Products · Product
Matrix
Raised as a usability problem by 266 people on Hacker News over 12 years (2015–2026), in 204 threads.
- 1
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- 3Message delivery is wonky and slowUnreviewed
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- 5Joining large rooms can take hoursUnreviewed
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- 2
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- 4Message delivery is wonky and slowUnreviewed
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- 6Joining large rooms can take hoursUnreviewed
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Every issue, all time, most people first
Chats stop decrypting after a day with confusing documentationUnreviewed
20152026- Joining encrypted group chats shows delays and 'joining' messages before access2026-05-05
- Encryption is so hard to use that chat rooms end up unencrypted in practice2026-02-09
- Encrypted chats fail to sync and actions spin then fail with no details2026-02-05
Verification kicks users out and prompts for removed devices with no dismissUnreviewed
20152026- Repeated 'verify your device' prompts for old devices that can't be dismissed, cluttering every launch2025-12-24
- Each time they return, they lose 30 minutes troubleshooting device verification problems2025-11-20
- Devices often fail verification and messages fail to decrypt, almost monthly2025-11-20
End-to-end encryption is clunky to set up and confusingUnreviewed
20152026- Hard for ordinary users to find a client, sign up, and set up encryption2026-08-30
- E2E encryption is too hard for most non-technical users to work with2024-02-15
- Non-technical user confused by encryption prompts, needing constant help on new devices2023-09-21
Message delivery is wonky and slowUnreviewed
20152026- Messages feel slow to arrive, more like email than instant messaging2025-12-01
- The app is flaky, so messages often fail to send reliably2025-10-06
- Messages can take two days to arrive because a human checks for spam2025-04-03
Keys must be imported and clients validated at every new loginUnreviewed
20152026- Verified vs unverified session status is confusing and doesn't make sense even for technical users2025-11-20
- Verifying chat participants' sessions is a disgusting, hard-to-use process2021-11-08
- Constant session verification prompts confuse people and are hard to make sense of2021-09-27
Joining large rooms can take hoursUnreviewed
20152026- Popular rooms take a long time to become usable, and rooms go out of sync when logged in on a second device2022-03-07
- Joining large rooms can take hours2022-03-02
- Joining large rooms takes days and message delivery is delayed2021-12-28
Onboarding assumes concepts new users must figure out on their ownUnreviewed
20152026- Onboarding assumes Matrix concepts and makes new users figure out clients, servers and auth2025-08-03
- Onboarding is inscrutable even for very technical users2024-02-14
- Poor user experience that makes it hard to onboard others2022-03-02
Taken username forces trying multiple home servers before giving upUnreviewed
20152026- Username taken on matrix.org forces trying multiple home servers, then giving up2025-12-24
- Matrix signup has been too painful, so users keep giving up on it2021-10-26
- Can't find Matrix in the Play Store, web page unusable, and sign-up makes finding friends too hard2020-10-06
Messages appear out of order in different clientsUnreviewed
20152026- Messages stay unreadable as 'Waiting for this message' unless the right clients were online2025-07-29
- Different clients show messages in different orders, confusing users about the conversation sequence2024-12-06
- Messages appear out of order in different clients, confusing the conversation's meaning2024-12-05
Every one-to-one chat requires accepting a room inviteUnreviewed
20152026- Users must join and leave chats individually, and spaces have no categories2022-11-20
- Bridging chats from different services into one room doesn't work well or at all2022-10-19
- Every new 1:1 chat from a bridge creates a room invite the user must accept2020-06-30
Chat scrolling and message display feel laggy compared to SignalUnreviewed
20152026- Chat scrolling and message display feel laggy, unlike Signal's instant loading2025-04-03
- Notifications are often delayed and the interface is built around chat rooms, not direct messages2019-06-12
- Messages arrive with massive latency and the client becomes unusable when bridging Twitch chat2017-01-18
Joining rooms needs a /join command because GUI search doesn't workUnreviewed
20152026- Encryption breaks, joining rooms fails, and room search is broken2026-02-10
- Joining the space didn't show all rooms and took many tries; links opened web client instead of app2023-02-09
- Joining rooms needs a /join command, GUI search doesn't work, and setup involves confusing server choices2020-05-07
Push notifications force a persistent ugly notification to stay runningUnreviewed
20152026- Notifications not delivered to phone unless the app is actively opened2023-09-21
- Push notifications are awkward, forcing a persistent ugly notification to stay running2023-07-31
- Push notifications unreliable, app hangs opening channels, messages stuck with no way to delete2021-09-24
Logging in, messaging and joining groups are more complex than rivalsUnreviewed
20152026- Confusing from the first moment; logging in, messaging and joining groups are far more complex than Discord or Slack2021-12-28
- Lacks polish of Discord and Slack, hard for new users to adopt2021-07-27
- Feels clunky because it mixes instant messenger and Slack-style layouts2021-01-07
Unreviewed issues were grouped by machine: Claude Haiku labelled each comment as a usability complaint, named what it's about and summed up the problem in a line, and a small model grouped similar problems. Nobody has checked them by hand. Expect mistakes.
