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I'm looking for a group chat tool with minimal onboarding for folks in the same physical space. Ideally, users wouldn't have to create an account at all: they could just scan a QR code, enter their name, and start participating. Something fully web-based with support for desktop and mobile browsers would be ideal.

The use case is for a small conference, where participants will physically arrive at a lounge and check in. At that point we'll give them some materials, including information about how to join the chat. A short while later, people will spread out into several smaller spaces. We intend to post QR codes in each of those spaces for joining the chat as well.

The chat will be used mostly for side-channel communication, though we may post "official" stuff in there as well, e.g. "Item X on the agenda will be starting in five minutes".

We've considered Signal and WhatsApp (both have more onboarding than I'd like) as well as Slack and Discord. We probably don't need multiple channels, but private messaging would be good to have. Discord feels like the closest choice, but it also seems like overkill, and I'd like to avoid making folks install an app on their phones.

Is there anything out there that fits the bill?

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  • Not sure why you associate Discord with forcing installation of app on the phone. It works in any web browser without a problem.
    – Destroy666
    Commented Jul 11 at 15:28
  • @Destroy666, yeah, maybe I'm wrong. I've used Discord in a browser on my laptop but thought the mobile experience was heavily weighted towards their app. I'll have to try it out.
    – Chris
    Commented Jul 11 at 21:17

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We ended up using a Slack instance that the organizer had already set up for previous conferences:

  1. Create an invitation link in Slack
  2. Shorten it using Bitly using a custom back-half that's easy to type
  3. Post the Bitly QR code and short URL, and encourage folks to join

This worked okay, but we didn't get as many people enrolled in the chat as we would have liked. Participants were somewhat likely to already use Slack, which means our success rate is probably slightly inflated.

The event runs annually, so I'd still love to see other answers posted.

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