Kevin Gibbs
- Headquarters: San Francisco, California, United States
- Area Served: Worldwide
- Current CEO: Bret Taylor
Quip is a collaborative document and spreadsheet platform that sparks team communication by integrating chat and comments directly within documents. This Salesforce-acquired tool promotes effective collaboration to break the need for long email strings and repetitive meetings.
29. Jira
- Product Type: Project Management Software
- Industry: Software
- Founded Date: 2002
- Founders: Mike Cannon-Brookes, Scott Farquhar
- Headquarters: Sydney, New South Wales, Australia
- Area Served: Worldwide
- Current CEO: Mike Cannon-Brookes
Jira is a project management tool focused on issue and bug tracking, primarily used by software development teams. Although not specifically a team communication platform, Jira’s task-oriented environment allows for seamless collaboration through comments, file attachments, and notifications, which help developers and project managers work closely together throughout the development process.
These were all the competitors of Slack. If you know any other competitors, please do write in the comments below.
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