When comparing Hike vs Element (formerly Riot), the Slant community recommends Element (formerly Riot) for most people. In the question“What are the best messaging apps for Android?” Element (formerly Riot) is ranked 2nd while Hike is ranked 25th. The most important reason people chose Element (formerly Riot) is:
You're not confined within Element's or even Matrix garden, and you don't have to make users of other networks switch to Matrix.
Specs
Ranked in these QuestionsQuestion Ranking
Pros
Pro Lots of great features
It contains a wallet for money transfer, news update & sports update feature.
Pro Without data media sharing option within 100m
Pro Great sticker system
A very fast sticker suggestion based on key words typed. This helps to send relevant stickers quickly. Also when we press upon a sticker it opens a quick reply sticker option.
Pro Night-mode
Hike has an app theme & auto night mode(8pm-6am) inside to reduce strain on eye while texting at night.
Pro Has a timeline
It has a timeline(photo + text), which is similar to BBM.
Pro Photo editing feature
It has a selfie edit feature like Instagram, helps with editing selfies for profile photos & photo statuses.
Pro Bridges to other networks
You're not confined within Element's or even Matrix garden, and you don't have to make users of other networks switch to Matrix.
Pro Markdown support
Code snippets in chats can be highlighted with Markdown.
Pro Simple interface
Element has a very simple interface, adding the ability for more inexperienced users to use it.
Pro VOIP and Videoconferencing
Pro Supports encryption
Element allows for fully encrypted text, voice, and video chatting.
Pro Widgets support
Want to watch that flick at YouTube and discuss it at the same time? Have Grafana graphs stacked above your DevOps team chat? Collaboratively edit Google Docs and chat over without switching applications? This is possible with Element.
Pro Decentralized
An open network for secure, decentralized communication.
Pro Self-hosting and federated network
Pro Libre/open source
Pro Search
Search messages in your current room, or all the rooms you're in. Not subject to a message history limit like Slack.
Pro Cross platform
Web browser
Linux
OS X
Windows
Android
iOS
Pro Large existing community
With public rooms for many people, and you can create your own and let people from the community join.
Pro Etherpad real-time document collaboration
An easy to activate integration that allows multiple authors to edit a document simultaneously.
Pro File Sharing
Pro Supports text, voice, video
Cons
Con Security of user information
First of all, this is closed source software. It also lacks-end-to-end encryption. In today's time, irrespective of every other feature, encryption is the most important one. Because without it, rest of the features become risky to use and thus meaningless.
