There’s another one that seems promising actually, it’s called Fluxer. Even then it’s still a bit out as it’s undergoing a rewrite.
Just noticed someone already mentioned this. It’s promising but it’s getting rewritten and they just received a bunch of funding to continue development.
i wanted to chime in. this could be done as a frame within the ui that makes it SEEM that the group chat is part of the server. like, you setup your group chat, then link it to your server so it all feels as if its part of the same experience. like it appears in your list of channels but perhaps with some unique visuals or separated ui. but it all populates when interacting with the other server channels.
so to the uninitiated it just looks like another channel and the experience is less awkward.
or even drag and drop the group chat from the left side of teamspeak into our server and it “just works” if you are an admin.
edit: thinking about this further, if the account that owns the groupchat is also the server admin, allow admin to be able to assign a group permission to a group chat role. so for example the default permission group normal could be assigned the standard role in the group chat.
Then if the linked group chat was NOT owned by the server admin, then clients would have the channel banner present but if they click it, they are prompted to be asked if they wish to join. and then if they do join, the group chat appears in the groupchat section on the left side as normal, for that client.
That’s the problem! TeamSpeak UI/UX is garbage. They are trying to be Discord with original TS components.
They should allow community feedback and should listen to the community regarding their UI because they don’t know anything about UI/UX design and we will be the ones using it.
The core of TeamSpeak is great, one of the main reasons is because C++ and C are the standard for VoIP because they provide the precision and speed required for real-time communication.
Again, the problem is the UI/UX!
Since Discord is turning to garbage, well it kind of is there already, soon because of their required Face ID crap. The best viable options is Spacebar, Stoat.chat and fluxer.app
Please, PLEASE, implement this feature. It really is the only thing that I need. Being able to post text/memes/announcements independently from a voice channel is a must.
First, thank you all for taking the time to share your feedback with us.
Global/Persistent text channels:
This has been one of the most requested features in recent times (next to screensharing ofc ^_^), and we’re aware of the gap it creates, especially for new users/communities coming from other platforms where voice & text chats are part of the server, rather than independent services/areas. We’re open to the Idea of having server-wide/persistent text channels on TeamSpeak. The question is not if, but when and how. On the server side, there’s real work involved in doing this right. And the last thing we want to do is rush out a half-baked feature, especially when it’s such a highly requested one.
This is actually something we’ve tried doing before:
Also check: Ability to text in channels without joining them - Add text channels to the server
Permission System:
This is something we’ve talked about internally many times. The permission system is powerful, and we know a lot of users value that depth. What we have discussed before is to introduce a simplified “default mode” (or an easy view, something like that) that covers the most common use cases, and then letting power users/server admins who need the full range of control switch into an advanced view. That way, newcomers aren’t staring down a wall of permissions on day one, but nothing is lost for those who’ve spent years (or decades by now) learning it.
Chat in general:
We know our chat and messaging experience isn’t as feature-rich as other platforms offer right now. Things like richer formatting/markdown (this is in active development/soon to reveal), more embeds, voice memos, custom emojis… we’re aware of it. We’d actually love to hear more specific feedback on the chat side of things.
That said, let me be honest: It comes down to priority and resource allocation. We’re a small team, smaller than most people think, that has to make calls about what gets built first and in what order, and we’re working through that. I’m not going to sit here and pretend that everything will be ready next week or in the coming months, but we are paying attention, and we do care about all the feedback coming in.
Thanks again for all the feedback. We’re logging everything and creating tickets internally.
Self hosting is free for up to 32 client slots. Or am I missing something?
i think one of the biggest positives so far is you guys are setting aside time to watch the forums and interact directly. I am sure that goes a long way with the people interested in team speak.
