ARMADA VS ELEMENT
They differ on 3 of the things we checked: iphone, custom emoji, imports a discord server.
| Fact | ARMADA | ELEMENT |
|---|---|---|
| Status | Beta | Stable |
| Founded | 2026 | 2017 |
| Hosting | Cloud or self-host, Decentralized | Cloud or self-host, Federated |
| Encryption | Every message and call is end-to-end encrypted. | TLS in transit; private rooms and DMs are end-to-end encrypted by default, public rooms are not. |
| Pricing | Free; no paid tier or ads; Soapbox is funded by grants and donations | Apps and matrix.org accounts free; Element Server Suite Community free to self-host; Enterprise priced per seat and Sovereign per deployment (quote only) |
| Open source | Yes | Yes |
| Official cloud service | Yes | Yes |
| You can host it yourself | Yes | Yes |
| Windows | Yes | Yes |
| macOS | Not confirmed | Yes |
| Linux | Yes | Yes |
| iPhone | No | Yes |
| Android | Yes | Yes |
| In a browser | Yes | Yes |
| Text channels | Yes | Yes |
| Voice channels | Yes | Yes |
| Video calls | Yes | Yes |
| Screen share | Yes | Yes |
| Threads | Yes | Yes |
| Roles and permissions | Yes | Yes |
| Bots or an API | Yes | Yes |
| Custom emoji | Yes | No |
| One account, many communities | Yes | Yes |
| Export your data | Not confirmed | Yes |
| No ads | Yes | Yes |
| Members pay nothing | Yes | Yes |
| Imports a Discord server | Yes | No |
| Bridges with Discord | Yes | Not confirmed |
In short
Armada. Open beta ahead of v1.0 with near-daily 0.x releases; the repo was created in June 2026. Discord import uses a bridge bot and brings channels, up to 99 roles, custom emoji and up to 10,000 messages per channel (servers of 100 members or fewer), with live bridging; members must re-join via invite and bridged channels are not E2EE. Community messages and DMs are E2EE (relays see ciphertext); voice runs over self-hostable LiveKit with client-side encryption. Release assets cover Windows, Linux and Android; macOS is claimed in the README but no macOS build was found in releases, and iOS is web-only with a native app in progress.
Element. The mature, decentralised option: pick any homeserver (or run Synapse yourself), E2EE is on by default for private rooms and DMs but off for public rooms, and threads, power-level roles, bots, chat export and Element Call screen sharing all exist. Expect a Slack-like rather than Discord-like UX (Spaces instead of servers, no custom emoji), a learning curve around device verification and key backup, and no Discord importer (only bridges such as matrix-appservice-discord). Element the company monetises hosting and enterprise, so the consumer apps stay free.
Something wrong here? Tell r/LeavingDiscord.
I build Probed, one of the destinations here. It gets the same facts as the rest.