Matrix: a European alternative to Slack and Microsoft Teams for small businesses

By Simon Casano · Published on 02/10/2026 · 7 min read

Also available in: Français · Nederlands · Deutsch

Slack and Microsoft Teams have become the default tools for team chat. They are convenient, but your conversations are stored by an American company, the price goes up with every user, and you depend entirely on their decisions.

Matrix takes a different approach: an open standard that you can host yourself or have hosted in Europe. Here is what you need to know before choosing.

What is Matrix?

Matrix is an open communication protocol, maintained by the Matrix.org Foundation. It is not an app but a standard, a bit like email: anyone can run a server, and different apps can talk to each other.

In practice, an organisation has its own Matrix server, most often Synapse, on its own domain name. Users sign in with an app such as Element, available on desktop, in the browser and on smartphones. You get what you expect from team chat: rooms, direct messages, threads, file sharing, reactions and calls.

What changes compared with Slack and Teams

Your data stays on your server: you choose where it is hosted, for example in the European Union, and who has access to it.
End-to-end encryption: in Matrix, private conversations and direct messages are end-to-end encrypted by default. Only the participants can read them, not even the host. Slack and Teams do not encrypt messages this way.
Federation: your users can chat with people on other Matrix servers (partners, customers, suppliers) without everyone having to create an account on the other side.
No lock-in: the protocol and the software are open source. If you change hosts, you keep your domain, your accounts and your rooms.
Price: Slack and Teams charge per user. A hosted Matrix server can be billed at a fixed price, whatever the number of people.

Who uses Matrix?

Matrix is not a fringe project. The French government uses it for Tchap, the messaging app of its civil servants. In Germany, the armed forces use it for BwMessenger, and the healthcare sector relies on it for TI-Messenger. These choices are explained by the same reasons as for a small business: keeping control of your data, encrypting exchanges and not depending on a single provider.

Limits to be aware of

Matrix is not perfect, and it is better to know it before migrating:

Fewer integrations: Slack and Teams connect to hundreds of tools in one click. With Matrix the choice is narrower, although bridges and bots exist.
Managing encryption keys: to read old encrypted messages on a new device, each user must keep their recovery key. It is a habit to get into.
A slightly different learning curve: Element looks like Slack, but some settings are specific to Matrix. A short training session at the start saves a lot of questions.

Switching to Matrix in a small business

A successful migration happens in stages:

Start with a pilot team of a few people for two or three weeks.
Recreate your main channels as rooms, and group them in a space for the company.
Show everyone how to install Element and back up their recovery key.
Set a date from which internal exchanges happen on Matrix, and keep the old tool read-only for a while.

If you do not want to run a server, managed Matrix hosting takes care of installation, security updates and backups. You keep your domain and your data, without the maintenance.