EchoIt 0.7.1

Please update before mid-November

The connection helper that EchoIt 0.7.0 relies on will be switched off in
mid-November 2026. After that, 0.7.0 can no longer connect to anyone on a
different network.

0.7.1 keeps using that helper while it runs — so you can still reach friends
who haven't updated yet — and moves to a helper run by Number 0 on its own
once it's gone. Update now, and ask the people you talk to to update too.

Terms of Use and a Privacy Policy

The first time you open 0.7.1, EchoIt shows a short summary of its terms and
asks you to agree. The full Terms of Use
and Privacy Policy
are on the website, written in plain words: what stays on your device, what
leaves it, and who can see it. Your answer is kept on your device only.

Nothing left behind

• Uninstalling on Windows now removes everything EchoIt kept: your
  messages, files, settings and the key that opens them. Before, that only
  happened if you ticked a box in the uninstaller.
• On Android, EchoIt's data is no longer included in backups or in
  phone-to-phone transfers. Your history stays on your phone and nowhere else.

Files you saved out of EchoIt — to your Downloads folder, say — are yours, and
stay.

Names and About

Names can be up to 25 characters and "About you" up to 256. A longer name or
About from someone else is shortened on screen, and the About box no longer
stretches when you drag its corner.

Known gaps, unchanged

• Messages arrive while EchoIt is in use on your phone; otherwise the next
  time both phones are. That includes files: keep EchoIt open on the sending
  device until the other side has the file.
• Rarely, a message can be lost.
• Someone you removed may still see you as online while you both have EchoIt
  open.
• On Android, a file is still copied into EchoIt before it is sent.

Install

Windows — EchoIt_0.7.1_x64-setup.exe, or update from Settings in the
app. Windows may say it "protected your PC": choose More info → Run anyway.
Android — EchoIt_0.7.1_aarch64.apk, 64-bit devices only. Install over the
top; your messages and contacts are kept.

EchoIt 0.7.0

Files without the wait

• On Windows, sending a file no longer makes a copy first. It goes from
  where it already is, so even a large video starts sending straight away. If
  you move, change or delete the file before your friend has it, EchoIt tells
  you both, and you can send it again.
• On Android, files come from the phone's own picker. Choose
  Photos & videos or Document from the paperclip.
• Photos and videos show a preview before they are downloaded. Your friend
  sees a small, blurred picture of it right away, and the full file when they
  tap it. Your own copy shows your original.
• Progress sits on the file itself — a ring on the bubble. Tap it to stop a
  download and tap again to carry on from where it stopped.

Choosing messages

Long-press a message and a bar takes the place of the chat's header, as in
other messengers, so nothing on the screen moves. From it: Reply,
Forward, Copy, Select all and Delete. There is no vibration any
more; the message gives a small press-in instead.

Delete removes messages from your device only. Your friend keeps their copy,
and EchoIt says so before you confirm.

Remove a contact

From a contact's ⋮ menu, or from their profile. They are removed from your
device only, and they are not told. You can also delete your chat with them —
from your device; theirs stays. To talk again, add them with their ticket.

Unread chats on the app icon

The taskbar icon on Windows shows how many chats have something unread. On
Android, the launcher shows a number or a dot, depending on the phone.

A video with no sound

Some videos carry their sound in a format EchoIt's player can't play (often
films with 5.1 sound). EchoIt now notices, and offers Open in another
player — VLC, PotPlayer, or whatever your device uses for videos.

Steadier connections

• Two phones that failed to connect, after an update for example, kept
  waiting until someone reopened the app. They now keep trying by themselves
  while EchoIt is open.
• A connection request that didn't get through the first time is sent again.
• Read now shows even when the two devices' clocks disagree by a few
  seconds.

And

• EchoIt starts faster, most noticeably on phones.
• An update shows its download progress, in Settings and on the taskbar icon.
• Small animations: new messages, the photo viewer (drag down to close),
  menus and the chat list. They follow your device's reduce-motion setting.
• Works better with TalkBack: menus are named, and the chat header reads out
  whether your friend is online or typing.
• Checked between Windows and Android, both ways: requests, messages, typing,
  read receipts, reactions, replies and delete.

