What is the best alternative to Beejive?
Pro Beautiful User Interface
Although IMO has a comparable, and in some cases superior, feature set when compared to the competition its key selling point is its interface. From LifeHacker when it won "Best IM Client": Signing on, navigating chats by tapping the tabs at the bottom, searching for buddies, and v...
Pro Easy to switch between conversations with tabs
Tabbed chats make it easy to switch between conversations
Pro Lists and chat histories are searchable
Both your buddy lists and chat histories are searchable.
Con No support for third-party instant messaging networks
On March 3, 2014, IMO will start discontinuing support for all third-party instant messaging networks.
Pro Push is quick
Push notifications are extremely quick.
Pro Cross-platform
Support for iOS, Android, and Blackberry.
Pro Built-in browser
Kik is the first messenger with a built-in browser.
Con Not for young people
Kik has a lot of sexual predators and can be dangerous for kids.
Pro View downloaded Office and iWork documents right within the app
With support for CloudApp and Droplr, you can send Photos and view PDFs, Office and iWork documents right within Verbs.
Pro Minimalist approach and a beautiful interface
Verbs distinguishes itself from the competition with a minimalist approach to IM and a beautiful interface.
Pro Use CloudApp and Droplr to send Photos
With support for CloudApp and Droplr, you can send Photos and view PDFs, Office and iWork documents right within Verbs.
Con Notable client support exceptions
IM/MobileMe MSN/Windows Live Yahoo! Facebook Jabber ICQ
Pro Registration without phone number
Registration is handled by random generated IDs. No phone number needed.
Pro Encrypted communication
Provides complete end-to-end encryption.
Pro Provides a web client
You can control and message with friends via Threema Web, the official web client for Threema.
Con Single device only
You cannot use multiple devices to send messages. However, it does have message mirroring on a web client.
Con No cloud sync
E2E encryption means no cloud syncing of messages.
Con Not free
Unlike many other options Threema is not free as it costs $1.99 for the app.
Pro Comes pre-installed
No need to download or sign up for a new service
Pro Cross-platform within Apple ecosystem
iMessage is available on iPhone, iPod, iPad, and Mac.
Pro Free and unlimited messages over Wi-Fi and data
Messages clearly indicates whether messages are being sent over iMessage (blue) or SMS (green) where messaging rates apply. iMessages do not count as SMS messages with your carrier, instead they use a negligible amount of data to send over Wi-Fi and cellular data networks.
Con Not cross-platform
iMessage is not available on anything but Apple devices.
Pro Free and convenient large file sharing
Copy/paste videos, gifs, images, geolocation, and documents, drag over files for practically any time up to 1.5GB in size. Images can be compressed, too. asdf f
Pro Privacy focused
In addition to the end-to-end encryption that provides privacy to communications, the app also includes self destructing timers for chats, and the ability to permanently delete messages, yours and theirs, from your device.
Pro Beautiful UI
Very customizable with a lot of clean looking options.
Con Not fully open source
Telegram has an open API and protocol free for everyone, but the backend software is not open source. Therefore 100% privacy can not be evaluated.
Con Can only be used with a phone number
It is not possible to activate and use Telegram by mail etc. You need a phone number.
Con Only "Secret Chat" messages are encrypted end to end
The only way to get end-to-end encryption (client-client) using Telegram is to use the Secret Chat function, anything through the service is server-client encrypted. Also secret chat is only implemented in the mobile apps, meaning there is no way to encrypt messages end-to-end when using the deskt...
Pro Truly open and secure, comes from the Open Whisper Systems Team
Backed by people nut about privacy, including Edward Snowden, Whistleblower and privacy advocate Laura Poitras, Oscar winning filmmaker and journalist Bruce Schneier, internationally renowned security technologist Matt Green, Cryptographer, Johns Hopkins University
Pro Encrypted voice calling
Unlike many other apps, signal provides not only text messaging but also live encrypted voice calling.
Pro Free as in both free beer and freedom, not as in "The customer is the product"
Pay Nothing - The development team is supported by community donations and grants. There are no advertisements, and it doesn't cost anything to use.
Con Centralized architecture
Signal's server architecture has been partially decentralized since December 2013, when it was announced that the messaging protocol that is used in Signal had successfully been integrated into the Android-based open-source operating system CyanogenMod. As of CyanogenMod 11.0, the client logic...
Con Code being used in Whatsapp and other parties undermines trust
It's unlikely FB would add encryption it does not have access to.
Pro Effortlessly builds your contacts by using your phone number as identification
WhatsApp will automatically find all of your contacts currently using Whatsapp and add them to your contacts. This makes it really easy to setup and given that it's the most popular messaging app it's likely that a lot of your contacts are already using it.
Pro Straightforward interface
The interface is very simple, fast and easy to use. You can start using it as soon as the app has been downloaded - it does not require setting anything up or registering. You can communicate with anyone in your contacts list that also uses WhatsApp. Includes useful features like seeing when a cont...
Pro Widely used
WhatsApp reported 800 million users in April, 2015. Your friends are most likely already using WhatsApp, so it's easy to get setup. Also it's the overall highest rated messaging app on the play store.
Con Single device
You cannot use the same WhatsApp account on multiple devices (e.g. a tablet, a PC and a cellphone). The account is tied to the device with the specific cellphone number. Chat history is deleted when you sign in to a new account, unless you have created a backup.
Con Hard to migrate history cross platform
Migrating your chat history from Android to iOS or the other way around is not so simple. In some cases it requires a 3rd party app and in some the only way is to migrate specific chats one by one.
