Element

Is Element actively maintained?

Element is under active development: 2574 commits landed over the last 11 months, averaging roughly 261 commits a month in the most recent quarter.

The most recent tagged release, v1.12.30-rc.1, shipped within the last month — a current, installable version exists today.

Of the 46 projects we track in Communication - Custom Communication Systems, Element ranks #5 by health score — in the top quarter of its category.

What Element actually does

Element is a client application designed to connect to the Matrix communication network across web browsers and mobile devices. It provides an interface for text messaging, voice communication, and file sharing within custom chat environments. As a Matrix client, it relies on a separately hosted homeserver to route traffic and store message history.

Best fit: It suits technical teams or individuals who want to maintain full control over their communication channels using the open Matrix protocol.

Worth knowing: You will need to manage user authentication, homeserver federation, and client updates independently, which adds ongoing administrative overhead.

Deployment notes

Since it runs on Node.js, you will typically need to serve it behind a reverse proxy to handle TLS termination and configure persistent storage if you are hosting the client assets locally alongside your server.

Links

• Official website
• Source code