For the baby boomer generation, freedom means owning a car. They shook off their authoritarian parents and drove around the country in their new Ford or Chevrolet. They longed for wide open roads, independence and disconnection.
For Millennials, liberation is access to the Internet.
As a community-oriented generation, they want to be connected at all times. The thought of being disconnected for an indefinite period of time is terrifying for most young people - and for them, it's not just being disconnected from the internet, but also from their friends.
alternatives to Slack
Generation Y now makes up a large part of the working world : So it's no wonder that online communication tools are becoming increasingly popular.
Project management software providers such as
Asana or Crocagile have made it their mission to rethink the concept of "email". "Social media" is not only an everyday term, but also an indispensable networking phenomenon.
And chats? A lot has changed since the days of AOL Instant Messenger, whether for private or business purposes.
The best-known tool for business chats is
Slack – and so clearly that a reviewer in the New York Times wrote:
"Slack has some unusual features that make it perfect for work, such as automatic archiving of all interactions, good search functionality, and the ability to work from almost any device. Because Slack is hosted online and extremely customizable, it's also easy for corporate technology departments to set up and use. These features have made Slack one of the fastest-growing business applications in history."
Farhad Manjoo , The New York Times
Not only is Slack highly efficient at what it does—having been a huge hit with millennials who use it to seamlessly switch between discussing business projects and discussing Game of Thrones—but it also offers a very good free version.
No wonder Slack claims a good portion of the collaboration software market.
Until now.
Even in the free version, Slack offers more features than some teams want to use, and the upgrade costs (starting at €6.25 per member per month) may be too expensive for smaller companies.
Innovations lead to further innovations, and Slack alternatives that aim to do exactly these things differently are springing up faster than Apple fans on the day of the latest iPhone release.
9 Slack alternatives for easy collaboration
There are plenty of chat tools out there, so I came up with criteria to evaluate the best Slack alternatives.
Every top Slack alternative must…
be scalable for at least 500 users
be well suited for small and medium-sized businesses (although options for large enterprises are available)
Apps for iOS and Android offer
With these criteria in mind, I have listed the best Slack alternatives.
The products are listed in random order.
1st Rocket.Chat
iOS | Android
Slack alternative Rocket.Chat
Active chat with channels and participant list in Rocket.Chat ( source )
Rocket.Chat, the collaboration tool from Brazil, is intended for communities and companies that want to privately host their own chat service, as well as for developers who want to create and develop their own chat platforms ( according to their LinkedIn profile ).
The app itself is open source and more than 850 developers are working on the project. This also means that you never have to pay a cent for Rocket.Chat and the full version is always available to you without any restrictions.
The downside of being open source: If you ever have a problem with Rocket.Chat, you can't call customer service (although you can ask for help in the online forums on GitHub ) and the project is a constant work in progress.
Rocket.Chat offers almost every feature you'll find in Slack and positions itself as a Slack alternative. If you're missing a feature, you can request it on GitHub.
A cool bonus feature is automatic translation into more than 35 languages in real time – a feature that requires a plug-in in Slack.
Upgrade cost: Completely free
Important integrations: GitHub, Zapier
2nd Fleep
iOS | Android
Slack alternative Fleep
A Fleep discussion about Project Grudly on a tablet ( Source )
Fleep may have a strange name, but it is a serious communication tool. The Estonian company even describes its product as the ideal communication option.
While many of these tools have the stated goal of replacing or eliminating email, Fleep recognizes the fact philippines telegram data that email isn't going away anytime soon. Rather than ignoring the fact that email exists, Fleep integrates it - much like Google Hangouts does in Gmail - and allows users to chat with each other directly from their email inbox.
Fleep opens up other ways of communication too. Fleep is an open network, so users can chat with other Fleep users regardless of their platform, company or team. You can even communicate with people who are not Fleep users, as long as you have their email address. They will simply receive your Fleep messages as an email.
Even in the free version, you have unlimited conversations and a full message history. The team is working on an integrated task management tool for the paid version.
Upgrade costs: 5 euros per month for unlimited users
Important integrations: Toggl, Jira
3. Flock
iOS | Android
Slack alternative Flock
Flock was designed to enable teams to send fewer emails and focus on faster, more straightforward means of communication. Sounds familiar, right?