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ChatABit protects your messages as they travel from phone to phone. Start with a display name, check who you’re talking to, and keep direct and group conversations private—even when other phones help carry them.
ChatABit locks the contents of your direct and group messages so the people in the conversation can read them. This is called end-to-end encryption.
If your message travels through another person’s phone, that phone passes along the protected message without reading it. You can use the shared network while keeping the conversation between its participants.
Choose a display name and get started without registering an account or sharing a phone number. ChatABit creates your app identity on your device.
For added confidence, check a contact’s verification QR code or compare the safety numbers in the app with that person. Doing this in person, or through another way you already trust, helps you confirm the person behind the name.
Alongside protecting the message itself, ChatABit protects the connection between linked devices. This adds another layer of encryption while information moves across the network.
Messages also carry a digital signature: a built-in check that helps receiving devices verify the sender’s app identity and detect changes to a message along the way.
Your group conversations are encrypted for the people taking part. When someone leaves or is removed, ChatABit changes the secret code used to protect new group messages.
That helps keep future conversations within the current group as your plans, crew or community change.
Turn on voice-to-text on a supported phone and your phone creates a text version of your voice message. The audio stays on your phone for this step, rather than being sent to an online transcription service.
The text then travels with the same message protection as your conversation, so people can read along when listening isn’t convenient. You control whether to send these text versions in Settings.
Remove a message from your own history, or request deletion of your own message for everyone in the conversation. Voice messages and their text versions are included.
Deletion takes effect on other devices when they receive your request. Copies someone has made outside the app, such as screenshots or recordings, remain outside that control.
Messages travel directly between connected phones or through other participating phones. When a connection becomes available later, a phone can pass along a message it has been holding. Messages are stored for a limited time, so delivery depends on a connection becoming available within that time.
Live voice uses an active connection. Nearby-device permissions and battery settings affect connectivity; on iPhone, keeping the app open gives the best results.
You’ll need a phone and language that support on-device speech recognition. Enable “Send text with my voice messages” in Settings. Your phone may need internet access to download language support first.
People can receive the text even if their own phone does not support transcription. As with other automatic transcription, the words may occasionally need clarification.
An independent security review is not currently available on this site. This page explains ChatABit’s security design and features.