I think there should be a way to create text chat only just for chatting abt random stuff, and you can look at it without
for community idea, i think would be better to not “force” join in the community voice chat to see what it’s happening there, for example, sometimes i just wanna see if my friends are online on the voice chat, or to send a message there, but dont want to join in the voice
If I may be so bold:
I have a friend from my Discord channel, age 22, who is studying cybersecurity and learning to code and what not. He’d be open to an internship with you all to help you build persistent text messaging for your communities. Leverage the interns! He’s a great guy. I’ve been gaming with him for years (and I’m in my late 30s). Contact me here if you’re interested.
I am one of those people who used to use teamspeak way back in the early 2000s, I am a discord user looking for an alternative after the digital ID stuff. I just don’t like the direction it’s heading for privacy.
I tried TS6 Linux client, and I love the application. I am a little confused on the difference between a group chat and a server though. Alot of the things seem similar, but do you have to pay monthly to use a server like Discord? In Discord this is free but only the premium features are paywalled like emojis and profile enhancement features.
I also want to see TS6 have a mobile app on iOS and Android. I want to see this become the new Discord, I absolutely love the TS6 interface and the audio and video streaming quality!
group chats and private messages started outside a ts server work like discord. though they can be encrypted.
server channel chat windows are peer 2 peer. only participants have a record of the chat, and at current are not editable. the server has no chat log. these chats can also be encrypted.
as far as gifs or images, by default if someone posts a gif or image into server chat, that is routed through teamspeak infrastructure. unless you save it to the ts file system and link to that directly in the chat. but those are treated like file downloads.
this is what i understand that it works like currently. otherwise. ts6 is in dev so things are subject to change.
as far as what is behind pay - staff should answer. but generally ts6 doesnt have a pay model yet beyond the community server program.
Teamspeak has always been free up to 32 slots. That might stay the same or not, we don’t know. You can host free by hosting with your own hardware. But if you do not want to host with your own hardware, you need to buy either TS Community or buy a VPS and host the server from there.
Sorry in advance, new to the TS forums. I totally agree with the OP.
The gaming guild/clan that I run is roughly 300 people. During peak play times, we’ve had 100+ people in Discord voice for sieges and other events, and always say we wish we were still using TS because there is no equal for comms. So we’ve been patiently waiting for TSx to fill that need, specifically for perma text channels and user capacity, as we’ve been using Discord as a 2-in-one voice and forum solution like many other communities. We’ve been wanting to jump ship from Discord for ages, hoping that TS will provide those specific needs. We’ve been very frustrated with Discord for years. But TS just hasn’t been ready for us to justify the move, because TS6 just doesn’t have the capacity or the text permanency yet.
Now, with all the bad press around Discord, it seems like MANY others are looking for that alternative. And we’ve all been hoping TS6 would be ready for that. But without higher user capacity and permanent global chat channels, it’s hard for larger guilds/clans like mine to justify switching to TS right now, even if we want to, like we do.
Maybe I’ve missed it, but is there a roadmap of feature priorities somewhere? If not, I would suggest, even if it doesn’t have timelines, just something as simple as like:
I’m sure that would go a long way in community support, and may even influence some guild/clans to wait to use TS6, instead of deciding to set roots in another platform like Stoat/Matrix/etc. Because I know from my perspective of leading a gaming community, people generally don’t like change, and it’s like herding cats to try to execute on that change. And once a change is made, you don’t want to fatigue your community by telling them to make a disruptive change again. So I don’t want to move us to another platform when we would rather use TS in the first place.
So my biggest question is, biased as it may be:
That’s really the only 2 things my community needs to function and commit to switching to TS. And I’m sure there are MANY others out there with the same needs. I feel like with all this drama going on with Discord, now is the time to capitalize on stuff like this and try to snag as much of that userbase as possible. Strike while the iron is hot, so to speak. Thoughts?
For the love of god yes please give us permanent separate chat channels with a better permissions system. I am pretty sure there are many many people awaiting only these 2 features to swap back over to Teamspeak. We all remember the good old days!
I’m commenting and hoping the ts team sees this!
