head to head · open source
chat vs meet
chat has 13,548 GitHub stars, 2,093 forks, 41 open issues and last shipped 11 days ago. meet has 2,465 stars, 334 forks, 183 open issues and last shipped 2 days ago. chat leads on adoption by 450% (13,548 vs 2,465 stars). chat is written in Go under GPL-3.0; meet is written in Python under MIT. chat has attracted 15% as many forks as stars, meet 14%. meet was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee.
Two open source projects, one decision. Both are free and self-hostable — the differences are community size, license terms, language stack and release pace.
← all 20902 open source comparisons
Side by side
| chat | meet | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 14K | ★ 2.5K |
| License | GPL-3.0 | MIT |
| Written in | Go | Python |
| Last push | 2026-10-25 | 2026-11-03 |
| Forks | ⑂ 2.1K | ⑂ 334 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick chat if
- You weight community size — 14K stars and counting
- You want the GPL-3.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Go
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick meet if
- You want the meet feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches Python
- You evaluated both and meet fits your workflow better
About chat
Tinode Instant Messaging Server Instant messaging full stack. Backend in pure Go (license GPL 3.0), clients for Android (Java), iOS (Swift), and web (ReactJS), as well as gRPC client support for C++, C , Go, Java, Node, PHP, Python, Ruby, Objective C, etc (all clients licensed under Apache 2.0). Wire transport is JSON over websocket (long polling is also available) or protobuf with gRPC. This is beta quality software: feature complete and stable but probably with a few bugs or missing features. Follow instructions to install and run or use one of the cloud services below. Read API documentation. Tinode is not…
About meet
LiveKit Chat with us Roadmap Changelog Bug reports La Suite Meet: Simple Video Conferencing Powered by LiveKit, La Suite Meet offers Zoom level performance with high quality video and audio. No installation required—simply join calls directly from your browser. Check out LiveKit's impressive optimizations in their blog post. [!TIP] New here? Start by introducing yourself in our Matrix channel: We’re happy to discuss ideas, answer questions, and help to deploy LaSuite Meet. Features Optimized for stability in large meetings (+100 p.) Support for multiple screen sharing streams Non persistent, secure chat End to…
More in Business Software
Related comparisons
More Collaboration & Communication projects
Compare either of these against the rest of the Collaboration & Communication field.
Frequently asked questions
Is chat or meet more popular?
chat has 13,548 GitHub stars and meet has 2,465. chat has the larger community by that measure.
Are chat and meet free?
Both are open source. chat is licensed under GPL-3.0 and meet under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between chat and meet?
chat is written in Go and meet in Python. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, chat or meet?
Choose chat if you want the larger community (13,548 stars) or its GPL-3.0 licence terms. Choose meet if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.