Straight across
Most of Mattermost maps one to one
- Server or workspaceOrganisation
- TeamTeam
- Channel categoryCategory
- Public and private channelManaged channels, public or private to the team
- Direct and group messagesDirect and group direct messages
- System, team and channel roles with custom schemesOrganisation, team and channel roles over a permission bitmask
- Incoming webhooks and slash commandsIncoming webhooks and slash commands
- Boards and PlaybooksTask boards, and nothing
- PluginsNo equivalent
Before anybody moves
Five questions to answer first
- Why you are leaving
- Whether self-hosting is a requirement or a habit
- What your plugins do
- Which integrations already speak the Slack payload shape
- What your compliance export was doing
The plan
Migrate from Mattermost to Enclessa
- Confirm you actually want to stop operating itEnclessa is a hosted service and is never distributed. Enterprise buys a dedicated deployment in a region you name, still operated by us. If running it yourself is a requirement, the rest of this guide does not apply, and that is a fair answer.
- Map teams, categories and channels straight acrossThis part is close to mechanical. Create the teams, then the categories, then the channels that are actually in use — or import those channels with their history instead of creating them empty. The vocabulary is nearly the same, which makes it tempting to rebuild everything — rebuild only what is alive.
- Translate the permission schemesEnclessa resolves permissions from roles at organisation, team and channel level over a bitmask, with allow and deny overwrites on a category or a channel. Most Mattermost schemes translate to something slightly simpler; write the translation down before you apply it.
- Repoint the webhooks and commandsEnclessa accepts the same Slack-shaped webhook payload Mattermost does, and custom slash commands work the same way — your endpoint gets a request and answers within three seconds, publicly or privately. Most integrations need a new URL and a header.
- Decide what happens to direct messagesDirect messages and group direct messages are end-to-end encrypted here, with no administrator override and no server-side search. That is a stronger confidentiality position than you had and a real change in what compliance tooling can see — make sure whoever owns that policy has agreed to it.
- Import the channel history worth keepingInvite people first, so their messages are matched to them by email address. Run the mmctl export create command on the old install and upload the ZIP in Admin → Import. The preview shows the channels, their message counts and who matched, and a match is used only once you confirm it; pick the channels and the team, and each becomes a new managed room with its threads, reactions and attachments. Running the same export again does not duplicate messages. The importer is on every paid plan, not on Free.
- Export the old install for the archive, then cut overTake the export you need for retention out of Mattermost while it is still running, run both for a fortnight, then make the old install read-only on an announced date and decommission it on your own schedule.
Leaving Mattermost
Getting your data out of Mattermost
- Check what your version’s bulk export supports, and whether it covers the channels you care about.
- The command-line client is the usual route for an administrator on a self-managed install.
- A self-managed installation also has the database and the file store directly, which is the fallback when the export tooling is not enough.
- Compliance exports, if you use them, are a separate mechanism from the bulk export.
- Run a test export early. The bulk export is what the Enclessa importer reads; a compliance export is not. Attachments are included unless the export is run without them.
FAQ
Moving from Mattermost: questions
- No. Enclessa is a hosted service and is never distributed to a customer. The Enterprise plan provides a dedicated deployment in a region you name, operated and updated by us — which is not self-hosting and not air-gapped.
- Usually with only a URL change. Enclessa accepts the same Slack-shaped webhook payload, and custom slash commands work the same way: your endpoint receives a request and answers within three seconds, either into the channel or privately to the caller.
- Channel history, yes. Run the mmctl export create command, upload the ZIP in the admin console, and import the channels you pick into new managed rooms with their original times, threads, reactions and attachments up to 100 MB each. Direct messages are not imported, because they are end-to-end encrypted here and the server cannot write into an encrypted room. The importer is on every paid plan, not on Free.
Bring your team over this afternoon
Free for up to 10 people, with encrypted direct messages and video calls. No payment card, no time limit, no server to run.
For businesses and organisations only — not available to consumers.