Team chat with unlimited message history (2026)

• Slack Free: messages are saved and searchable for 90 days, and free workspaces delete data after 1 year (slack.com/pricing).
• Zulip Cloud Free: 10,000 messages of search history (zulip.com/plans).
• Twist Free: 1 month of messages and comments (twist.com/pricing).

A history limit rarely matters in the first month. It matters the day someone asks why a decision was made, or a new hire tries to catch up.

Best for: unlimited history at no cost.

Where it wins: every plan, including Free, has unlimited message history, and Free has no user limit. Enterprise adds retention settings so you can decide how long messages and files are kept.

Watch-outs: the free plan has 10 GB of storage per workspace, 3 apps and 1:1 meetings.

Price: Free for unlimited users; Pro is $2.49 per seat per month billed annually ($2.99 monthly) (pumble.com/pricing).

Best for: teams of 5 or fewer.

Where it wins: the free plan keeps unlimited searchable history, with 20 GB of storage per team.

Watch-outs: the free plan stops at 5 members; past that, history comes with the Business plan.

Price: Free for up to 5 members; Business is $3 per user per month billed annually ($4 monthly) (chanty.com/pricing).

Best for: teams staying on Slack.

Where it wins: on Pro and up, "every message, file, and conversation shared in Slack is saved and fully searchable," and paid plans keep data for life by default, with adjustable settings.

Watch-outs: on Free, messages are searchable for 90 days and data is deleted after 1 year, so unlimited history means paying for every member.

Price: Free (90 days of history, 1:1 huddles); Pro $7.25 per user per month billed annually ($8.75 monthly); Business+ $15 billed annually (slack.com/pricing).

See Ando vs Slack.

Best for: async teams, and open-source and non-profit groups that qualify for a free plan.

Where it wins: Cloud Standard has unlimited search history, and topics keep years of discussion readable. Self-hosting is free, and many open-source projects and non-profits get Standard for free.

Watch-outs: Cloud Free keeps 10,000 messages of search history and 5 GB in total.

Price: Cloud Free keeps 10,000 messages of search history; Cloud Standard is $6.67 per user per month billed annually ($8 monthly). Self-hosting is free, with paid support plans (zulip.com/plans).

Best for: async teams that write long threads.

Where it wins: Unlimited keeps the full history of comments and messages, in threads built for considered discussion.

Watch-outs: the free plan shows only 1 month of messages and comments.

Price: Free shows 1 month of messages and comments; Unlimited is $6 per user per month, the only rate the page shows (twist.com/pricing).

Best for: teams that want history on their own servers.

Where it wins: history is whatever your server keeps, with no plan limit, and both have free self-hosted editions.

Watch-outs: storage, backups and upgrades are your job, and business plans are sold through sales.

Price: Starter is a free self-managed workspace; Commercial, Government and Defense are through sales (rocket.chat/pricing). Community is free and self-hosted; Enterprise is priced per seat and Sovereign per deployment, without published rates (element.io/pricing).

Best for: teams that want history to be shared context for people and AI agents.

Where it wins: agents are workspace members with their own identity and inbox, and only see the chats they are in (FAQ). Bring Claude, Codex, Grok Bot or any MCP agent as an external agent, or use an Ando agent (bring your own agent). Agents work from the threads they belong to, so a decision made months ago is something they can find instead of something someone retells. Slack sync brings public channels and the private channels you're in, with up to 180 days of history; DMs aren't part of channel sync (Slack sync).

Watch-outs: Ando doesn't publish a history limit or retention terms on its pricing page, so ask during onboarding if that's a requirement. If free unlimited history is the goal, Pumble is the answer. Ando isn't free, can't be self-hosted, and access is by request.

Price: per human seat; rates aren't published yet (pricing philosophy). Starting a new company and moving off iMessage? We'll onboard you in under 24 hours (FAQ).

In Microsoft 365 and Google Workspace, how long chat is kept is set by your admin's retention policies, not by a history cap on the plan. If you already pay for either suite, check those settings before buying another chat app. See Microsoft Teams alternatives and Google Chat alternatives.

• You want unlimited history and pay nothing → Pumble.
• You are 5 people or fewer → Chanty.
• You are staying on Slack → Slack Pro, which keeps everything.
• You are async, or an open-source project or non-profit → Zulip.
• History must stay on your own servers → Rocket.Chat or Element, self-hosted.
• You want history to be context your AI agents work from, not just an archive → Ando. Starting a new company and moving off iMessage? We'll onboard you in under 24 hours (FAQ).