Live Helper Chat: self-hosted live support with bots, voice and messaging channels
Live Helper Chat - live support for your website. Featuring web and mobile apps, Voice & Video & ScreenShare. Supports Telegram, Twilio (whatsapp), Facebook messenger including building a bot.
At a glance
- What is it?
- Live Helper Chat is an Apache-2.0 PHP application that puts a live chat widget, an operator back office and a bot engine on your own server. It is broad rather than minimal, and the breadth is also where the friction starts.
- Who is it for?
- Adopt Live Helper Chat if you need a self-hosted operator console with a bot engine and messaging channels you control, and you have a PHP host plus someone who can follow the install docs. Do not adopt it if you want a managed service with no server work, or if you need the Dockerfile in the repository root to match the documented PHP 8.2 minimum.
- Can I use it commercially?
- Yes. Apache-2.0 is a permissive licence: you can use, modify and sell software built on it, as long as you keep its copyright and licence notices.
- Is it still maintained?
- Yes. The repository last received commits 1 day ago.
- What is it written in?
- Mainly PHP, according to GitHub's language statistics.
Answers come from the project's GitHub data, last synced on September 17, 2026, and from our analysis. They are not legal advice.
DEEP OPEN-SOURCE ANALYSIS
What Live Helper Chat solves, and for whom
The project describes itself as an open-source application that brings live support to your site for free. The relevant word is site: this is software you install on infrastructure you control, not a hosted chat product with a monthly seat count. The README states the application is used in production environments serving over 10,000 chats per day with dozens of operators working at once, and links to a performance page for the details.
That framing tells you who it is for. Support teams that already run their own servers, agencies that deploy client sites and want the chat widget, support desk and reporting in one codebase, and organisations with a policy against routing customer conversations through a third party. The repository also ships mobile clients for iOS and Android and a desktop app written with electron, so the operator side is not limited to a browser tab.
The scope is wider than chat. The README lists Telegram, Viber, Discord, Mattermost, Facebook Messenger, Instagram, WhatsApp through several routes, SMS and WhatsApp via Twilio, LDAP and Microsoft authentication, 2FA, Amazon S3 storage, Elasticsearch statistics and a REST API. Each of those is a separate repository or documentation page, which is the first sign of how the project is assembled.
How the PHP application is put together
The repository root holds a Dockerfile, a LICENSE, a README and a single directory, lhc_web. Everything that runs lives inside lhc_web. The install instructions confirm this: you change into that directory, install composer dependencies, and then open lhc_web/index.php in a browser. There is no separate frontend build step described in the README, no Node process required for the core chat, and no database migration tool mentioned in the quick start.
Extensions are the integration mechanism. The README warns that when installing extensions you should make sure your version has webhooks enabled, and points at a line in lhc_web/settings/settings.ini.default.php. That file is the configuration surface, and the warning implies webhooks can be off in a given build, which would silently break extensions that depend on them.
The bot engine is the part that has moved fastest. The README lists integrations for Rasa, ChatGPT in three modes (chat responses, chat completion and assistant), Ollama, Gemini, Dialogflow, n8n and any third-party REST API. There is also an MCP setup page for Claude or ChatGPT. The assistant integration is flagged as something OpenAI will deprecate, so the ChatGPT surface here is not stable and you should expect to revisit it.
Voice, video and screen sharing come in two flavours. Agora is the paid option, Jitsi is described as free out of the box. That is a real architectural fork: the paid path offloads media to a vendor, the free path expects you to run or reach a Jitsi deployment.
Installing Live Helper Chat from the repository or a release
The README gives two paths and they differ in one step. Cloning the repository means you must install composer dependencies, with a minimum PHP version of 8.2. Run this from inside the repository after cloning:
cd lhc_web && composer installAfter that, the README says you can enter lhc_web/index.php in your browser. That URL is the installer entry point, so the next thing you should see is the web-based setup rather than a chat widget.
The second path skips composer entirely. Download the most recent release from the releases page, and the README states you do not need to install composer dependencies in that scenario. For anything other than these two routes, the README points at the install documentation page rather than describing the steps itself.
If you prefer containers, the repository root contains a Dockerfile. It is short and worth reading before you build:
FROM php:7.4-apache
RUN docker-php-ext-install mysqli
RUN docker-php-ext-install pdo
RUN docker-php-ext-install pdo_mysql
RUN docker-php-ext-install zip
RUN docker-php-ext-install gd
RUN docker-php-ext-install bcmathThe image copies ./lhc_web to /var/www/html, sets that as the working directory and exposes port 80. Note the mismatch: the base image is php:7.4-apache while the README states a minimum of PHP 8.2 for the composer route. Treat the Dockerfile as a starting point to update, not as a supported deployment. The README also links a separate docker-standalone repository for a more complete setup.
