No phone number or email address is required to signup. Similar functionality like Element, but still in an earlier stage of development. Decentralized servers routed through Lokinet.
Official website getsession.org
Our take
No phone number and no email at signup is the headline, and for a privacy crowd that genuinely matters. The catch is reach: almost nobody you know already uses it, and onboarding contacts onto an account ID rather than a familiar handle is real work. Pick Session if metadata resistance ranks above convenience and you accept being the one who evangelizes it; if you just want secure chats with normal friends, Signal gets you further faster.
GitHub at a glance
session-foundation/session-android
Stars
778
+ 10 this week
Last commit
2mo ago
healthy
License
GPL-3.0
Latest release
1.33.4
2mo ago
Stars, last 10d
Listed in
Session alternatives
Signal Similar look and feel of WhatsApp and other commonly used messaging apps, makes switching easy. Signal requires your phone number as an personal identifier.
SimpleX Chat Decentralized messenger that assigns no identifier to users, not even a random number. Contacts are established via one-time invite links or QR codes, with all data stored on-device only.
Status No phone number or email address is required to signup. Uses the peer-to-peer (p2p) messaging protocol Waku that removes centralized third parties from messages.
Threema No native desktop apps available yet, but there is a web version for your browser. No phone number is required to signup but there is a payment involved to get the app.…
Molly Hardened fork of Signal for Android that adds an encrypted local database, automatic RAM wiping on lock, and Tor/SOCKS proxy support via Orbot. Ships in two variants: one with FCM push and one fully FOSS without Google.
Delta Chat Delta Chat doesn't have their own servers but uses the most massive and diverse open messaging system ever: the existing e-mail server network. Chat with anyone if you know…
Session license, in plain English
GPL-3.0 Strong copyleft
Free to use and modify, but anything you distribute that is built on it must also be open under the same license.
Permits
- Commercial use
- Modification
- Distribution
- Patent use
- Private use
Requires
- Disclose source
- Same license
- State changes
- License and copyright notice
Does not provide
- Liability cover
- Warranty
Why it matters: Strong copyleft keeps every distributed version open. A vendor cannot fold this into a closed product and ship it without releasing their changes.
Plain-language summary of the project's license, not legal advice. Read the full text for the exact terms.