5 open source alternatives to Zoom

Try one of these open source video confe­ren­cing servi­ces.

I recently atten­ded the Prac­ti­cal Open Source Infor­ma­tion POSI confe­rence, which was held on a free and open source video confe­ren­cing plat­form. As I atten­ded a series of exce­llent talks about prac­ti­cal uses of open source soft­ware, I reali­zed how common­place video confe­ren­cing had become over the past few years.

If open source does anyt­hing, it provi­des choice, and now that more and more workers have the free­dom of working remo­tely, having an option in the way you connect makes a lot of sense.

Some­ti­mes, you need a full-featu­red video confe­ren­cing appli­ca­tion with mode­ra­tion, a presen­ta­tion mode, and brea­kout rooms, while other times, all you want to do is make a quick call to a friend so that you can see each other’s faces.

Jitsi

Jitsi is an easy, casual, but robust video calling plat­form. You can self host it or use it on the public instance at meet.jit.si. It’s got custo­mi­za­ble URLs that make it easy to share links with friends you want to meet with, in-call chat, admi­nis­tra­tive controls, and call recor­ding. It’s very acti­vely deve­lo­ped and has a whole collec­tion of new featu­res being tested and rele­a­sed each year. It’s the plat­form Open­source.com uses for our weekly meetings.

Signal

Signal is alre­ady a popu­lar secu­rity-focu­sed chat appli­ca­tion, and it recently added group video calls to its featu­res. The video calls are great for simple meetings, and because you can only meet with other people in your Signal contact list, there’s no concern over unwan­ted guests at your video call party. There’s also no back and forth «phone tag» as you try to locate the virtual room you’re suppo­sed to be meeting in. It all happens in Signal, so there’s no guess­work requi­red.

Signal itself is pretty intui­tive, and the video feature fits neatly into its exis­ting conven­ti­ons. In short, as long as your contacts are using Signal, this is a no-effort video calling plat­form. This is the appli­ca­tion I use for perso­nal contacts, and I regu­larly use its video calling feature to connect to friends and family.

P2p.chat

P2p.chat is the easi­est of them all, in both design and imple­men­ta­tion. Working through Web Real-Time Commu­ni­ca­tion (WebRTC), p2p.chat is a web appli­ca­tion that allows you to connect directly to the person you’re calling, with no host server requi­red. There’s not much to the p2p.chat inter­face, but that’s anot­her part of its appeal. There’s no admi­nis­tra­tive control or presen­ta­tion mode because p2p.chat is very much the «vidp­hone» promi­sed in sci-fi: A casual, no-effort person-to-person (or people-to-people) video call with some­body far away.

You use custom URLs to create a meeting space dyna­mi­cally, so they’re rela­ti­vely easy to remem­ber (aside from the small rando­mi­zed part) and type. I use p2p.chat with friends who aren’t on Signal, and it’s never let me down.

BigBlu­e­But­ton

Desig­ned for class­ro­oms, confe­ren­ces, and presen­ta­ti­ons, BigBlu­e­But­ton is the solu­tion you’re looking for if you need strict admin controls and extreme flexi­bi­lity. With BigBlu­e­But­ton, you can mute all parti­ci­pants, block and kick a parti­ci­pant, create brea­kout rooms, create a colla­bo­ra­tive white­bo­ard, share scre­ens, give presen­ta­ti­ons, and record sessi­ons. Parti­ci­pants can raise a digi­tal hand for atten­tion and set their status as a non-verbal method of commu­ni­ca­tion. It’s easy to use, but it’s a seri­ous plat­form for focu­sed and very large groups. I’ve atten­ded a few tech­ni­cal confe­ren­ces using BigBlu­e­But­ton, inclu­ding the Prac­ti­cal Open Source Infor­ma­tion (POSI) confe­rence.

Wire

Wire is an exce­llent choice for corpo­rate custo­mers looking for a hosted video chat and group­ware client. Licen­sed under the AGPL, this open source project is avai­la­ble for desk­top and server, Android, and iOS. It featu­res video calling, messa­ging, and file sharing, so even a remote meeting essen­ti­ally has all the conve­ni­en­ces of meeting in person. You can try Wire for free for a limi­ted time and then purchase a support contract for your company. Alter­na­tely, you can host it your­self.

Open source video chat

There’s no reason to settle for propri­e­tary video calling hosted by compa­nies you may not fully trust. The open source opti­ons avai­la­ble today are great for keeping in touch with all the people in your profes­si­o­nal and perso­nal life. Try one of these solu­ti­ons the next time you want to meet with friends.