Teamspeak is one of the best but not only, voice or communication software for gamers. There are lots of alternatives to Teamspeak. Not that I want you to change away from Teamspeak. I love it, and it the software I use most. I just want you to know about the alternatives to Teamspeak as there might be others that you want to use for other than gaming.
Alternatives to Teamspeak
These alternatives to Teamspeak does are not listen in any particular order.
First alternative – Discord
Discord itself claims you can ditch both Skype and Teamspeak with this software. Claiming it is the only communication tool gamers need. Let’s look at what Discord is. First of all, Discord is totally free and available to most operating systems.
Like its competitors the communication is encrypted. Another good thing is that Discord hides your IP. So no chance of getting DDoS by your enemies in-game. There is also a mobile app, so you can always be in touch with your friend. I have this app just to be able to get in-touch with my son. As he rarely responds to SMS, messenger or any other social media.
Server hosting is taken care by Discord. You manager your server your self via the web interface or the app. Not like Teamspeak where you have to host it your self or rent a Teamspeak server. It is worth to check out. Teamspeak has lost quite a few users to Discord. And is probably Teamspeaks strongest contestant at the moment.
Second alternative – Mumble
Mumble is another great communication tool for gamers and other people who want to communicate over the internet.
Mumble is also encrypted and uses public/private key authentication by default. You can locate your fellow gamers across servers. Easy to set up and has an in-game overlay so you can see how is talking. A challenge with gaming clans with several hundred members.
As with several of the other software, Mumble is free (and open source) and available for most operating systems. No licensing (Teamspeak do you hear that?). Has a great user permission system and several community made web interfaces.
Third alternative – Ventrilo
For several years there were some rumors that Ventrilo was not being developed any longer. On several websites, it says they stopped on v3.0.8 for Windows and V3.0.13 for Mac. I was a Ventrilo user in the old days and went to their website to check this. There I found Version 4.0.0 for both Windows and Mac.
Their interface is a bit simpler than some of the others, but don’t let that fool you. It is still a powerful communication tool. However, their servers are not free. You need to rent from an approved host.
Fourth alternative – Ring
I was told Ring was another alternative to Teamspeak. To me, it looks a bit more like an alternative to Skype. Yes, I know some people use Skype to communicate when gaming. They should stop doing that :p
Ring is can do voice, teleconference, media sharing and messaging. Yea, that seems like Skype to me. If you are looking for a communication tool for gaming, you should probably check out the first three alternatives.
That’s my short list of alternatives to Teamspeak.
Please check out Teamspeak 3 server with autostart
Enjoy!