What's your favorite open source video conferencing software?
Displaying poll results.5084 total votes.
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- By the end of 2026, how useful do you think agentic/multi-agent AI systems will actually be in your daily work or personal projects? Posted on March 11th, 2026 | 40 comments
Jitsi (Score:3)
Hey, a poll that works.
You just left off the CowboyNeal option.
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I must be the only one who hasn't heard of any of these then...
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I've only heard of them in Slashdot comments.
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I haven't heard of the BigBlueButton, but I have heard of the Big Comfy Couch [wikipedia.org]...
BBB -- it's a thing. (Score:2)
I've used Big Blue Button starting a decade ago, and it's good! Largely centered around a classroom, or at least presenter paradigm, it had solid clients and worked well. Alas, the clients were Flash/Java based. I know a transition to HTML5 clients was underway, but around that time I changed companies to one that had a commercial application. I am still on the BBB mailing list, and it's still actively developed and supported. I should probably check it out again.
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No...you *and* me.
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Which has the biggest network effect? (Score:2)
Evidently it's Jitsi from the results.
However I said Other because none of the people I have remotely interacted with recently is in any OSS video conferencing network... OSS network effect = 0?
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I think it's just because of the 123 effect.The first item in a list always has an advantage.
I chose Riot because that's the only one I heard of besides Linphone, which while a GNUix user myself I think hints at the probably functional but boring nature of the project. I don't do covidcon, but ask the poll said only favorite not actual usage I chose the one with the most striking name.
Re: Which has the biggest network effect? (Score:1)
What do you mean "network"?
Jitsi Meet requires only a browser.
And ye olde desktop Jitsi uses bog-standard SIP and XMPP.
This isn't asshole-ruled walled-garden abominations like WhatsApp, you know?
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Your comments often seem somewhat off the wall. In this case it appears you don't know what "network effect" means. My first hit on that search is https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org] (and that matches my intended context). There are (at least) three aspects of the "network effect" that might apply here in terms of increasing the value of any video conferencing network under consideration. I will use Jitsi as an example, since you mentioned it.
One aspect is the familiarity (unless Jitsi is extremely easy to us
None! (Score:3)
I don't use any! :P
Jitsi: I'm just not smart enough? (Score:1)
I wanted to set up a Jitsi server on my domain, but it looks like I need to already be running an XMPP server, and maybe even be paying for a SIP trunk? I need a better guide for setting up Jitsi server.
Re:Jitsi: I'm just not smart enough? (Score:5, Informative)
I used their official docker setup [github.com] and it wasn't too bad, after I realized I actually had to set up the values they list in the CONFIGURATION section. It sets up the (completely internal) XMPP server for you, and the SIP server is only necessary if you want people to be able to connect by phone
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Great, thanks for the tip!
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Very cool, thank you, that sounds like it might be the way to go!!
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Where's the "none of the above" option? (Score:5, Insightful)
I mean, seriously... I've never had a vendor or customer who used ANY of these services. Having to install your own meeting server isn't something that most organizations want to deal with, when they can just click on a hyperlink in an e-mail and use someone else's system.
Sure, that system might be insecure as hell, but you would be surprised how many people just don't give a damn about that right now. Actually, a lot of us here work in IT, so you wouldn't really be surprised at all :)
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Yeah; me too. I attend one virtual meeting a week, for a private club. It uses Zoom, so that's what I use.
It's not private, then.
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Having to install your own meeting server isn't something that most organizations want to deal with, when they can just click on a hyperlink in an e-mail and use someone else's system.
If you have a company of any size (~200 people) then the integration work to get the system set up is already so great that a dedicated IT person is going to be required to handle it. Even more true if you want the thing set up to TVs in conference rooms, etc.
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I've never even heard of any of those before. So of course I voted for Riot because it sounds cool.
It's not my job to deal with this stuff but I'd imagine the smaller companies would just use Zoom or something as fool-proof as possible and larger ones would have Teams or Skype or something integrated like that.