Where Live Helper Chat is the wrong choice
The install story is the first limitation. There is no single supported deployment described in the README. You choose between a composer install on a PHP 8.2 host, a downloaded release, a hand-maintained Dockerfile on PHP 7.4, or a separate docker-standalone repository. Four paths, four maintenance profiles, and the README does not tell you which one the project treats as canonical.
The integration list is the second. Telegram, Viber, Discord, Facebook Messenger, WhatsApp, SMS, LDAP, SSO, S3, Elasticsearch and the rest are mostly separate repositories. Installing an extension requires webhooks to be enabled in settings.ini.default.php, and the README's phrasing suggests this is not guaranteed. If your plan depends on three channels, you are maintaining three additional codebases alongside the core.
The AI side carries its own expiry risk. The ChatGPT assistant integration is documented as something that will be deprecated by OpenAI. Bot flows built on it will need rework. If your support automation is the reason you are evaluating this project, budget for that migration before you start, not after.
Finally, this is PHP with a server, a database and a settings file. If nobody on the team wants to own a PHP host, patches and extension upgrades, a hosted product will cost less in engineering time than the licence price of zero suggests.
Mibew Messenger and the hosted alternatives
Mibew Messenger is the closest comparison people search for, and the difference is scope rather than quality. Mibew is a chat widget and operator console. Live Helper Chat is that plus a bot engine with Rasa, ChatGPT, Ollama, Gemini, Dialogflow and n8n connectors, plus voice, video and screen sharing through Agora or Jitsi, plus Telegram, Viber, Discord and Facebook channels, plus a REST API and an MCP setup page. If you only need a widget and a queue, the extra surface is configuration you will never touch and upgrade risk you will still carry.
The other alternative is not a project at all: a hosted live chat service. The trade is explicit. Hosted tools remove the PHP host, the composer step, the settings file and the extension repositories, and in exchange your customer conversations and your operator accounts live on someone else's infrastructure. Live Helper Chat exists for teams that cannot or will not make that trade. Self-hosting also means the performance ceiling is yours to manage, and the README's 10,000 chats per day figure refers to deployments the project has seen, not to a guarantee for your hardware.
Licence, upgrades and what maintenance costs
The repository is Apache-2.0, which permits commercial use, modification and redistribution, and includes a patent grant. The README is explicit that the Agora voice, video and screen sharing integration is paid, and that Jitsi is free out of the box, so a licence-clean deployment can still carry a vendor bill. Several integrations point at third-party services (Twilio, Facebook, Agora, OpenAI, Google) whose own terms apply to the data you send them. That is a description of the licence file and the README, not legal advice; if you redistribute a modified build, read the Apache-2.0 terms yourself.
Upgrade cost tracks the release cadence. The most recent releases listed are 4.91v on 2026-09-07, 4.90v on 2026-08-19 and 4.89v on 2026-08-19, and the last push to the repository was on 2026-09-15. Releases arrive often and their titles are terse: 4.91v is labelled "Restricted replaceable variables", 4.90v "Track who set user online manually". You will not learn from the title whether a release touches your extensions, so read the diff or the linked notes before upgrading a production instance.
The hidden cost is extension drift. Each integration is its own repository with its own compatibility window against the core. A core upgrade that changes the webhooks setting or the bot API can leave a channel extension behind. Pin your core version, test the extensions you actually use, and keep the composer lock file from the release path rather than rebuilding dependencies on every deploy.
Editorial conclusion
Adopt Live Helper Chat if you need a self-hosted operator console with a bot engine and messaging channels you control, and you have a PHP host plus someone who can follow the install docs. Do not adopt it if you want a managed service with no server work, or if you need the Dockerfile in the repository root to match the documented PHP 8.2 minimum. Before committing, verify the webhooks setting in settings.ini.default.php, confirm the release you download needs no composer step, and check whether the paid Agora path or the free Jitsi path fits your voice and screen sharing plans.
Frequently asked questions
What PHP version does Live Helper Chat need?
The README states a minimum of PHP 8.2 for the cloning route, where you run composer install inside lhc_web. The Dockerfile in the repository root is based on php:7.4-apache, so it does not match that stated minimum and should be updated before use.
Does Live Helper Chat need composer?
Only if you clone the repository. The README says that when you download a release instead, you do not need to install composer dependencies. After either route, you open lhc_web/index.php in your browser.
Can I install Live Helper Chat with Docker?
The repository root contains a Dockerfile that copies lhc_web to /var/www/html and exposes port 80, and the README also links a separate docker-standalone repository. The README does not present the root Dockerfile as the supported deployment path.
Is voice, video and screen sharing free in Live Helper Chat?
There are two integrations. The README describes Agora as paid and Jitsi as free out of the box, with documentation pages for each. Choosing between them is a deployment decision, not a configuration toggle.
Community notes