Toxic vs Tox
A side-by-side comparison of two self-hosted chat & communication options — licensing, setup difficulty, resource needs, and what each one replaces.
| Feature | Toxic | Tox |
|---|---|---|
| Deploy effort | Read-the-docs project | Read-the-docs project |
| Health score | 79 · Good | 86 · Excellent |
| Category | Chat & Communication | Chat & Communication |
| License | GPL-3.0 | GPL-3.0 |
| Language | C | C |
| Setup difficulty | Medium | Medium |
| Min. RAM | 64 MB | 64 MB |
| Deployment | bare-metal, source | bare-metal, source |
| GitHub stars | ★ 1,305 | ★ 2,685 |
| First released | 2014 | 2013 |
| Replaces | Skype, WhatsApp | Skype, Discord |
What are Toxic and Tox?
Toxic
Toxic is a console client for the peer-to-peer, encrypted Tox communication protocol. It provides text chat, file transfer, and audio calls from the terminal with no central servers.
- Terminal-based Tox client
- Fully peer-to-peer
- Encrypted chat and calls
- File transfer support
Tox
Tox is a free, peer-to-peer instant messaging protocol with end-to-end encryption and no central servers. The c-toxcore library is the reference implementation that powers a range of Tox clients.
- Fully peer-to-peer
- End-to-end encryption
- No central servers
- Voice and video calls
Toxic vs Tox: key differences
Both projects are written in C. Tox has the considerably larger community, at 2,685 GitHub stars versus 1,305.
Why pick each one
Choose Toxic if…
- Released under the GPL-3.0 license
- Active community (1.3k GitHub stars)
- Written in C
- Tiny footprint — runs in 64 MB RAM
Watch out for
- Terminal UI only
- No offline messaging
Choose Tox if…
- Released under the GPL-3.0 license
- Active community (2.7k GitHub stars)
- Written in C
- Tiny footprint — runs in 64 MB RAM
Frequently asked questions
Is Toxic or Tox better?
Neither is universally better. Tox has the larger community; both share a medium setup difficulty, so the decision comes down to features and licensing.
Are Toxic and Tox free and open-source?
Yes. Toxic is licensed under GPL-3.0 and Tox under GPL-3.0. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.
Can I run Toxic and Tox with Docker?
Toxic: check the project docs for container support. Tox: check the project docs for container support.