EU Sovereignty Score
Non-EU vendorCollaborationHeadquarters: GB

Element (Matrix): sovereignty score and 8 European alternatives

Element is a secure collaboration and messaging service built on the open Matrix standard, developed by the creators of Matrix. Matrix is a decentralised, interoperable protocol for real-time communication: different servers can talk to each other through federation. Element offers a free app for personal use, Element Pro for teams and organisations, and Element Server Suite (ESS) for running Matrix servers, in Community, Pro and TI-Messenger editions. It supports end-to-end encryption, group chat, file sharing and voice and video calls. You can self-host on Kubernetes using Element's Helm charts or use a managed cloud service.

Element is developed by Element Creations Ltd, a company in the United Kingdom with a registered office in London and associated entities in Germany, France and the US. The UK is outside the EU. The code is open source under AGPLv3 or later and GPLv3 or later, alongside a commercial licence. When self-hosting, data stays under your own control. For the managed service, hosting regions are not published in the sources; European organisations can ask Element.

See the 8 European alternatives ↓Assess your stack with Element (Matrix) pre-selected
Sovereignty score
79 / 1000 = high exposure
100 = sovereign
  • Jurisdiction SOV-250
    Headquartered outside the EU (GB)
  • Data residency SOV-3100
    EU-only hosting
  • Cryptographic key sovereignty SOV-390
    Self-hostable: encryption keys under your own control
  • Freedom from lock-in SOV-680
    Open source: low switching costs
  • Source & runtime sovereignty SOV-4 · SOV-675
    Source code auditable, forkable and self-hostable

SOV codes: the matching objective in the European Commission's Cloud Sovereignty Framework. Official source

How the score is calculated

Facts and evidence

Last checked October 2, 2026
HeadquartersGB (OTHER)Verified by hand
EU adequacy decisionYes — found adequate by the European CommissionVerified by hand
Sovereignty modelVendor-hosted (non-EU)Verified by hand
Data hostingEUVerified by hand
Open-sourceYesVerified by hand
GDPR-compliantYesVendor-stated
Hosting signalCLOUDFLARENET - Cloudflare, Inc., US (US)Technically measured
CategoryCollaboration
TypeProduct
Websiteelement.io ↗

The hosting signal shows the network that serves the vendor's website, often a CDN, and not necessarily where the service or your data is hosted. How we verify · Something wrong? Suggest a correction

Top EU-based & GDPR-compliant alternatives to Element (Matrix)

The European alternatives to Element (Matrix) come from our knowledge base of over 6,200 vendors. We only list vendors headquartered in the EU or the EEA; fully European-owned vendors rank before vendors with a foreign owner. For each alternative you see the country, the open-source status and a short description.

Score per alternative: 0 = high exposure, 100 = sovereign

37 European Collaboration vendors are in the catalogue. View the whole category · Submit an alternative · View category on the map

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Why digital sovereignty matters with Element (Matrix)

Element (Matrix) is headquartered in GB, outside the EU. Contracts and data therefore also fall under non-European law. The GDPR applies through contractual terms, but in a conflict with local legislation you have less certainty than with a European vendor.

Data is hosted exclusively in the EU, so Element (Matrix) scores best on data residency.

Element (Matrix) is open source. You can audit the source code, self-host the software and keep the encryption keys under your own control. Switching is easier because data and software are not tied to a single party.

What this means for your organisation depends on your whole stack and context. The free assessment weighs Element (Matrix) together with your other vendors and gives a total score, a heatmap and the main risk drivers.

Frequently asked questions

What is the best European alternative to Element (Matrix)?

It depends on your use case. Strong EU alternatives to Element (Matrix) include BigBlueButton (self-host), CryptPad and FluffyChat. On this page you can compare 8 EU alternatives by jurisdiction, data residency and open-source status.

Are there open-source alternatives to Element (Matrix)?

Yes. Open-source EU alternatives to Element (Matrix) include BigBlueButton (self-host), CryptPad, FluffyChat, HedgeDoc, Huly, HumHub and Nextcloud. These keep your data fully under your own control and let you self-host if you want to.

Is Element (Matrix) GDPR-compliant and where is the data hosted?

Element (Matrix) is headquartered in GB (OTHER) and hosts data in EU. The vendor states it is GDPR-compliant, but the data falls under non-EU jurisdiction. For full EU data residency the EU alternatives on this page usually offer more certainty.

Details and sources

Verified by handHeadquarters, owner, hosting locations and licence have been checked by us against public sources. Free of charge and for every vendor, not a paid label. Nothing in this knowledge base is taken over automatically. Last checked on October 2, 2026.

Sources

Public sources used in the latest check of this record.

Compliance evidence

The links below point to the vendor's own public documents. We only record what we found: a missing link means "not found publicly", not "not compliant".

No public compliance evidence has been recorded for this vendor yet. Do you know its DPA or subprocessor list? Something wrong? Suggest a correction

Digital sovereignty in Collaboration

Collaboration: Team communication, file sharing, video conferencing, document editing. In this category the choice of vendor determines who has legal access to your data, where that data lives and how easily you can switch later.

Also in this category

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8 European alternatives to Element (Matrix) — GDPR-compliant & EU-hosted · EU Sovereignty Score