Comparison of the communication channels in remote work

Recently the vast changes have happened in the business world. The pandemic situation in 2020 has forced companies all over the world to build the process of remote work. The biggest risks companies face when working remotely are influence on employees’ effectiveness, engagement, and attitude, as well as the process of communication and knowledge sharing. Although it was very challenging in the beginning, now most of the companies looked at remote work from a different perspective. Not only people manage to work on a remote basis – they know how to do it effectively and beneficial.

One of the most important decisions to make is to decide on communication channels. The article presents a brief overview of the main business communication platforms.

​Types of communication channels

Slack is a pioneer of business communication tools launched by an American Software company in 2013. Slack was designed to facilitate easier and faster business-to-business communication and replace emails. Keeping everything in one place is easily accessible by anyone working in the same team, reduces the number of repetitive questions, helps to keep everyone in a loop, and facilitates smooth onboarding of new people. The team is an alternative to Slack, which was released in 2017 by Microsoft as part of the Microsoft 365 group. Similar to Slack, its main aim is to bring all people working together at the same place and by that improve collaboration, reduce unnecessary emails, and keep communication transparent. Another Slack competitor is Chanty. Although Chanty is less popular, it positions itself as being the most robust alternative to Slack. The main advantage of Chanty in comparison to Slack is that it is faster and more affordable (75% cheaper). Moreover, Chanty has a built-in task manager.

The table below presents an overview of the main features of the platforms. You can find the detailed comparison of the channels in the following file: Comparison of communication channels.

Monthly comparison

Choosing a channel to establish effective communication with a remote team


All three platforms have very similar main functions and are aimed at making the communication process faster, easier, and more transparent. However, there are still differences that should be considered depending on a company’s needs. It is crucial to decide on the features that are the most important for your business to choose the most suitable communication channel. While Slack and Teams are known almost to all businesses ranging from small start-ups to big corporations, Chanty is the least popular of the three platforms and therefore lacks enough reviews to base opinion on. It has fewer features and functions available than Slack and Teams. However, for small companies, its price and built-in task manager (not available in the other two business messengers) can be the best advantage.

Moreover, Chanty positions itself as being the easiest to use, and its main aim is to create an intuitive experience for its users. When comparing Slack and Teams, Slack is relatively easier to get started working with. While in Teams, you need first to configure your Office 365 domain.

Furthermore, Slack gives companies the possibility to invite their clients or partners as guests to the chosen channels, which has also improved external business communication and collaboration. On the other hand, Teams can be more affordable when a company has a Microsoft Business packet (Office 365), so a company does not need to pay for it separately. The biggest disadvantage of Chanty is its limited integrations. Last but not least - the design and layout of the platforms should be considered. Many customers distinguish Slack as being with the best user interface, but this factor is quite individual, so before making a decision it’s worth checking and comparing demo versions of the platforms.


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Maciej Dulski

Maciej Dulski
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