Comparison of instant messengers - Definition and Overview

The following tables compare general and technical information for a number of instant messenger programs and protocols used for communication between one or more people. Please see the individual products' articles for further information. External links lead to extensions that add a feature to a client.

Contents

1 General information

2 Network support

3 Operating system support

7.1 Official websites
7.2 Review

General information

Basic general information about the instant messengers: creator/company, license/price etc.

	Creator	First public release date	Type	Current stable version	Cost	License
Adium	Adam Iser	September 2001	Multi-protocol	0.76	Free	GPL
AIM	AOL	May 1997	Single protocol	5.9	Free Adware	Proprietary
aMSN	Alvaro J. Iradier Muro	May 2002	Single protocol	0.94	Free	GPL
Centericq	Konstantin Klyagin	?	Multi-protocol	4.20.0	Free	GPL
Fire	Eric Peyton	?	Multi-protocol	1.0.4	Free	GPL
Gaim	Mark Spencer	November 1998	Multi-protocol	1.1.2	Free	GPL
iChat	Apple Computer	August 2002	Multi-protocol	2.1	Free	Proprietary
ICQ	Mirabilis	November 1996	Single protocol	4	Free Adware	Proprietary
Kopete	Kopete Team	March 2002	Multi-protocol	0.9.2	Free	GPL
Miranda IM	Miranda IM project	2000	Multi-protocol	0.3.3.1	Free	GPL
MSN Messenger	Microsoft	July 1999	Single protocol	6.2	Free Adware	Proprietary
Proteus	Defaultware	?	Multi-protocol	4.09	15 USD	Proprietary
Psi	Justin Karneges	2001	Single protocol	0.9.2	Free	GPL
Trillian	Cerulean Studios	July 2000	Multi-protocol	3.0	Free	Proprietary
Trillian Pro	Cerulean Studios	September 2002	Multi-protocol	3.0	25 USD	Proprietary
Yahoo! Messenger	Yahoo!	June 21 1999 [1] (http://docs.yahoo.com/info/pr/milestones.html)	Single protocol	6.0 (Win) 2.5.3 (Mac)	Free	Proprietary
	Creator	First public release date	Type	Current stable version	Cost	License

Network support

Information on the networks that each client can access.

	AIM	ICQ	MSN Messenger	Yahoo!	IRC	Jabber	Rendezvous	Novell GroupWise Messenger	Lotus Sametime	Gadu-Gadu	Skype
Adium	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No
AIM	Yes	Yes	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No
aMSN	No	No	Yes	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No
Centericq	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	?	?	No	No
Fire	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	?	?	No	No
Gaim	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	Yes	Plugin [2] (http://meanwhile.sourceforge.net/)	Yes	No
iChat	Yes	Yes	No	No	No	No	Yes	?	?	No	No
ICQ	No	Yes	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No
Kopete	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	Yes	Yes	Yes	No
Miranda IM	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	?	?	Yes	Plugin [3] (http://www.miranda-im.org/download/details.php?action=viewfile&id=1570)
MSN	No	No	Yes	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No
Psi	No ¹	No ¹	No ¹	No ¹	No ¹	Yes	No	No	No	No ¹	No
Proteus	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	?	?	Yes	No
Trillian	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	No	No	No	No	No
Trillian Pro	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	No
Y!M	No	No	No	Yes	No	No	No	No	No	No	No
	AIM	ICQ	MSN Messenger	Yahoo!	IRC	Jabber	Rendezvous	Novell GroupWise Messenger	Lotus Sametime	Gadu-Gadu	Skype

Note 1: Interoperability with proprietary protocols can be achieved using server-side gateways (so-called transports) in Jabber.

Operating system support

The Operating systems the clients can run on without emulation.

	Windows	Mac OS X	Linux	BSD	Unix
Adium	No	Yes	No	No	No
AIM	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
aMSN	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Centericq	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Fire	No	Yes	No	No	No
Gaim	Yes	Yes ²	Yes	Yes	Yes
iChat	No	Yes	No	No	No
ICQ	Yes	Yes	No	No	No
Kopete	No	No	Yes	Yes	Yes
Miranda IM	Yes	No	No	No	No
MSN	Yes	Yes	No	No	No
Proteus	No	Yes	No	No	No
Psi	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Trillian	Yes	No	No	No	No
Trillian Pro	Yes	No	No	No	No
Y!M	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
	Windows	Mac OS X	Linux	BSD	Unix

Note 2: The Mac OS X version must be self compiled, and will only run with an X server and GTK+ installed.