The newest 50 complaints
- Matrix is described only as having awful UX, with no specific problem given2026-10-28
- Cannot select several messages to delete them at once2026-10-10
- Matrix clients are clunky, and rooms get out of sync due to federation2026-10-10
- Too many server and client variants; hard to set up and choose2026-09-28
- Hard for ordinary users to find a client, sign up, and set up encryption2026-08-30
- Poor user experience made the app effectively unusable for the commenter2026-08-01
- Email on Matrix is confusing; unclear what the Gmail equivalent is2026-08-01
- Matrix client apps lack many features and are too unpolished to use2026-07-14
- Slow, bloated app with a poor user interface and experience2026-07-13
- Keeps losing encryption keys and identities, and feels clunky and slow to use2026-07-08
- Clients feel cumbersome and glitchy, and Signal's backup UI is hard to use2026-05-31
- Joining encrypted group chats shows delays and 'joining' messages before access2026-05-05
- Matrix audio/video support is very complex with little documentation, hard to get running2026-04-05
- A room briefly disappears from the list while being moved to the top2026-03-12
- Took over 30 minutes to get working; setup is hard compared to Discord2026-02-18
- Self-hosting Matrix is messy, with unreliable NAT traversal and poor video quality2026-02-17
- Self-hosting Matrix and XMPP was unpleasant and required much effort to get working2026-02-16
- Matrix apps have poor UI and accessibility, unusable for someone with bad eyesight2026-02-16
- Signup and key/backup setup was confusing to the user2026-02-12
- Space admins can't set channel order, and sub-spaces replace categories, hurting navigation in large communities2026-02-11
- Encryption breaks, joining rooms fails, and room search is broken2026-02-10
- Couldn't log back in without a logged-in device to confirm the login2026-02-10
- Setting up the multi-server stack is tedious, and the auth server lacks an invite system2026-02-09
- Searching messages doesn't work, so users must export chats and search text files2026-02-09
- Encryption is so hard to use that chat rooms end up unencrypted in practice2026-02-09
- Client feels laggy and unpolished, death by a thousand small usability cuts2026-02-09
- Random re-authentication problems nobody can explain keep breaking the chat experience2026-02-09
- Encrypted rooms add friction and complexity compared to unencrypted ones2026-02-09
- Weird UI made it hard to use when the commenter tried it previously2026-02-06
- Encrypted chats fail to sync and actions spin then fail with no details2026-02-05
- Messaging is slow to respond, even in unencrypted rooms2026-02-05
- Slow, janky and often unstable to use2026-02-05
- Rough edges around sign-in and device verification make it hard to use2026-01-24
- Non-technical users must choose a homeserver and verify keys across devices2026-01-18
- Matrix is called unusable from a UX perspective2026-01-11
- Login breaks each time because it distrusts the user's cookie-deletion setup, showing a warning2025-12-24
- Username taken on matrix.org forces trying multiple home servers, then giving up2025-12-24
- Repeated 'verify your device' prompts for old devices that can't be dismissed, cluttering every launch2025-12-24
- Official desktop client is buggy, bloated, and cluttered2025-12-24
- New users must be told to change server URLs; no simple invite link works2025-12-24
- Users ignore or misunderstand recovery key instructions and fail to validate sessions across clients2025-12-18
- Can't tell which installation docs to follow; main docs are archived or outdated2025-12-04
- MAS migration failed and calls don't connect behind NAT, costing days2025-12-01
- Messages feel slow to arrive, more like email than instant messaging2025-12-01
- Encryption desyncs between mobile and web, showing 'cannot decrypt' messages that need repeated re-syncing2025-12-01
- Terminal Matrix clients are abandoned or broken, so the commenter cannot get a working one2025-12-01
- Decryption problems on Matrix clients, now mostly fixed; older clients still fail to decrypt messages2025-11-20
- Random keys must be written down or copied, and users can't memorize them2025-11-20
- Frequently breaks unexpectedly for occasional users, needing troubleshooting each time it's reopened2025-11-20
- A persistent pop-up about unverified devices won't go away after trying an alpha client2025-11-20