Installing your own server is optional (Score:2)
Most of these have public servers that people can use (jitsi has meet.jit.si and riot can be used with the matrix.org server). Being able to install your own server is a feature that is completely absent from most of the commercial systems.
MOD PARENT UP (Score:2)
Parent is insightful. Grandparent, not so much.
Re: Zoom. From the previous poll. (Score:1)
It said open source.
Also Zoom does not even qualify as a conferencinf software, due to being more of a series of holes and backdoors with video conferencing painted on it.
Oh, come on... (Score:2)
It has to be SDR/[NV/VIC]/[VAT/RAT]/WBD/Reflector (the MICE tools), CU-SeeMe (original or White Pine) or Internet Phone.
You know, the stuff from the 90s that allowed unlimited conferencing without needing a central server and without tying up the network.
Re: Oh, come on... (Score:3)
But wouldn't you also need someone to conference with?
Re: Oh, come on... (Score:2)
And how does that work if everyone is behind NAT?
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WebRTC (Score:3)
A webpage with a webrtc element. Why complicate things with an app?
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Most of the poll is that, such as jitsi and riot.
Re: WebRTC (Score:2)
I wrote a demo that allows you to initiate WebRTC sessions over a LAN using a QR code and the device camera to handshake.
It's not nearly as straightforward as it should be, but the fact that it can be used without any Internet connection or running a server node is sick.
Re: WebRTC (Score:1)
*facepalm* Kids today . . .
none (Score:4, Insightful)
I have never heard of any of them.
Emacs. No! VI (Score:1)
argh!
Only tried Jitsi, a very bad experience (Score:1)
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Re: Only tried Jitsi, a very bad experience (Score:1)
Why are you using the demo server then?
Of course a free open-source project that doesn't sell away your privacy or tries to defraud you (aka advertisement) can't suddenly scale up a thousandfold!
Because: How much money did you pay exactly?
If you're in a business, install jitsi-meet on your server, and be done with it. Get an actual private experience for free. What kind of show are you running that you don't have an admin for that?
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Why are you using the demo server then?
Of course a free open-source project that doesn't sell away your privacy or tries to defraud you (aka advertisement) can't suddenly scale up a thousandfold!
Because: How much money did you pay exactly?
If you're in a business, install jitsi-meet on your server, and be done with it. Get an actual private experience for free. What kind of show are you running that you don't have an admin for that?
I didn't say I was using their demo server. It was running on AWS (Amazon EC2) with the latest version of Jitsi and with more than sufficient resources allocated, and the guy administering it has 30 year's experience of server administration. When there were issues he was asked to check the server status and there were no problems, it was just a software issue. I don't know why the choice of server would make the mobile app crash and close unexpectedly and the call quality vary so much. Often video was fin
I used to use ekiga back in the day. (Score:2)
It interoperated with NetMeeting, so if you ever need to video conference with anyone running Windows NT or 2000, you could do it.
Never heard of any of them (Score:2)
Like everybody else I use Cowboy Neal Connect.
roll20.net (Score:3)
roll20.net, of course.
HEllo (Score:1)
Riot uses Jitsi (Score:2)
I set up our own matrix server on EC2 when we went into lockdown here, and we haven't looked back.
Riot's just easy to use, the only issue with the Jitsi plugin is you can't screen share which is a pain. I'd still rather use that than Zoom though.
Re: Riot uses Jitsi (Score:1)
Desktop Jitsi offered screen sharing.
Signal (Score:2)
Because Snowden said so.
There are open source video conferencing tools? (Score:2)
Commercial WebRTC video chat? (Score:2)
I have tried Jitsi. It does not work very well.
I tried talky.io. It works better, but it is limited to just 6 people.
I want an open source WebRTC video chat that works well and lets me do ~12 people. I am willing to pay money.
The value of being able to just send my relatives a link, having them click on the link, and having things work is great. No additional software install, no account creation, etc.
Thanks.
Signal (Score:1)
Re: Signal (Score:1)
Signal supports group video chats?
i want one that ... (Score:2)
Skype (Score:1)