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New to this? Read How Socketchat works first.
A Socketchat server is one program, socketchat server, with its data in one folder. It runs on a cloud server, a computer at home that stays on, or a small device such as a Raspberry Pi 4. The hard part is reachability: your friends’ apps must be able to connect to it on TCP port 7444.

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Pick a way

Some quick guidance:
  • Trying it out with a friend nearby? Use Same Wi-Fi.
  • Friends anywhere, and a computer at home that stays on? Use Port forwarding, if your internet provider allows it.
  • Friends anywhere, and you want it always on? Use a Cloud server.
  • Friends anywhere, and nothing open to the internet? Use a private network: Tailscale for the quickest setup, WireGuard for no accounts and no outside service.
  • Your internet provider shares one public address among many homes (CGNAT)? Port forwarding cannot work there. Use Tailscale or a cloud server.
A ready-made server you can buy from socketchat.org is planned. See Hosted by Socketchat.

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What every way has in common

--host in socketchat server init is the name or IP address your friends will dial. Invite links carry it, so pick it before you invite anyone:
The address must be a host name or an IP address. A host name uses letters, digits, hyphens, underscores and dots. Write a name in another alphabet in its xn-- form (punycode), as DNS stores it.
init makes the server’s certificate, and every invite link and every member’s app remembers its fingerprint. Back up the data folder once the server works. If you lose the certificate and run init again, everyone has to accept a new one. See Server settings and backups.
Pick an address that stays the same. Each member’s app keeps dialing the address from the link it joined with, and the links it makes for others carry that same address. public_host in the server’s config file sets the address in new socketchat server invite links, but it does not move people who already joined. That is why the pages below show how to keep a fixed local address, a fixed name that follows a changing home IP, or a domain name.

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Running the server

run keeps going until you press Ctrl-C. invite prints a one-time link that registers one new person, and works while the server runs. To keep a server running after you log out, run it as a service; the cloud server page has a systemd unit for Linux.