this post was submitted on 02 May 2026
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Some time ago when Discord used Surveillance Services to face scan all their users a lot of possible alternatives where thrown around.

  • It should be already hosted by someone
  • have voice chat
  • Be easy to sign up to so that i can convince people
top 50 comments
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Mumble + phpBB

[–] Smoogs@lemmy.world 0 points 2 hours ago
[–] Eyedust@lemmy.dbzer0.com 7 points 11 hours ago

Ventrilo. Hobbles away on my cane.

[–] Drusas@fedia.io 5 points 12 hours ago

Signal, but I don't play with randos, just people I know.

[–] RebekahWSD@lemmy.world 1 points 10 hours ago (1 children)

I'm very tired so I thought you were saying discord was gone and what would I do then and I was like "well. Me and twin game from adjacent rooms so we'd open the doors and yell but husband would be annoyed" and now I understand you mean new program.

I'd probably go back to ventrillo since I know it existed.

[–] Buffalobuffalo@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 points 3 hours ago

The ultimate start to a polycule.

[–] MeowerMisfit817@lemmy.world 3 points 14 hours ago

web.fluxer.app is your best choice.

[–] EndlessNightmare@reddthat.com 7 points 19 hours ago

Element, or whatever Matrix client of choice if you prefer a different one.

[–] MuttMutt@lemmy.world 28 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Look at Mumble. It's FOSS (Free Open Source Software)

https://www.mumble.info/about/

[–] early_riser@lemmy.world 13 points 20 hours ago (1 children)

Mumble lacks a ton of stuff that Discord has. There's no persistent text chat, no screen sharing, no video. What it does have is really really easy administration.

It frustrates me that all these Discord alternatives are trying to do everything Discord does when even Discord can't pull it off sustainably at scale. Discord has been in the "be really cool to attract users" phase, and now it's morphing into the "Oh crap we actually have bills to pay" phase. That's why you're seeing ads now, and it's only going to get worse.

I don't want a billion concurrent users. I want a place for my small group of friends to hang out that isn't hard to deploy or manage.

[–] corsicanguppy@lemmy.ca 3 points 18 hours ago (2 children)

Mumble lacks a ton of stuff

You're there to voice chat while gaming. It's not a support forum and it's not a wiki.

Why 'systemd' something simple?

[–] papalonian@lemmy.world 3 points 13 hours ago

You're there to voice chat while gaming.

And while doing so, one might want to do one of the things they listed.. being able to quickly share screens is a huge part of discord for my group, we're always showing each other new games we're playing or helping each other out on games we're playing together

[–] Passerby6497@lemmy.world 2 points 16 hours ago

Yeah, and who ever sends text to people they want to game with?!?

[–] Magnum@infosec.pub 8 points 21 hours ago

We use matrix

[–] TheAlbatross@lemmy.blahaj.zone 41 points 1 day ago (1 children)

The steam voice chat feature really improved and is very intuitive to use now. I'll frequently use that.

[–] dan1101@lemmy.world 8 points 1 day ago

We've been using steam for many years for our weekly gaming sessions. Can't remember why we stopped using discord but it was way before all the photo ID requests. I definitely don't miss discord downloading like 20 updates every week.

[–] bridgeenjoyer@sh.itjust.works 11 points 1 day ago (2 children)

Discord is still king. People are way too invested.

Matrix is decent for me. Voice, video, and screen share, works well. Have not had issues with small friend groups

[–] msage@programming.dev 1 points 11 hours ago

Matrix + Jitsi

[–] Fierro@piefed.social 2 points 17 hours ago

I use matrix with a friend, matrix calls (the one that has the option for video) drop out on their own with no warning and the ring tone is very easy to miss, I wish there was anything to do about those two problems. Other than that it's great, legacy calls seem more robust

[–] Tiral@lemmy.world 1 points 15 hours ago

So all they're doing it making you a "teen' account if you don't want to verify. All that means is you can't join "mature" discords like porn and stuff like that. For gaming with friends it won't matter.

I've tried Fluxer but it's been a bit fiddly for me on Linux. It's okay, voice chat works, but there are bugs for me with video chatting or screen-sharing. If it starts getting fixed, I'll stick with it, otherwise I'm gonna keep looking.

[–] CptHacke@piefed.social 22 points 1 day ago

Fluxer appears to be the most promising, though it is still very new and they are working furiously to get it up to par with a tiny dev team that consists of two (three?) people. Most basic features are quite usable now, though.

