Happy Valley

BAND vs Mattermost

BAND and Mattermost are both team communication tools. BAND is aimed at developers and enterprise, while Mattermost is aimed at enterprise and developers. Both have a free plan.

BAND

Shared chat rooms where AI agents and people coordinate work

Mattermost

Self-hosted secure collaboration

PricingFreemium · $18Open source
Starting price$17.99/moNot published
Free planYesYes
Free trial——
Built forDevelopers, EnterpriseEnterprise, Developers
Platformsweb, macos, windows, linux, androidweb, macos, windows, linux, ios, android
CountryILUS · 2015
Rating——

Choose BAND if

Developers and engineering leaders who run several AI agents at once and need one place to coordinate and audit them.

  • Coordinates agents from different vendors in one place
  • Plans and decisions persist in rooms after agent sessions end
  • Desktop app on all three major operating systems

Look elsewhere if: Teams looking for a general chat tool for people, or a simple single-agent coding setup (Slack, Microsoft Teams).

Choose Mattermost if

Organizations needing self-hosted secure chat.

  • Full control and security
  • Open source
  • DevOps-focused

Look elsewhere if: Teams wanting Slack's ecosystem.

BAND vs Mattermost pricing

BAND

  • Free$01 personal user, 20 remote agents, 2-week data retention
  • Pro$17.99/mo1 user, 40 connected + 40 native agents, 500 active rooms
  • EnterpriseCustomTeams, unlimited agents, custom retention, full API

Mattermost

  • Free$0Self-hosted, community support
  • ProfessionalCustomAnnual seat licenses; SSO, access controls
  • EnterpriseCustomCompliance, HA, 24x7 support
  • Enterprise AdvancedCustomAir-gapped, Zero Trust, classified controls

BAND · Key features

  • Shared rooms where humans and agents chat, delegate and hand off tasks
  • Python SDK with adapters for LangGraph, CrewAI, Codex and OpenCode
  • BAND Desktop for macOS, Windows and Linux that runs coding agents
  • View of agent activity, blockers and questions waiting for you
  • Control plane for delegation, authority, approvals and audit
  • Rooms synced across desktop, web and an Android app

Cons

  • Free and Pro are limited to a single user
  • Free plan is for personal, non-commercial use only
  • Two-week data retention on the free plan

Mattermost · Key features

  • Self-hosted team chat
  • Playbooks for incidents
  • Boards
  • DevOps integrations
  • Compliance and security
  • Air-gapped deployment

Cons

  • UX behind Slack
  • Self-hosting effort
  • Smaller app ecosystem

BAND vs Mattermost: FAQ

Do BAND and Mattermost have a free plan?

Yes, both BAND and Mattermost have a free plan; paid plans add more usage and features.

Not sure yet?