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I really wanted matrix to succeed, but I've completely and entirely given up on it now. State resolution is just a total mess. On the best of days it's a hide

I really wanted matrix to succeed, but I've completely and entirely given up on it now. State resolution is just a total mess. On the best of days it's a hideously complicated system that sucks crazy resources, and on the worst of days rooms get blown up and bricked. Supposedly it's not as bad as before, but the fact that rooms can get bricked in the first place is bonkers. Just computing the member list of a room is a disaster due to the complex resolution algorithm - I spoke to a homeserver admin once who found that the DB storage space of just the member list can easily reach multiple gigabytes for larger rooms. Also years later, we still don't have custom emojis, user statuses, user bios, invite links etc. - very basic things that literally every messaging platform has. https://github.com/element-hq/element-meta/issues/339 https://github.com/element-hq/element-meta/issues/339 https://github.com/element-hq/element-meta/issues/573 https://github.com/element-hq/element-meta/issues/573 https://github.com/element-hq/element-meta/issues/426 https://github.com/element-hq/element-meta/issues/426 I'm interested in hearing if anyone has used simplex and what kind of experience it is. It seems like simplex is going for a similar audience as signal but using a very different approach. I don't think they've really had a breakout though and haven't heard it talked about much.

Arathorn 10mo ago
> State resolution is just a total mess. Not since https://matrix.org/blog/2025/08/project-hydra-improving-state-res/ https://matrix.org/blog/2025/08/project-hydra-improving-stat... > I spoke to a homeserver admin once who found that the DB storage space of just the member list can easily reach multiple gigabytes for larger rooms. This is nothing to do with state resolution; it's due to Synapse's implementation deliberately cutting corners on storage efficiency while trading off for speed. I showed how it could be fixed a few months ago here: https://youtu.be/D5zAgVYBuGk?t=1853 https://youtu.be/D5zAgVYBuGk?t=1853, but we prioritised fixing state resets instead. > Also years later, we still don't have custom emojis, user statuses, user bios, invite links etc There are MSCs for all of these now, and implementations are starting to filter through. The reality is that the project has been in a funding crunch since 2023 and we've had to focus on survival by prioritising stuff people pay for (i.e. big servers for govtech deployments) rather than custom emoji.
- juliangoldsmith 10mo ago
  >trading off for speed If speed is a concern, why did you all stick with Synapse (essentially single-threaded due to the GIL) over moving to Dendrite? As far as I can tell, Dendrite is, for all intents and purposes, abandoned.
  - Arathorn 10mo ago
    Because we didn't have enough people or cash to do a good job of simultaneously writing two servers, and as Synapse had gone into production across *.gouv.fr and other critical deployments, we instead frantically backported Dendrite's main novelties to Synapse - adding instead worker processes to Synapse so it could easily scale beyond the GIL: https://matrix.org/blog/2020/11/03/how-we-fixed-synapse-s-scalability/ https://matrix.org/blog/2020/11/03/how-we-fixed-synapse-s-sc... The hope was always that we would then get back to Dendrite and be able to invest in it and migrate over, but the cash situation got worse in 2022 due to Matrix being more and more successful (causing the available $ in the industry to be flow to integrators rather than the upstream project), and instead we had to essentially park Dendrite dev in 2023 other than for critical fixes. Meanwhile, to try to fix the $ situation, we added Rust workers to Synapse as "Synapse Pro" to give customers a reason to actually route money to us as the upstream project, and nowadays Element is actually on a more economically sustainable path. However, at this point the likelihood is that rather than progressing Dendrite we'll instead look to add more Rust to Synapse and fix its resource usage. That said, others are of course very welcome to continue progressing Dendrite forwards, and I personally find it super depressing that we failed to progress both servers at the same time.
