River, a free decentralized group chat built on a rebuilt-from-scratch Freenet, enables real-time chat with under-1-second latency and no central server

River is a free decentralized group chat system built on the rebuilt Freenet network, delivering real-time messaging with under-one-second delay and no central server.

The article explains River’s sub-second chat performance and shows how to join the official room and use the CLI tools.

It highlights that privacy-focused group chat can work on a decentralized network without sacrificing responsiveness.

Related terms include riverctl, WSL, Windows, Hyphanet, and Ian Clarke.