ChatWave is a modern, simple, and secure REST API for a self-hosted messenger — open source and licensed under GPLv3.
This repository contains only the backend, built with Python 3.11 and FastAPI.
- 🏠 Self-hosted backend
- 🔐 Secure auth (JWT Bearer HS256), TLSv3, password hashing
- 👤 Account & profile management
- 💬 Personal & group chats
- 🎙️ Media messages (voice, images, files)
- ⚡ Real-time message updates via WebSocket
- 🧹 Permanent deletion of messages
- 🌐 Web frontend (in development: chatwave-web)
- 🎥 Video messages (real-time)
- 📞 Audio & video calls (1-on-1 and group)
git clone https://github.com/lifufkd/ChatWave
pip install -r requirements.txt
cd ./src
nano .env (Fill in the env file according to the section "ENV configuration")
uvicorn main:app --host 0.0.0.0 --port 8000Read this instruction on project docker page
DB_HOST=<DOMAIN-OR-IP>
DB_USER=<USER>
DB_PASSWORD=<PASSWORD>
REDIS_HOST=<DOMAIN-OR-IP>
MEDIA_FOLDER=<PATH> # Must be same in run command (-v chatwave_appdata:/app/data)
# Optionaly
DB_DATABASE=<DATABASE-NAME>
DB_PORT=<PORT>
DB_SCHEMA=chatwave
REDIS_PORT=<PORT>
REDIS_DATABASE=0
REDIS_USER=<USER>
REDIS_PASSWORD=<PASSWORD>
JWT_SECRET_KEY=09d25e094faa6ca2556c818166b7a9563b93f7099f6f0f4caa6cf63b88e8d3e7 # 256 bit random string
JWT_ACCESS_TOKEN_EXPIRES=1209600 # Token expire time in seconds
JWT_ALGORITHM=HS256
CHUNK_SIZE=16 # Decimal value in MB for streaming video
MAX_UPLOAD_IMAGE_SIZE=30 # Decimal value in MB
MAX_UPLOAD_VIDEO_SIZE=8192 # Decimal value in MB
MAX_UPLOAD_AUDIO_SIZE=512 # Decimal value in MB
MAX_UPLOAD_FILE_SIZE=16384 # Decimal value in MB
MAX_ITEMS_PER_REQUEST=100 # Decimal value
You can help by testing, opening issues, or contributing code. Also check out our frontend repo ChatWave Web
Distributed under the GPLv3 License. See LICENSE for more information.