    - The_President 10mo ago
      Matrix team is doing a solid job of running - Keep it up and keep eating the Slack/Teams marketshare up with competitive features and pricing. Additional business considerations like HQ location costs, tax liabilities, and talent pool availability on paper also affect what you have to work with. London tax, talent, and labor pay versus Austin for example. Also I got your name wrong last time - I apologize for that.
mxuribe 10mo ago
I also wanted - and still want - matrix to succeed! But, i've also semi-given up. I still use it because there a small number of folks i still chat with; though that's dying off. I managed a synapse home server very early in matrix's life, for a few years, and yeah it was complex back then...and for me the security is fine. Sure, there are gaps and things to be address for security...but, overall the thing that grinds my gears are the heavy resources needed. I started returning to xmpp. Is xmpp "simpler" or "more secure"? I would reply: no. But, you know where xmpp is really great? Ridiculously low needs for resources for a server! I understand that in this day and age we have far more access to so much more computing power...But, why should we allow bloat just because we can? Sorry, nowadays if I'm just trying to provide for chat, I'm looking into xmpp. I have no experience with simplex, but i think i'll wait til it bakes a bit more (and also see the resources usage story in a year or so). Its funny, I was such a matrix fan boy, and now i'm looking at a chat tech (xmpp) that has been around for tons of years - figure that!
- Jnr 10mo ago
  At this point I just want them to die off completely so we could get something better. They have been unable to make real improvements that make using Matrix a nice experience. And their existence somehow inhibits other solutions from emerging in the OSS community chat space.
  - Arathorn 10mo ago
    > And their existence somehow inhibits other solutions from emerging in the OSS community chat space. How?
    - mystraline 10mo ago
      People new to the system think that Matrix can work. So FLOSS devs spend time trying to lipstick the pig. Takes time away from other areas. Matrix is completely busted, for the article's aforementioned reasons, and others. My complaints is that ive seen child sexual assault imagery on your primary servers, hours later (and thousands of CSAM images) finally the user banned. And still does it cause some federated server they are connected to still allows them to be half-joined to a room. The only safer way to federate is to disable image caching and preloading, and ideally defed from matrix.org. And combined are the laughable moderation tools. I'm sure for some gov deployment, they're not going to spread child sex images. But on the public internet, even basic tooling is a joke. I recommend all Matrix admins to discontinue. Its frankly too legally dangerous to run it, given all the various failure modes and E2EE failures. Its 1 size doesnt fit at all. And it being gone would allow others to potentially succeed.
behringer 10mo ago
I have a room going on multiple years now.
INTPenis 10mo ago
I used it for a year or so, with the default servers, worked just fine. We tried to get a group chat over from Signal to SimpleX but were unsuccessful in the end for unknown reasons. It just petered out and I didn't reinstall it on a new phone. Maybe there was no migration?
ekjhgkejhgk 10mo ago
Have you tried XMPP?

