Jack Dorsey launches decentralised Bluetooth messaging app

Bitchat peer-to-peer messaging is not reliant on internet

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Bitchat should work when phone service or internet access is restricted.

Jack Dorsey has launched a messaging app which doesn’t need internet, central servers, phone numbers or email.

Block CEO, and famously Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey has launched Bitchat - a new messaging app which works without internet, phone service or any of the personally identifiable details which are currently needed for most messaging.

Bitchat operates using a phone’s Bluetooth signal. This allows users to communicate in crowded environments such as festivals, or protests where WiFi and phone service is restricted – by accident or by design.

Bitchat gets around the problem of the limited range of Bluetooth, typically around 100m, by using a Bluetooth mesh network, which relays messages through other users in range.

A white paper, available on GitHub, states that the service is completely decentralised and encrypted, as the mesh network does not require a user’s email address, phone number or phone account to operate. Crucally, no central servers means that no data is collected, and users can’t be tracked.

“Bitchat addresses the need for resilient, private communication that doesn’t depend on centralised infrastructure,” the app’s white paper states.

“By leveraging Bluetooth Low Energy mesh networking, Bitchat enables direct peer-to-peer messaging within physical proximity, with automatic message relay extending the effective range beyond direct Bluetooth connections.”

In a post on X, Dorsey said that the Bluetooth mesh network has a range of around 300m.

Messages also disappear by default, with optional group chats – referred to as “rooms” – allowing users to interact with multiple people at the same time.

A beta version of Bitchat is available on Apple’s TestFlight. The beta app already has 10,000 testers, since launching on Monday.

Bitchat is very on-brand for Dorsey, who has focussed on decentralised technologies since leaving Twitter in 2021. Dorsey left the board of X competitor BlueSky, because he believed that the social media app was repeating the same mistakes as Twitter by centralising policy management and applying greater moderation.