What would you recommend for a group chat application/platform nowadays?

Hi folks, I figured I'd ask for an up to date set of opinions of what's a reasonable platform for hosting a group chat for roughly 7 close friends. I know every few years the landscape changes with some companies going funky or new contenders arising, so I figure let's talk about it.

Ideally we want to move to a platform that is fully cross-platform on both mobile and desktop, have reasonable chat channel support, and allow for rich media …

application chat platform privacy