Features

Information on what features each of the clients support.

	File transfer	Graphical smileys	In-built Games	Voice and webcam conversations	Themes/skins	Plugin system ³	Third-party addons ⁴
Adium	Partial	Yes	Yes	No	Yes	Yes	Yes
AIM	Yes	Yes	Partial	Yes	Yes	No	Yes
aMSN	Yes	Yes	No	No	Yes	Yes	Yes
Centericq	Partial	No	No	No	Yes	No	?
Fire	?	Yes	No	No	?	?	Yes
Gaim	Partial	Yes	No	No [4] (http://gaim-vv.sourceforge.net/)	Yes	Yes	Yes
ICQ	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	Yes
iChat	Yes	Yes	No	Yes	No	No	Yes
Kopete	Partial	Yes	No	No	No	Yes	Yes
Miranda IM	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	Yes	Yes	Yes
MSN	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	Yes
Proteus	Partial	Yes	No	No	Yes	Yes	Yes
Psi	Yes	Yes	No	No (scheduled)	No	No	No
Trillian	Yes	Yes	No	Voice only	Yes	No	Yes
Trillian Pro	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Y!M	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	No
	File transfer	Graphical smileys	In-built Games	Voice and webcam conversations	Themes/skins	Plugin system	Third-party addons

Note 3: Plug-in system to add/expand the default features for the application, or protocol. Such as (but not limited to) Trillian chat client - Plugins

Note 4: Third party add-ons which are usually not approved by the author of the application and are usually standalone. Such as (but not limited to) AOL Instant messenger - Third-party add-ons

Protocols

Information on the Network protocols used to connected clients.

	Creator	First public release date	License	Identity (not inc. alias)	Asynchronous message relaying
Rendezvous	Apple Computer	August 2002	Proprietary	Username@hostname	No
Gadu-Gadu	?	1999 (?)	Proprietary	Unique number e.g. 12345678	Yes
IRC	Jarkko Oikarinen	August 1988	Open standard	Nickname!Username@hostname (or "hostmask") e.g. ~user!usr@a.b.com ⁵	Yes
Jabber	Jeremie Miller	May 2000	Open standard	JID e.g. usr@a.b.c/home ⁶	Yes
.NET Messenger Service	Microsoft	?	Proprietary	E-mail address (.NET Passport)	No
OSCAR protocol	AOL	?	Proprietary	Username or UIN e.g. 12345678	Yes
YMSG	Yahoo	?	Proprietary	Username	No
	Creator	First public release date	License	Identity (not inc. alias)	Asynchronous message relaying

Note 5: In ~usr@a.b.com, the a.b.com part is known as the "hostmask" and can either be the server being connected from or a "cloak" granted by the server administrator; a more realistic example is ~myname@myisp.example.com.

Note 6: In usr@a.b.c/home, the home part is a "resource", which distinguishes the same user when logged in from multiple locations, possibly simultaneously; a more realistic example is user@jabberserver.example.com/home

External links

Official websites

Adium X (http://www.adiumx.com/)
AOL Instant Messenger (http://www.aim.com/)
aMSN (http://amsn.sourceforge.net/)
Centericq (http://konst.org.ua/en/centericq/)
Fire (http://fire.sourceforge.net/)
Gadu-Gadu (http://www.gadu-gadu.pl/)
gaim (http://gaim.sourceforge.net/)
iChat (http://www.apple.com/ichat/)
ICQ (http://www.icq.com/)
Kopete (http://kopete.kde.org/)
Miranda (http://www.miranda-im.org/)
MSN Messenger (http://messenger.msn.com/)
Proteus (http://www.proteusx.com/)
Psi (http://psi.affinix.com/)
Trillian (http://www.ceruleanstudios.com/)
Yahoo! Messenger (http://messenger.yahoo.com)

Review

Helpbytes - Yahoo! Messenger review (http://www.helpbytes.co.uk/messbeta6.php)

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