[–] AbsolutelyNotSpez@lemmy.world 21 points 1 day ago (1 children)
[–] shirasho@feddit.online 5 points 1 day ago

Stoat desktop feels like it was just put in the oven, especially on Linux. It may get there someday, but I cannot recommend Stoat in good faith.

[–] palordrolap@fedia.io 15 points 1 day ago (2 children)

Still using Discord here. Never sent them a face photo. Can't say either way for the other people I still talk to on there.

Prior to that I remember using TeamSpeak, which apparently still exists. Still proprietary and monolithic though, which might not be to your preference.

[–] voxthefox@lemmy.blahaj.zone 1 points 4 hours ago

I think most established accounts theyve already collected enough data to infer your age, they are only asking for identification for a subset of the population so that can verify their data or when they flag as underage.

[–] snooggums@piefed.world 5 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (1 children)

Same, we are planning on ditching when stuff like facial recognition actually kicks in but we are just trying to have fun in the evenings and the ability to easily share text/images/video/streaming with a small group has a lot of inertia.

Also one friend plays on xbox and as far as we know discord is the only one that is cross compatible.

[–] iamthetot@piefed.ca 7 points 1 day ago (4 children)

Since you say you're planning to ditch it when that facial recognition kicks in, I'm genuinely curious: are you okay with, or unaware, that Discord is already monitoring all your activity and messages to determine your age?

[–] snooggums@piefed.world 4 points 1 day ago (1 children)

I assume absolutely every single app is doing shady shit like that, and to be honest I don't really care if they are estimating my age off of what I do. I do care about showing my ID, because it has details that I don't want them to have and is a completely different thing.

[–] grue@lemmy.world 4 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

I assume absolutely every single app is doing shady shit like that

No. Only the proprietary and/or corporate-controlled ones.

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[–] MycelialMass@lemmy.world 6 points 1 day ago (4 children)

When i play with my brother we use our phones to, get this, call each other. Obviously harder to do with more people but if its just you and a buddy your phone can be used as a phone.

[–] early_riser@lemmy.world 2 points 20 hours ago

I've done this before and it works in a pinch.

[–] MuttMutt@lemmy.world 1 points 18 hours ago

This is what I did years ago. No cell phone, land line. DSL still required a phone line at the time but long distance was included free. Would play Diablo 2 with someone I knew who was about 800 miles away.

[–] WhyJiffie@sh.itjust.works 2 points 1 day ago (2 children)
[–] Curious_Canid@piefed.ca 8 points 23 hours ago

Many cell plans, at least in the US, offer unlimited calling.

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[–] Magnum@infosec.pub 1 points 21 hours ago

What's with your ingame audio?

[–] slazer2au@lemmy.world 10 points 1 day ago

TeamSpeak or an old fashioned LAN Party

[–] TootGuitar@sh.itjust.works 9 points 1 day ago (2 children)

Back in the day we used Ventrilo for voice chat.

Stoat seems like a nice, newer alternative to Discord.

[–] harmbugler@piefed.social 15 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Mumble is a drop-in replacement for Ventrilo. Cons: very basic. Pros: very basic.

[–] p4rzivalrp2@piefed.social 1 points 14 hours ago

Its not necessarily basic tnough? Just very different feature set iirc. Cant you even set up directional sound from games or smth crazy

[–] Onomatopoeia@lemmy.cafe 7 points 1 day ago

Ventrilo

Holy hell haven't heard that name in years

[–] popekingjoe@lemmy.world 7 points 1 day ago

I use a self-hosted TeamSpeak6 server with my friends. My friends use Discord without me afaik. I can't make people share my principles, but they're slowly coming around to how bad companies can be with their encroaching data hoarding.

[–] BaraCoded@literature.cafe 7 points 1 day ago

I use a matrix client called "Commet", but for easy sign-up, I guess it's Stoat or Fluxer.

[–] iamthetot@piefed.ca 4 points 1 day ago

Fluxer for me and my friend group. Signal was actually the primary plan but it doesn't work for two main reasons for us, both related to the fact that we record ttrpg sessions. Since I don't think this would affect most people, I'd also recommend Signal, though some people dislike needing a phone number to sign up.

[–] hexagonwin@lemmy.today 5 points 1 day ago

for only voicechats, mumble seemed good

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