How to set up Rocket.Chat on Saplo: your own company chat instead of Slack Pro

Teams communicating via Slack will sooner or later face the bill: the Pro plan for five users costs $41 per month, or $498 annually, and every additional team member increases that cost because Slack charges subscriptions per person. Furthermore, the entire chat history, uploaded files, and integrations reside in the provider's cloud. Rocket.Chat is an open-source corporate messenger: team channels, threads, private messages, voice and video calls, and integrations, all on your server and without user limits. Below is a step-by-step guide on how to set up Rocket.Chat on Saplo.

Why Rocket.Chat instead of Slack Pro

A paid cloud messenger is convenient as long as the team is small and the bill is low. Problems start when the company grows:

• subscription counted per person, Slack Pro for five users costs $41 per month, which is $498 per year, and the bill grows with each new team member, regardless of how often a given person writes,
• conversation history and files are stored with the provider, years of design decisions, links, and attachments sit on external company servers, and the free Slack plan additionally hides messages older than 90 days,
• there is no self-hosted version, Slack exists exclusively in the cloud, so internal company communication always passes through the infrastructure of an external provider, regardless of the paid plan.

Rocket.Chat has none of these drawbacks: it's a full messenger hosted on your Box, with channels, threads, private messages, and video calls. The license doesn't count users, you create unlimited accounts, and the total cost is the cost of the Box itself, regardless of whether five people or fifty are writing.

Requirements

To set up Rocket.Chat on Saplo, you need:

• A Box with Docker running (the engine automatically enables it during installation from the catalog, requiring container nesting, which Saplo has by default),
• A minimum of 2 GB RAM free on the Box and 10 GB of disk space. The cheapest plan that can handle this is Box M for $69 per year (this plan also provides SSH access with a key, useful if you want to check container logs yourself),
• A domain or *.saploapp.pl subdomain, included with every plan, where the chat will be hosted,
• You DO NOT need a separate database, the engine sets up its own MongoDB container along with the application and configures it as required by Rocket.Chat.

You can find a full description of the application and its place in the catalog on the Rocket.Chat on Saplo page.

Step-by-step installation

1. In the Saplo panel, go to App catalog and select Rocket.Chat (category "Business tools").
2. Select a Box with at least 2 GB of free RAM and 10 GB of free disk space, and the domain or subdomain where the chat will run.
3. Confirm the installation. The engine downloads the official rocket.chat and mongo:8.0 images and sets up two containers connected in a single network: the database is only visible to the application, and the chat exposes only the Box's nginx with free SSL to the outside.
4. The database starts as a single-node replica set, and the engine automatically initializes it. Rocket.Chat requires replica set mode even with a single node, because live new message notifications read the database oplog, which a regular, standalone MongoDB database does not maintain.
5. The first startup can take several minutes: the images themselves weigh over 1.4 GB together, and the application builds cache and performs database schema migrations on first run. The engine waits for the chat to actually respond via HTTP before considering the installation complete, so a longer installation does not mean an error.
6. After the installation is complete, the chat will be available under the specified domain, and you can create an administrator account yourself on your first visit.

First steps after installation

1. Open your application domain. The "Setup Wizard" will ask for your organization name, email address, and password. This becomes the first administrator account, and no one else has access to it, so complete this step as soon as possible after installation.
2. Disable open registration (Administration -> Settings -> Accounts) so that people outside your team who find your domain cannot create accounts themselves. You invite your team with links from the administration panel.
3. Create channels for teams and projects, and break down longer topics into threads to keep the main channel readable. Private messages are for one-on-one conversations, and files uploaded to the chat are stored on your Box's disk.
4. Install the Rocket.Chat desktop and mobile applications and enter your server address in them. They work like a Slack client: you log in with your chat account and have all your history, even outside the browser.
5. Connect your email (Administration -> E-mail -> SMTP) so that the chat can send registration confirmations, password reset links, and notifications for unread messages. You get an inbox included with every plan, so just its SMTP details are enough.

Rocket.Chat on Saplo vs. Slack Pro

Then there's the billing method: you pay a monthly cloud subscription regardless of anything else, while you pay for Box once a year, so your messenger bill stops being an item that grows with your team by itself.

Frequently asked questions

Do I need a separate database? No, the Saplo engine deploys its own MongoDB container with the application and initializes a single-node replica set required by Rocket.Chat in real-time. You do not configure the database manually or purchase anything extra.

Do I pay for additional users? No, this edition of Rocket.Chat does not count seats. You can create unlimited accounts with no extra charge per account. The actual limit is the Box's resources: chat history and uploaded files are stored on its disk.

Can people outside the team create an account? By default, registration is open, as with most self-hosted messengers. If the chat is only for your company, disable registration in Administration -> Settings -> Accounts and invite people using links.

Do video calls work? 1:1 calls connect via WebRTC and work immediately after installation, and group calls use Jitsi Meet built into Rocket.Chat. If you're behind a very restrictive NAT, video or audio in 1:1 calls may not connect without your own TURN server, which you can configure in Administration -> Video Conferencing.

Does the chat send emails? Only after connecting SMTP in Administration -> E-mail -> SMTP. Without it, registration confirmations, password resets, or notifications will not be sent. Email is included in every plan, so you just need to enter your mailbox details.

How much space does the installation take? The recipe manifest declares a minimum of 10 GB of disk space, and the Docker images themselves weigh over 1.4 GB together. Box M, the cheapest plan that can handle this, has 30 GB, so there's plenty of room left for chat history and uploaded files.

If your team pays for Slack per person but wants to keep chat history and files on its own server, contact us, and we'll help you choose a Box and set up Rocket.Chat.