Open Source Collaboration & Communication Software
Collaboration & Communication software provides shared environments for real-time messaging, video conferencing, and joint document editing. These tools centralize team chat history, project notes, and digital whiteboards to prevent information from being scattered across different platforms. This type of software serves organizations and teams that need to manage internal discussions and shared knowledge bases. Self-hosting these apps ensures that sensitive company conversations and private project files remain on internal servers rather than on external corporate clouds.
This page lists 94 open source tools in the Collaboration & Communication category. The most popular are Excalidraw, AppFlowy and Affine. Most use the AGPL-3.0 or Apache-2.0 license, and 74 offer an official Docker image.
Excalidraw
A virtual whiteboard for sketching diagrams, flowcharts, and wireframes with a hand-drawn style and real-time collaboration.
AppFlowy
A collaborative workspace for notes and databases that provides data ownership and native cross platform support.
Affine
A local-first knowledge base that merges structured documents, infinite whiteboards, and databases into one workspace.
Rocket.Chat
A secure communication platform providing real-time messaging, voice, and video for organizations requiring full data control.
Logseq
A privacy-first knowledge management platform using bidirectional linking and outlines to organize notes and tasks.
Mattermost
A self-hosted collaboration platform providing team chat, workflow automation, voice calling, and screen sharing for secure organizations.
Nextcloud
A self-hosted content collaboration platform for syncing files, contacts, and calendars across multiple devices and users.
Jitsi
Host encrypted video conferences via a web browser or mobile app using a self-hosted server deployment.
Huly
Integrates project management, team chat, CRM, and collaborative documents into a single self-hosted business application framework.
Zulip
An organized team chat application using topic based threading to support both live and asynchronous communication.
Neko
A self hosted virtual browser that runs in docker and uses WebRTC for real time streaming.
Linkwarden
A collaborative bookmark manager that preserves webpages via screenshots and PDFs to prevent data loss from link rot.
SimpleX Chat
A privacy focused messaging platform that operates without user identifiers to protect metadata and identity.
Etherpad
A real-time collaborative document editor featuring character-by-character version history and author attribution for self-hosted environments.
Overleaf
A real-time collaborative LaTeX editor for creating scientific documents and academic papers in a web browser.
AITable
A visual database platform for building spreadsheets and internal tools with automated APIs and real-time collaboration.
Stalwart Mail Server
A mail and collaboration server supporting IMAP, JMAP, SMTP, CalDAV, CardDAV, and WebDAV protocols.
Tinode
A federated instant messaging platform with a Go backend and native clients for mobile and web.
Element
A communication client for encrypted messaging and collaboration built on the decentralized Matrix protocol.
Planka
A self-hosted kanban board for agile teams to manage tasks through real-time collaborative project boards.
Grist
A relational spreadsheet that combines database structure with spreadsheet flexibility for organized data management and analysis.
Screego
A self-hosted screen sharing tool designed to provide high resolution and low latency communication.
Fluxer
An instant messaging and VoIP platform for communities featuring Markdown support, voice and video calls, and self-hosting.
BigBlueButton
A virtual classroom system for real-time audio, video, and collaborative tools designed for online learning.
ownCloud
Self-hosted server for file storage, synchronization, and sharing with support for WebDAV, CalDAV, and CardDAV.
Mumble
Low-latency voice chat software featuring a dedicated server and cross-platform clients for high quality audio communication.
CryptPad
A collaborative suite providing end-to-end encrypted document editing and file sharing for privacy focused team workflows.
HuLa
A cross-platform instant messaging system providing private and group chat capabilities across desktop and mobile devices.
OpenPencil
A design editor for opening Figma files with AI assistance, real-time P2P collaboration, and a programmable CLI.
ONLYOFFICE Docs
Provides collaborative online editing for text documents, spreadsheets, presentations, and PDFs with Office Open XML compatibility.
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