Private messenger with no user identifiers
SimpleX Chat
A messenger that has no accounts, no phone numbers and no usernames.
- License
- AGPL-3.0
- Onion support
- Supports onion routing
- Reaches the network
- Only through the gateway's Tor
What it is for
Most messengers know who you are. SimpleX does not give anyone an identifier to know: there is no user ID on any server, and contacts are linked by one-time invitations.
- 01Chat one to one and in groups, with voice, files and disappearing messages.
- 02Connect to people through a link or QR code, without exchanging a phone number or handle.
- 03Keep your profile on your own device, not on a company server.
Why it helps your privacy
No identifiers
There is no account number, username or phone number tying your conversations together. The network cannot say who talks to whom.
End-to-end encrypted
Messages are encrypted on your device. The relay servers that queue them carry ciphertext only.
Separate queues per contact
Each contact uses its own unidirectional message queues, so two contacts cannot be correlated by the servers.
Your profile stays local
Contacts, groups and the profile live in a local database, which on Ombra sits on your encrypted disk.
Onion services
Supports onion routing
SimpleX relay servers can be reached as onion services, and the app can route its traffic through Tor.
How it is set up in Ombra
- Routed through Tor
- SimpleX has no proxy setting that Ombra can preset, so it starts through a proxychains wrapper that sends everything to the gateway's Tor.
- Fails closed
- The desktop firewall only lets traffic reach the gateway. A direct connection by the app would be blocked, not leaked.
- Conditions of use
- SimpleX shows its conditions the first time it opens and you accept them yourself. Ombra never accepts on your behalf.
- Provenance
- The arm64 desktop build is not signed upstream. Ombra pins its SHA-256 at build time but cannot verify an upstream signature.