Delta Chat vs Papercups
A side-by-side comparison of two self-hosted chat & communication options
— licensing, setup difficulty, resource needs, and what each one
replaces.
Not the right match-up?
Compare Delta Chat with
choose an app… Chatwoot SimpleX Chat Etherpad Tinode Centrifugo Screego Typebot Berty Mumble ejabberd The Lounge qTox Synapse FluffyChat Quicksy Bridge MongooseIM Toxic Syphon Element X Briar mautrix-signal Session Chatmail Chatmail Relay SchildiChat Snikket Tigase XMPP Server Wesh Network Metronome IM Monocles Chat Prose
Compare Papercups with
choose an app… Plane Chatwoot Focalboard Super Productivity Wekan SimpleX Chat Etherpad OpenProject Habitica Self-Hosted Planka Leantime Centrifugo Screego Typebot git-bug Kanboard Berty Mumble Kaneo The Lounge Taskwarrior Zammad WorkAdventure Soketi Remark42 Isso FreeSWITCH qTox MiroTalk Ferdium FreeScout Telegram Bot API Server Rustpad Erxes Asterisk WeeChat Ergo irssi Quicksy Bridge Kamailio Cusdis Libredesk Tox Stoat AnyCable Chitchatter Live Helper Chat Spacebar Nextcloud Talk Indico RetroShare SIPCAPTURE Homer Peer-calls mautrix-telegram Routr GlobaLeaks openSIPS mautrix Databag Galène InspIRCd Candy Toxic Hyphanet FusionPBX soju KiwiIRC Glowing Bear Bonfire Pretalx Notifo SimpleX Briar Quassel IRC OTS matrix-commander Mumble Web Comentario BitlBee ngIRCd Miaou Session Nextcloud Talk Signaling Server UnrealIRCd MiroTalk C2C matrix-appservice-irc Linphone Chatmail Relay Hookshot Atheme IRC Services Maunium Sticker Picker Spectrum 2 Shhh Gamja Jami Server Bridge Mollysocket Anope PushBits Comm Tiledesk Heisenbridge Slixmpp Ferdium Server Solanum Wesh Network Draupnir baibot matrix-media-repo Charybdis IRCd Zusam Cactus Comments ircd-hybrid Scuttlebutt Room Robust IRC Flexisip SAMA Biboumi Hebbot ircu2 Libervia Jami YunoHost Mail Relay 3CX ARN-Messager Freepbx GNUnet Groupboard MailBag Mailman3 Mailing List Manager Mlmmj Web Peachpub PrivMX WebMail SIP3 TrueConf Wazo Yeti-Switch
Feature Delta Chat Papercups Category Chat & Communication Chat & Communication License MPL-2.0 MIT Language Rust Elixir Setup difficulty Medium Medium Min. RAM 256 MB 1,024 MB Deployment bare-metal, binary docker, bare-metal, source GitHub stars ★ 916 ★ 6,097 First released 2017 2020 Replaces WhatsApp, Signal, Telegram Intercom, Drift
Why pick each one
Choose Delta Chat if… Leverages decentralized email No new server protocol Delta Chat details Choose Papercups if… Released under the MIT license First-class Docker support for quick deployment Mature project with 6.1k GitHub stars Written in Elixir Papercups details
Frequently asked questions Is Delta Chat or Papercups better? Neither is universally better. Papercups has the larger community; both share a medium setup difficulty, so the decision comes down to features and licensing.
Are Delta Chat and Papercups free and open-source? Yes. Delta Chat is licensed under MPL-2.0 and Papercups under MIT. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.
Can I run Delta Chat and Papercups with Docker? Delta Chat: check the project docs for container support. Papercups: yes.