Signal is working on a way to sign up without a phone number. The feature has not yet been officially confirmed, and it is not yet known whether it will be available to all users or in what form.
Briar fits into it’s own niche (operational design), making it a choice for certain activities but not what I would call your general normie chat app. It makes tradeoffs (using the local network, no caching relays, etc.) to increase security posture at the expense of general use. IIRC, Jack Dorsey’s BitChat was modeled after the same designs? (which is interesting, because Nostr his other pet doesn’t)
Don’t forget Briar!
Briar fits into it’s own niche (operational design), making it a choice for certain activities but not what I would call your general normie chat app. It makes tradeoffs (using the local network, no caching relays, etc.) to increase security posture at the expense of general use. IIRC, Jack Dorsey’s BitChat was modeled after the same designs? (which is interesting, because Nostr his other pet doesn’t)