#30 in Collaboration & CommunicationUpdated 2026-08

Zulip

by Zulip · Open-source team chat organised by conversation topics

46.6 — BenchRank score out of 100

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Overview

Zulip is a team chat app built around topics: each conversation is given a brief topic name inside a channel, so parallel discussions stay separate and can be picked up later. It runs as Zulip Cloud or on your own servers from the same open-source code, with export and import tools for moving between the two and importers for Slack, Teams, Mattermost and Rocket.Chat.

Best for: Distributed teams that want threaded team chat and a choice of managed cloud or self-hosting.
Pricing: Free Zulip Cloud tier and free self-hosted software; Standard is $6.67/user/month billed annually or $8 billed monthly, Plus $10 annually or $12 monthly.
Runs on: WindowsSelf-hosted

Strengths and trade-offs

Strengths

100% open-source; self-host or use Zulip Cloud, and move either way
Topic-based threading keeps parallel conversations separate
130+ native integrations, custom webhooks and a REST API
Free Standard plan for open-source, academic and non-profit groups

Trade-offs

Free plan caps search history at 10,000 messages and 5 GB total storage
Voice and video calls rely on outside providers such as Zoom or Jitsi
AD/LDAP sync and 100+ auth options are listed as 'Please inquire'
Plus needs 10 users minimum; consulting and training are billed hourly

Pricing

Published plans from Zulip’s own pricing page, in USD. Usage charges and add-ons may apply on top.

Zulip pricing tiers, monthly and annual rates in USD
Plan	Monthly	Annual (per month)	Includes
Free	—per user	—	10,000 messages of search history File storage up to 5 GB total Hundreds of integrations Guest accounts, advanced roles and permissions
Standard	$8per user/month	$6.67	Unlimited search history, 5 GB storage per user Custom groups and message retention policies Custom logo branding and public access option Priority commercial support
Plus	$12per user/month	$10	10 users minimum; all Standard features File storage up to 25 GB per user SAML SSO (Okta, OneLogin) and SCIM user/group sync Custom domain; limit user list access for guests

How this score is made up

Each dimension is scored out of 100 and combined into the headline score using fixed weights.

MCP support: 0 out of 100
API quality: 30 out of 100
Documentation: 55 out of 100
Agent friendliness: 57 out of 100
Pricing transparency: 100 out of 100
Changelog: 80 out of 100
Marketing site structure: 45 out of 100
Operational trust: 40 out of 100

Measured, but not part of the score

Useful to know, but not a mark for or against the product — so these do not affect the ranking.

Openness: 85 out of 100
Maintenance: 100 out of 100

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