Arathorn 10mo ago

> State resolution is just a total mess. Not since https://matrix.org/blog/2025/08/project-hydra-improving-state-res/ https://matrix.org/blog/2025/08/project-hydra-improving-stat... > I spoke to a homeserver admin once who found that the DB storage space of just the member list can easily reach multiple gigabytes for larger rooms. This is nothing to do with state resolution; it's due to Synapse's implementation deliberately cutting corners on storage efficiency while trading off for speed. I showed how it could be fixed a few months ago here: https://youtu.be/D5zAgVYBuGk?t=1853 https://youtu.be/D5zAgVYBuGk?t=1853, but we prioritised fixing state resets instead. > Also years later, we still don't have custom emojis, user statuses, user bios, invite links etc There are MSCs for all of these now, and implementations are starting to filter through. The reality is that the project has been in a funding crunch since 2023 and we've had to focus on survival by prioritising stuff people pay for (i.e. big servers for govtech deployments) rather than custom emoji.

juliangoldsmith 10mo ago
>trading off for speed If speed is a concern, why did you all stick with Synapse (essentially single-threaded due to the GIL) over moving to Dendrite? As far as I can tell, Dendrite is, for all intents and purposes, abandoned.
- Arathorn 10mo ago
  Because we didn't have enough people or cash to do a good job of simultaneously writing two servers, and as Synapse had gone into production across *.gouv.fr and other critical deployments, we instead frantically backported Dendrite's main novelties to Synapse - adding instead worker processes to Synapse so it could easily scale beyond the GIL: https://matrix.org/blog/2020/11/03/how-we-fixed-synapse-s-scalability/ https://matrix.org/blog/2020/11/03/how-we-fixed-synapse-s-sc... The hope was always that we would then get back to Dendrite and be able to invest in it and migrate over, but the cash situation got worse in 2022 due to Matrix being more and more successful (causing the available $ in the industry to be flow to integrators rather than the upstream project), and instead we had to essentially park Dendrite dev in 2023 other than for critical fixes. Meanwhile, to try to fix the $ situation, we added Rust workers to Synapse as "Synapse Pro" to give customers a reason to actually route money to us as the upstream project, and nowadays Element is actually on a more economically sustainable path. However, at this point the likelihood is that rather than progressing Dendrite we'll instead look to add more Rust to Synapse and fix its resource usage. That said, others are of course very welcome to continue progressing Dendrite forwards, and I personally find it super depressing that we failed to progress both servers at the same time.
  - The_President 10mo ago
    Matrix team is doing a solid job of running - Keep it up and keep eating the Slack/Teams marketshare up with competitive features and pricing. Additional business considerations like HQ location costs, tax liabilities, and talent pool availability on paper also affect what you have to work with. London tax, talent, and labor pay versus Austin for example. Also I got your name wrong last time - I apologize for that.

mxuribe 10mo ago

I also wanted - and still want - matrix to succeed! But, i've also semi-given up. I still use it because there a small number of folks i still chat with; though that's dying off. I managed a synapse home server very early in matrix's life, for a few years, and yeah it was complex back then...and for me the security is fine. Sure, there are gaps and things to be address for security...but, overall the thing that grinds my gears are the heavy resources needed. I started returning to xmpp. Is xmpp "simpler" or "more secure"? I would reply: no. But, you know where xmpp is really great? Ridiculously low needs for resources for a server! I understand that in this day and age we have far more access to so much more computing power...But, why should we allow bloat just because we can? Sorry, nowadays if I'm just trying to provide for chat, I'm looking into xmpp. I have no experience with simplex, but i think i'll wait til it bakes a bit more (and also see the resources usage story in a year or so). Its funny, I was such a matrix fan boy, and now i'm looking at a chat tech (xmpp) that has been around for tons of years - figure that!

Jnr 10mo ago
At this point I just want them to die off completely so we could get something better. They have been unable to make real improvements that make using Matrix a nice experience. And their existence somehow inhibits other solutions from emerging in the OSS community chat space.
- Arathorn 10mo ago
  > And their existence somehow inhibits other solutions from emerging in the OSS community chat space. How?
  - mystraline 10mo ago
    People new to the system think that Matrix can work. So FLOSS devs spend time trying to lipstick the pig. Takes time away from other areas. Matrix is completely busted, for the article's aforementioned reasons, and others. My complaints is that ive seen child sexual assault imagery on your primary servers, hours later (and thousands of CSAM images) finally the user banned. And still does it cause some federated server they are connected to still allows them to be half-joined to a room. The only safer way to federate is to disable image caching and preloading, and ideally defed from matrix.org. And combined are the laughable moderation tools. I'm sure for some gov deployment, they're not going to spread child sex images. But on the public internet, even basic tooling is a joke. I recommend all Matrix admins to discontinue. Its frankly too legally dangerous to run it, given all the various failure modes and E2EE failures. Its 1 size doesnt fit at all. And it being gone would allow others to potentially succeed.

behringer 10mo ago

I have a room going on multiple years now.

INTPenis 10mo ago

I used it for a year or so, with the default servers, worked just fine. We tried to get a group chat over from Signal to SimpleX but were unsuccessful in the end for unknown reasons. It just petered out and I didn't reinstall it on a new phone. Maybe there was no migration?

ekjhgkejhgk 10mo ago

Have you tried XMPP?