Conduit vs Rocket.Chat
| Tagline | Blazing fast Matrix homeserver written in Rust for small communities | Fully customizable open-source communications platform and Slack alternative |
| Category | Team Chat & Collaboration | Team Chat & Collaboration |
| Replaces | Slack, Discord, Microsoft Teams | Slack, Microsoft Teams, Discord |
| GitHub stars | 3.2k | 46k |
| Language | Rust | TypeScript |
| License | Apache-2.0 | MIT |
| Self-host difficulty | 2/5 Easy | 3/5 Moderate |
| Deploy options | Docker Manual | One-Click Docker Docker Compose Kubernetes Manual |
| Managed hosting | ||
| Last updated | 1 month ago | 5 days ago |
| View repo | View repo |
Where each falls short
The honest trade-offs — what you give up with each, versus the proprietary tools they replace.
Conduit
- Does not yet support all Matrix room versions or advanced federation features
- No built-in web client; needs Element or another client
- Bridges to other networks (Slack, Discord) require separate bridge services
Rocket.Chat
- Resource-heavy (Node.js + MongoDB) and can be slow at scale on modest hardware
- Some enterprise features (engagement dashboard, scalability, advanced auth) require a paid plan
- UI can feel cluttered compared to Slack
- Mobile apps have historically lagged the web client in polish
Bottom line
Choose Conduit if you want the lower-effort setup; choose Rocket.Chat for the larger community and ecosystem. Rocket.Chat has seen more recent development. Open each guide below for deploy steps and the full feature gap.
Rocket.Chat
Fully customizable open-source communications platform and Slack alternative