Known gaps

• Messages arrive while EchoIt is in use on your phone; otherwise the next
  time both phones are. That includes files: keep EchoIt open on the sending
  device until the other side has the file.
• Update both sides. Someone still on 0.6.x sees each photo or video you
  send with a small extra picture beside it — the preview.
• Someone you removed may still see you as online while you both have EchoIt
  open.
• With a long history, EchoIt takes a little longer to start.
• On Android, a file is still copied into EchoIt before it is sent, so you need
  about its size free.
• Open in another player saves a video you received to your device first.

Install

Windows — EchoIt_0.7.0_x64-setup.exe, or update from Settings in the
app.
Android — EchoIt_0.7.0_aarch64.apk, 64-bit devices only. Install over the
top; your messages and contacts are kept.

EchoIt 0.6.4

The app no longer freezes while a file downloads

On Android, downloading a large file could make EchoIt stop responding: you
were stuck on the chat screen, taps did nothing, and the Back presses you made
meanwhile all happened at once when the download finished — sometimes ending
with the app asking whether to close.

The cause was progress updates: the app was being told about every 64 KB that
arrived, hundreds of times a second, and redrew everything each time. Progress
now updates a few times a second, and only the parts of the screen that show
it are redrawn. Everything else from 0.6.3 is unchanged.

Known gaps, unchanged

• Messages arrive while EchoIt is in use on your phone; otherwise the next
  time both phones are. That includes files: keep EchoIt open on the sending
  device until the other side has the file.
• Large files have been tested most on computers. On phones this is new —
  if something misbehaves, please tell us what the screen said.

Install

Windows — EchoIt_0.6.4_x64-setup.exe, or update from Settings in the
app.
Android — EchoIt_0.6.4_aarch64.apk, 64-bit devices only. Install over the
top; your messages and contacts are kept.

EchoIt 0.6.3

Large files, done properly

0.6.2 lifted the size limit. This release makes big files something you can
actually follow, and stops them filling up your storage.

You can see what is happening

• Sending: a bar at the top of every screen — Preparing Holiday.mp4 to
  send · 42% · 5.4 GB of 13 GB — with Cancel, then Sent. Big files are also
  prepared much faster than before.
• Downloading: progress in the chat and in the bar, even if you leave the
  conversation.
• Saving: Saving Holiday.mp4 · 42%, with Cancel, then Saved with Open.
  On Android you also get a notification while it saves, and tapping the
  finished one opens the file.

When a transfer stalls

If the other device goes to sleep or offline mid-download, EchoIt says
waiting for data, then pauses with the reason and a Retry button —
and carries on from where it stopped by itself when they are back. No more
sitting frozen on the same percentage.

Files keep their names

What you send arrives under its own name, and is saved under it.

Storage is not wasted

• Once your friend has a file, EchoIt deletes its copy on your device. Your
  original file is untouched. If they never download it, EchoIt lets go after
  15 days.
• Saving a video moves it out of EchoIt instead of keeping it twice.
  Pictures stay in the chat.
• Free space is checked first — before sending, saving or downloading — so
  you find out before it starts, not at 90%.
• Saving on Android writes straight into Downloads, once, and the app stays
  usable while it does.

Known gaps, unchanged

• Messages arrive while EchoIt is in use on your phone; otherwise the next
  time both phones are. Nothing arrives while a phone is locked or asleep —
  and that includes files: keep EchoIt open on the sending device until the
  other side has the file.
• Large files have been tested most on computers. On phones this is new —
  if a send, download or save misbehaves, please tell us what the screen said.
• A message sent in the same instant the other phone shuts down can be lost.
  Rare, and being fixed.

Install

Windows — EchoIt_0.6.3_x64-setup.exe, or update from Settings in the
app.
Android — EchoIt_0.6.3_aarch64.apk, 64-bit devices only. Install over the
top; your messages and contacts are kept.

EchoIt 0.6.2

Send files of any size

The 256 MB limit is gone. Videos and audio now stream from your
device's encrypted storage while they play, a piece at a time, instead of
being loaded whole into the app — so a large video plays as easily as a
small one, and jumping ahead works straight away.