Con Shares meta data with Facebook
WhatsApp shares your messaging meta data with Facebook if you do not opt-out in the settings. If you use the same phone number for WhatsApp and Facebook, the profiles can easily be linked. See https://www.whatsapp.com/faq/en/general/26000016
Pro Can send encrypted messages
IM+ has the most extensive client support out of any of its competition and is the only app with the ability to send secure, off-the-record messages.
Pro Simple user interface
IM+ does the core IM experience incredibly well. The layout is intuitive to use and the very high app store reviews indicate how stable and user friendly the app is.
Pro Advanced chat history
Access your messaging history in the app or on the web
Pro In-house server support
You can set up a dedicated server to hold your communications. Great for businesses that want to build their own infrastructure.
Pro Multiple networks in one place
Among them Yahoo!, Facebook, Skype, Google, AIM, ICQ, XMPP, MSN. You can have multiple accounts associated with each service.
Pro Group chat
Trillian to Trillian group chat is available.
Pro Can communicate outside of Vine
You can send messages to people outside of Vine.
Pro Video tools
Vine can capture a video for you and has a grid to help line up shots.
Pro Video messages
Videos can be up to six seconds long.
Pro Secure
Messages are received from clients using secured (TLS or SSL) XMPP (jabber) protocol.
Pro Network efficient
AstraChat is tuned to make very efficient use of the network connection and processor so you can be confident that it will use very little of your battery or data allowance.
Con No OTR service
Off-the-Record Messaging (OTR) is a cryptographic protocol that provides encryption for instant messaging conversations. Astrachat doesn't include this protocol, that it is often included in other XMPP services.
Pro Enormous, constantly updated stamp collection
Since many brands use stamps for promotional purposes, everything from movies to food brands to Taylor Swift have released stamp collections.
Pro Photo filter and editing capabilities
Users have in-app editing tools, as well as Line's separate camera application, which has additional tools.
Pro Large celebrity and public figure usage rate
The caveat is that they are in Japan, but the app is commonly used to 'follow' public figures.
Con Account is locked to the Phone Number & Device
The entire account is locked to the phone number, which cannot be changed. If the application is installed on a new device with the same phone number, the previous account data will be wiped.
Con Users have been concentrated in Japan
Of the 360+ million registered users, the top country is Japan (50 million). Thailand and Indonesia are 2nd and 3rd with 33 and 30 million, respectively, with very small market penetration in the US (10 million, 11th place).
Pro Persists history
Your chat history is persisted by default (you can send incognito end-to-end encrypted self-destructing messages instead if you so desire).
Pro Allows self-destructing messages
You can send messages that will be removed from both parties after a defined period of time.
Pro Regular calls
You can buy Nimbuzz Credit and make calls at a reduced price.
Pro Chat rooms
Nimbuzz has public chat rooms that can be created or accessed by anyone.
Pro Video, audio and photo sharing
Nimbuzz can share media files.
Pro Video & photo messages
Photos have to be cropped to be square.
Pro Filters
That can be applied to photos and videos.
Pro Group messages
With up to 15 people.
Con Walled garden
Can't communicate with people outside of Instagram.
Pro Mass message multiple people at once
Ability to send a single message to multiple people without exposing their contact information to each other. Reach sends individual messages to the group rather than starts a group chat.
Pro Personalized and Individual conversations in "Group Mode"
When sending a message to a group of people, Reach starts a private conversation in your Messages, Mail or WhatsApp apps respectively for each recipient
Pro Reusable Recipient Groups
Improve workflow productivity by creating reusable recipient groups
Con Need to press "Send" button per each recipient
When sending a message to a group, the user must press "Send" button for each recipient. The only work around is to use Google Voice integration for fully automatic mass texting
Pro Can send self-destructing messages
Messages can be set to self-destruct after a set time.
Pro Offers 3 types of encryption
The app claims to be the only communication app that encrypts data in transit, on disk and on screen. Encryption in transit is used to make sure no-one can listen in on your conversations even if the traffic is going through their servers, encryption on disk is used to make sure that even if someo...
Pro Free and cross-platform
Google offers all features of Hangouts completely free on iOS, Android and web with quick and reliable sync across all platforms. It's also tightly integrated in other Google services - it can be accessed from services such as Gmail, Google+, Chrome. While the standard Hangouts offering is co...
Pro Group video support
If you have signed in your Google account, Hangouts allows making video calls with up to 10 people or one-on-one. There are business, education and government solutions that increase the participant count to for video calls to 15 as well as offers support for those accounts. Additionally, you can...
Pro Excellent read receipts in group chat
It's possible to know what each and every participant of the group has read. Their icons are displayed below the last message.
Con Lack of end to end encryption
Communications are encrypted between client and Google servers but not from sending client to receiving client. This means that there is still a possibility for someone other than the receiver to read your message if they have access to internal Google servers. But it allows also lightweight chat h...
Con Transitioning to corporate orientation
Google is turning Hangouts in to a Slack competitor. It's unclear what the future of Hangouts is, but Google has said the consumer Hangouts we now have 'isn't going anywhere.'
Con Not available on Windows Phones
There is no Hangouts app for the Windows Phone.
Pro Uses Facebook friends to create a contacts list
Allows communicating with anyone who's a friend on Facebook.
Pro Easy to share posts from Facebook
Integration with Facebook makes it easy to share any interesting posts from the Facebook timeline.
Pro Read receipts
Can see who has seen each message in group messages.
Con Lack of privacy
Messenger is owned by Facebook. Based on their privacy policy, this means that any information you provide (including messages sent) are used by Facebook to profile you and sell access to your data to advertisers.
Con Lack of end-to-end encryption
Secret (end-to-end encrypted) chats are only supported in one-to-one messages, and are not enabled by default, and the encryption has not been verified independently.
Con No video messages
Currently there is no way to send video messages using Messenger.
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