All of the above are some very good points. I think the biggest two are persistent text channel, so players can chat in them without having to connect to it, as well as a much easier-to-use permission system for server admins.
Actually, all the points raised here are important—and certainly for many who are still struggling with the decision to switch to TeamSpeak.
But let’s look at this from the developers’ perspective.
Personally, I fully understand that the developers don’t want to rush out certain fundamental features in a hurry. The damage that can result if new fundamental features haven’t been sufficiently tested and are still buggy—and therefore cause more problems for users than they solve—could be irreversible if it leads to a loss of user trust. (Mountaintop with their game SpectreDivide would be a good example for me of how, unfortunately, the wrong priorities and decisions were made here, which resulted in really strong user distrust (and never returned, no matter what they did) and ultimately led to the demise of the entire development studio—you certainly can’t compare the reputations of TeamSpeak and Mountaintop, but I think you understand what I mean)
On the other hand, I should also take into account in my statement just how long a period we’re talking about here, specifically regarding the development of TeamSpeak.
To be fair, one could certainly ask whether the damage might not actually be greater if the developers wait even longer to release new important features. (But that also has a lot to do with the size of the development team and its capacity, which in turn depend on other factors such as company revenue, etc.)
That’s why my opinion is very clear:
Dear TeamSpeak Team, even if the core features take a long time, take the time you need to get them perfect.
It’s better to post previews for 2–3 months and then release a rock-solid core feature.
In the end, that will likely be more beneficial than having a whole bunch of people here in the forum posting about everything that doesn’t work in the latest update and how bad everything is again because you couldn’t even get the basics right. Then you’ll have to keep patching things constantly and will likely end up spending just as much time (if not even more) on development as you would have if you’d just waited a little longer.
@SYOX I fully agree with everything mentioned. In the original post. The new Foundation II update looks amazing, I can not wait to try it out. However, the ability to create a text channel only, or even a voice channel, where the text chat is accessible to those outside the channel as long as they have permissions to access the channel, is by far the biggest drawback. My whole group of friends came over from Discord with the recent drama, but went back for the time being for two reasons.
The not being able to text chat with the server members that aren’t in their voice channel. Yes, we tried a Group Chat, which was ok but not ideal. People were reluctant to switch to begin with, then having to add everyone in the server to their contacts then accept the group chat invite after already having to get into a new server and get permissions set back up, is just one more barrier to entry for them.
And maybe most importantly no way to text chat from mobile. This is kind of included with part one, they have to be in a voice chat and a lot of time communication with people in the servers is done from mobile apps, while in a place they can’t speak freely or don’t want to risk on deafening and voice chat coming through (like at work or at a social gathering). Even just making group chats and direct messages accessible from mobile would be huge. Also the majority images being shared comes from mobile. Most people want to share pictures they’ve taken or memes they found on social media. Not being able to access a chat, and then share images from mobile is what I have experienced as the number one reason in my experience people leave TeamSpeak after trying it.
Thank you for all the work the team is doing though. I know it is a big effort for a small team. I just really would love to be able to use TeamSpeak with all my friends, but in the state it currently is, there will be no way to get them back on here until those features are added. I just hate that I have to choose hanging with my friends, or using TeamSpeak and getting so much better performance because of the optimization with resource usage.
Instead of repeating all the great suggestions of this thread i would like to point out one which, as a former discord user, i miss the most.
A simple app for android / ios would take teamspeak for me to the next level. I never thought about it while using it with discord but that is a “feature” which i truly miss.
Hi SYOX,
Glad to see TS is still going strong in terms of community communication and really happy to see that server-side persistent messaging is now planned. This was essentially the single feature that held me back from switching entirely.
I’ll be spinning up the latest beta again shortly (though, yes, I understand server side messaging isn’t here yet) to see how things are going.
Once again just wanted to say thanks for the hard work, and still looking forward to seeing where TS6 will go!