Tested between two copies of the app on a PC with a 300 MB video: it
arrived, played, and skipped to the end. On phones this is new — if a
video will not play, please tell us. Videos up to 256 MB fall back to the
old way of loading if streaming fails; bigger ones can be saved and opened
in another app.

Reply and react with a mouse

On the desktop app, hover over a message to get Reply and React
buttons beside it, or right-click a message to select it — the same as a
long press on a phone. Before, replying needed a finger swipe and reacting
a press-and-hold, so neither worked with a mouse.

Adding each other by ticket now settles straight away

If you and a friend both added each other by pasting tickets, one of you
could keep seeing "Waiting for them to connect back" until the first
message, and see the other as "Device ending in …" instead of their name.
Both sides now show the connection and the right name at once.

Icons

After updating on Windows, the taskbar and Start menu now pick up the new
EchoIt icon instead of keeping the old one.

Known gaps, unchanged

• Messages arrive while EchoIt is in use on your phone; otherwise the
  next time both phones are. Nothing arrives while a phone is locked or
  asleep.
• A message sent in the same instant the other phone shuts down can be
  lost. Rare, and being fixed.

Install

Windows — EchoIt_0.6.2_x64-setup.exe, or Settings → Check for
updates in the app.
Android — EchoIt_0.6.2_aarch64.apk, 64-bit devices only. Install
over the top; your messages and contacts are kept.

EchoIt 0.6.1

Large files work again after a reset

On 0.6.0, resetting EchoIt and setting it up again left large files
broken for good: anything over 16 MB was refused with "The limit is
16 MB". Reset removed your identity and messages but not the storage for
files, which stayed locked to the old identity, so the new one could not
use it.

Updating fixes it on its own. The first time 0.6.1 opens, storage
left over from an earlier identity is moved out of the way and fresh
storage is started. You do not need to reset, reinstall or do anything
else. Reset now also clears file storage properly.

Also fixed

• Contacts without a saved ticket can now share large files. Two
  phones now exchange tickets whenever they connect, so a contact who was
  added in a way that kept no ticket gets one the next time you are both
  online.
• When a file cannot be sent, a pop-up says why — in the middle of
  the screen, instead of a line of small text under the message box. If
  large files are not working, it now says so and gives the reason,
  instead of quoting a 16 MB limit that was never the real problem.

Install

Windows — EchoIt_0.6.1_x64-setup.exe, or Settings → Check for
updates in the app.
Android — EchoIt_0.6.1_aarch64.apk, 64-bit devices only. Install
over the top; your messages and contacts are kept. Open EchoIt on both
phones once before sending a large file.

EchoIt 0.6.0

What you write is now encrypted on your device

Message text and conversation data are stored encrypted, with a key that
comes from your recovery phrase. Someone with access to your device's files
can still see that you talked, with whom and when — the app needs
those to find your conversations — but not what was said.

Updating from 0.4.0 keeps everything. Checked on two phones: every
message, with its time, the contact and the connection survived the update,
and new messages went both ways straight after.

Messages arrive while EchoIt is in use

On Android, EchoIt now stays running, with a notification, while you use your
phone — so a message arrives in seconds even with EchoIt in the background
(measured: 4.6 s, with a notification). When a phone is locked or asleep,
Android stops EchoIt; the message waits on the sender's phone, marked as not
yet delivered, and arrives the next time both phones are in use. Nothing is
lost along the way, and there is no server holding it in between.

It also uses far less mobile data while idle: on a test phone the cellular
radio went from awake 83% of the time to 12%.

Files up to 256 MB

Photos, videos and documents now go directly from your device to theirs, by
a new transfer engine, and the limit goes from 16 MB to 256 MB. Videos play
in the app. On Android, saved files go to Downloads and documents open in
your phone's own apps.

Connecting is simpler

• A request says who it is from — "Sam wants to connect · says their
  name is Sam", next to a short code they cannot choose.
• Accepting connects both of you at once; nobody has to restart the app
  or add the other back.
• Contacts say "Not connected" when the other person is not around,
  instead of claiming a connection that is not there.

