Guide · updated 2026-10-05

What bitchat is

bitchat is a messaging app that can move a conversation without a company standing in the middle. Nearby phones pass packets over Bluetooth. When the internet is up, a second protocol, Nostr, carries location rooms and some private messages. You do not create an account, and you do not hand over a phone number to register.

The idea

Ordinary messengers assume a network. The phone opens a connection to a service, the service stores or forwards the message, and the other person’s app downloads it. That model is excellent when the network is healthy and you trust the operator. It is useless in a stadium basement, a blackout, a protest crowd, a hike, or any room where the only working radios are the phones themselves.

bitchat starts from the second situation. If two phones can hear each other, they can exchange messages. If a third phone can hear both, it can relay. The project describes this as a mesh with a limit of seven hops, which is enough to cross a small crowd and not enough to replace a city’s cell network. The tone of the product is closer to a shared channel than to a contact list. The maintainers have called it the side-groupchat.

Android and iOS speak the same binary protocol, so a group does not split by brand of phone. That compatibility is the reason an Android APK matters even in a room full of iPhones. One missing platform breaks the mesh for everyone standing next to that person.

Two paths, one app

The offline path is Bluetooth Low Energy, plus Wi-Fi Aware on phones that have it. Nothing is uploaded in order for that path to work. There is no bitchat server to log in to, because the design does not have one for local chat.

The online path is different. Geohash channels are public rooms named after a coarse map code. They travel through Nostr relays run by other people. Private messages between mutual favorites can also fall back to Nostr when the mesh cannot see the other phone. Calling the whole app “offline only” is inaccurate. Calling it “just another internet chat” is inaccurate too. The useful description is dual transport: local radio first, internet relays when you want range the radio does not have.

The app chooses and retries. You should still know which room you are in. A message typed into the local mesh is not the same act as a message typed into a city-sized geohash room.

Who ships the app

The public Android source lives at permissionlesstech/bitchat-android. The iOS and macOS source lives at permissionlesstech/bitchat. The project site linked from those repositories is bitchat.free. Google Play has listed the Android package com.bitchat.droid under Verse Communication PBC. The app was announced in 2025 by Jack Dorsey, who is also known for Twitter and Block. Those are facts about the upstream project.

They are not facts about this website. bitchat.cc writes guides and mirrors the signed GitHub APKs. We are not the publisher of record, and a page here is not an official release note. When you want the canonical file list, open the GitHub release. When you want the file with the hash written next to it, use the download page.

The Android repository says the project is released into the public domain and points to a LICENSE file. That is a statement about the source. It does not mean every APK on the internet that uses the name is authentic. Authenticity for the files on this site is the SHA-256 match against the GitHub asset.

What you need on a phone

The Android build targets API 26, so the practical floor is Android 8.0. The phone needs Bluetooth Low Energy. You will be asked for Bluetooth, for location (because Android ties that permission to Bluetooth scanning), and for notifications. None of those prompts create an account.

Store availability is a separate question from whether the APK exists. Play listings come and go by country. A missing listing is a reason to use the signed release and check the hash, not a reason to take a file from an unnamed channel.

What it is not

It is not a replacement for emergency services. A mesh of a few phones will not dial an ambulance. It is not a promise of anonymity. Private message content is encrypted with the Noise Protocol, and a nearby radio can still observe that a device is participating. The privacy guide is the page to read before you stake a decision on the word “encrypted”.

It is also not a bank. Version 2.0.1 can preview Cashu tokens. A token is a bearer instrument. This website never asks for one, and you should not paste one into a chat you do not trust.

If the idea fits, the next page is the install guide. If you want the radio story first, read how the mesh moves a message.