Also in this release

• Reactions on messages, and links highlighted — opening one asks first.
• A new look: calm teal instead of orange, a truly black dark mode, and a
  new icon.
• The recovery phrase stays inside its boxes on large text sizes.
• When a direct connection is not possible, traffic now goes through
  EchoIt's own connection helper only. It passes along encrypted data it
  cannot read. Finding the other device still uses a lookup service run by
  Number 0.
• Updating asks for the name your contacts will see, and Android asks for
  permission to show notifications.

Known gaps, stated rather than implied

• Nothing arrives while a phone is locked or asleep — see above. Some
  phones (Vivo, in our tests) stop EchoIt completely whatever the battery
  settings.
• A message sent in the same instant the other phone shuts down can be
  lost, and may then be shown as read. Rare — it needed the timing to
  within a fraction of a second — but real, and being fixed.
• Files are newly tested on phones in this release. If a photo, video
  or document misbehaves, please say so.

Install

Windows — EchoIt_0.6.0_x64-setup.exe. Installed copies can update from
Settings.
Android — EchoIt_0.6.0_aarch64.apk, 64-bit devices only. Install over
the top; your messages and contacts are kept.

EchoIt 0.4.0

Messages no longer disappear when the other person's phone is asleep

Sending used to ask "is there a connection?" when the useful question is
"is anyone there?". Those come apart for as long as it takes the network
to notice someone has gone — nothing announces it — and in that window a
message was accepted by a dead connection, shown as sent, and lost.

Measured on two phones: three of four messages sent to a sleeping phone
were reported sent and ceased to exist.

Now a message is only handed to the network when something has actually
been heard from the other person recently. If not, it waits on your
device, is shown in the conversation as Waiting for name with no
tick, survives the app being closed, and is sent the moment they are
back.

This does not deliver to a sleeping phone — nothing in the app can
do that, the whole process is frozen by Android. It replaces silent loss
with honest waiting.

Also in this release

• Profiles — a name, a picture and a line about yourself, shared only
  with people you have paired with. A ticket does not carry it.
• Pictures everywhere they belong — the chat list, the contact list,
  the conversation header, and the profile view.
• Tap someone's name in a chat to see their profile and their safety
  code — the one line on that screen they cannot choose for themselves.
• Read status as their picture — a grey tick when sent, their picture
  in grey when their device has it, in colour when they have read it.
• Select messages by long press, to copy, forward to several people
  at once, or delete for yourself. Deleting says plainly that it removes
  the message from your device only.
• Ask to connect — send a request instead of both people pasting
  tickets at each other. The name on a request is a claim, shown next to
  a short code that is not.
• Unread badges that had never once appeared, and a "new messages"
  button when one arrives while you are reading older ones.
• Conversations open at the newest message instead of a little short of it.
• The launcher icon loses its white tile.

Known gaps, stated rather than implied

• Messages do not arrive while the app is closed or the phone is
  asleep. Both people need the app open. This is the next thing being
  worked on.
• After Android freezes the app, the two devices may not reconnect on
  their own. Reopening the app fixes it.
• The in-place desktop update has still never actually run — this is the
  first release with a previous one to update from, so it becomes
  testable now.

Install

Windows — EchoIt_0.4.0_x64-setup.exe.
Android — EchoIt_0.4.0_aarch64.apk, 64-bit devices only. Install
over the top; your messages and contacts are kept.

EchoIt 0.3.0

Typing indicators, replies you can chain, and a batch of fixes to how
conversations behave.

New

Someone typing now shows as a bubble in the conversation, the way you
would expect, as well as a line under their name. It appears in well
under a second and disappears on its own — nothing is stored, so it
cannot get stuck showing someone as typing after they have stopped.

Swipe a message to the right to reply to it. Swipe several and they
chain together, so one reply can answer all of them. Swipe the same
message again to take it back out. The reply arrives with each original
quoted; tapping a quote jumps to it.

Older messages load as you scroll up, sixty at a time, keeping your
place instead of throwing you back to where you started.

Fixed

Opening a chat now starts at the newest message. It used to scroll
down and stop short, leaving the last message just off screen so you had
to nudge it.

The keyboard stays open after you send. Tapping Send moved focus to
the button, which closed it.

Pinch-to-zoom now only affects photos and videos. The whole app was
zoomable, so any screen could be pinched like an image. Photos zoom
properly, and the page stays put.

The back button closes a photo without leaving the conversation.
It used to do both at once.

The theme buttons fit at any system font size. With larger text the
System button ran off the edge of the screen. Every tab has been checked
at font sizes up to 1.5x.

A photo sent without a caption now reads "Photo" in the chat list
instead of "No messages yet".

Downloads

File	For
EchoIt_0.3.0_x64-setup.exe	Windows — use this one. The in-app updater installs this format.
EchoIt_0.3.0_x64_en-US.msi	Windows, if you need an MSI. Installs fine, but the updater path is built around the .exe.
EchoIt_0.3.0_aarch64.apk	Android, 64-bit

Windows: Settings → Check now will offer this and install it for you.

Android has no in-app updater. Download the APK and install it over
your existing copy. Same signing key, so your messages and identity stay
put. Do not uninstall first: that wipes the message store, and your
recovery phrase restores your identity, not your history.

Known gaps, stated up front

• Message history is not encrypted at rest. The Profile tab says so too.
• Background delivery on Android is not implemented. Messages arrive
  while the app is open.
• Saved photos do not appear in the Android Gallery. They land in the
  app's own folder, reachable from a file manager.
• File transfers are capped at 16MB. The protocol allows more, but
  larger transfers do not complete reliably yet.
• A conversation spanning several days shows only times, no dates.
• A connection that times out is reported as "Invalid Ticket." The
  ticket is usually fine; the handshake stalled.
• The app reaches Number 0's public relay and discovery services on every
  launch to find peers.

EchoIt 0.2.0

Media sharing, presence, and unread counts. Everything here was checked on
two physical phones on separate networks, not just built.

New

Send photos, videos and files. Tap the paperclip in a conversation.
Images and video render in the chat and open full-screen — swipe between
them, swipe down or press back to close. Documents arrive as a card and
open in whatever your device uses for that type. Anything can be saved to
your device.

Files transfer directly between devices, like messages. A message
carries only a reference; the bytes are fetched when you tap, so a
conversation full of pictures never spends your data without asking.

Who is online. A green dot and "Online" under a contact's name, and
"last seen 5 minutes ago" when they are not. It turns off when someone
closes the app, which is the part that usually goes wrong.

Unread counts. A number on conversations with messages you have not
read, cleared when you open them. Recent conversations sort to the top.

Size limit: 16 MB

The protocol permits 64 MB, but measured transfers at that size do not
complete — they time out and report a misleading error. 16 MB covers
photos comfortably and refuses what would stall. This will rise once
larger transfers are measured as reliable.

Downloads

File	For
EchoIt_0.2.0_x64-setup.exe	Windows — use this one. The in-app updater installs this format.
EchoIt_0.2.0_x64_en-US.msi	Windows, if you need an MSI. Installs fine, but the updater path is built around the .exe.
EchoIt_0.2.0_aarch64.apk	Android, 64-bit

Windows: Settings → Check now will offer this and install it for you.

Android has no in-app updater. Download the APK and install it over
your existing copy. Same signing key, so your messages and identity stay
put. Do not uninstall first — that wipes the message store, and your
recovery phrase restores your identity, not your history.

Known gaps, stated up front

• Saved photos do not appear in your Gallery on Android. They go to
  the app's own storage folder, reachable with a file manager. Putting
  them in the Gallery needs work that is not done yet.
• Message history is not encrypted at rest. The Profile tab says so too.
• No background delivery on Android. Messages and files arrive while
  the app is open. Deliberate for the beta.
• A conversation spanning several days shows only times, no dates, so
  it can read as out of order when it is not.
• A connection that times out is reported as "Invalid Ticket." The
  ticket is usually fine; the handshake stalled.
• Whoever adds a contact second can message first. The other side's
  composer unlocks when the first message arrives.
• The app reaches Number 0's public relay and discovery services on every
  launch to find peers.