Yodl ($10 a month for 5 people, BAA on every plan) is our first pick for a small practice that wants Slack-style channels. Microsoft Teams Essentials ($4 per user a month paid yearly, as of November 2026) is the best bundled option, and Hypercare is the pick when you need on-call schedules. TigerConnect is hospital-grade and sold through sales at unpublished prices.
How we chose
Two terms first. A BAA, or Business Associate Agreement, is the contract HIPAA requires before a vendor can handle protected health information (PHI): anything that identifies a patient and relates to their care. Without a signed BAA the vendor may not hold your patients' information, however good its encryption. So the first test was: does the plan a 5-person office would buy come with a BAA?
- BAA on the plan a small team would buy, not only on an enterprise tier.
- Price for 5 people in the vendor's own words, with the billing catch.
- Staff chat basics: channels, threads, direct messages, search, files.
- Apps for the phones staff already carry, plus a desktop option.
- Audit logs and retention controls an office manager can use.
- Honesty about limits.
Every price is as of November 2026, read from the vendor's own site. Prices change, so verify before you buy.
The list at a glance
| Tool | Price for 5 people as of November 2026 | Signs a BAA | Free tier | Best for |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Yodl (Team plan) | $10 a month flat, 5 users included | Yes, every plan | No | Small offices wanting channels at a flat price |
| Microsoft Teams Essentials | $20 a month ($4 per user, paid yearly) | Yes, by default on commercial plans | Yes (consumer Teams, not covered) | Offices already on Microsoft 365 |
| Google Chat (Workspace Business Starter) | $35 a month annual or $42 flexible | Yes, accepted in the Admin console | No (14-day trial) | Offices on Gmail |
| Zenzap Business+ | $50 total a month, up to 5 users, plus an unpriced HIPAA add-on | Yes, as a paid add-on | Yes (unlimited users, 1 GB) | Frontline teams leaving WhatsApp |
| Hypercare Starter | $40 to $50 a month ($8 or $10 per user, billing unlabeled) | Yes, Starter and up | No (90-day trial) | Clinics that want clinical messaging, with on-call schedules on Plus |
| Spruce Health Basic | $120 a month ($24 per user, plus taxes and fees) | Yes, all trials and plans | No (14-day trial) | Practices that also need patient texting and phones |
| TigerConnect | Contact sales, no published pricing | Yes, standard BAA published | Not published | Hospitals and large groups |
| Slack Pro | $43.75 a month, but the BAA needs an Enterprise plan | Enterprise plans only | Yes (90-day history) | Teams already on Slack Enterprise |
The tools, one by one
Yodl
Yodl is Slack-style chat for small healthcare teams, and it is first because it is the lowest flat price we found with a BAA on the plan a 5-person office actually buys. The Team plan is $10 a month for one location with 5 users and 20 GB of storage; extra users are $2 each and a second location is another $10 with 5 more users. It has channels, threads, direct messages, file previews, search, an audit viewer with CSV export, retention controls, legal hold, channel roles and passkeys. The limits: no voice or video calls, no SSO yet, an iPhone app still in beta, and no end-to-end encryption, by design, so search and audit work.
Microsoft Teams Essentials
Teams Essentials is $4 per user a month paid yearly, with chat, calling, meetings and 10 GB of cloud storage per user. Microsoft's HIPAA BAA applies by default through its Online Services Data Protection Addendum on commercial plans, so a 5-person office pays $20 a month with the agreement in place. The catch is the auto-renewing annual subscription, and Teams is built around meetings as much as chat.
Google Chat (Google Workspace)
Google Chat is bundled with Workspace; you cannot buy Chat alone. Business Starter is $7 per user a month on an annual plan or $8.40 on the flexible plan, so 5 people cost $35 or $42. An admin accepts the BAA in the Admin console, and Google lists Chat among the covered services; third-party add-ons are not.
Zenzap
Zenzap is WhatsApp-style business chat with AI agents, to-dos and workflows. Business+ is $50 total a month for up to 5 users with the annual toggle selected by default; the monthly rate is not shown. HIPAA compliance and a signed BAA are a separate add-on with no published price.
Hypercare
Hypercare is clinical messaging with role-based routing and pager replacement. Starter is listed at $8 a month, with a second price set showing $10, and the page does not label which is annual and which is monthly; on-call schedules and code team activations arrive with Plus at $15 or $19. Starter, Plus and Enterprise include a signed BAA; the 90-day trial does not.
Spruce Health
Spruce is a patient-communication platform first: HIPAA phone lines, two-way patient texting, video visits, e-fax and a shared inbox, with team messaging included. Basic is $24 per user a month, taxes and fees extra, so 5 people pay $120, and the BAA applies to all trials and plans. All users must be on the same plan.
TigerConnect
TigerConnect is hospital-grade clinical communication: role-based messaging, dynamic on-call teams, alerts from clinical systems, EHR patient context and escalation. There is no pricing page, so pricing is contact sales. Its standard BAA is published on its legal pages, and it is built for hospitals and large groups rather than a 5-person office.
Slack
Slack Pro is $8.75 per user a month on monthly billing or $7.25 annual, so 5 people pay $43.75 or $36.25. But Slack's HIPAA support is limited to Enterprise plans: you must execute a BAA, keep PHI only in messages and files, and monitor with DLP tools. Enterprise+ is contact sales; see our Slack comparison.
Which one for your team
- Two or three people: Chanty Business ($3 per user a month billed annually, with a BAA) costs less than $10 flat; Yodl is cheapest from 4 people.
- A 5 to 15 person office that wants channels and threads: Yodl, $10 for the first 5 and $2 for each extra person.
- Already on Microsoft 365 or Google Workspace: use Teams or Google Chat.
- On-call schedules or a pager replacement: Hypercare, on Plus for the schedules.
- Patient texting, fax and phones too: Spruce Health.
- Hospital or multi-site group with EHR integration: TigerConnect.
What none of these do for you
HIPAA does not certify apps. A signed BAA is required before PHI goes into a tool (45 CFR 164.502(e)), but it does not make you compliant by itself: you still need a policy on what goes in chat, the minimum-necessary habit, training and clean offboarding.
If you want the simplest version of that answer, Yodl is $10 a month for 5 people with a signed BAA, on the pricing page.
Buy the chat tool whose plan you will actually pay for comes with a signed BAA. For a small practice that is usually Yodl at $10 flat, Teams or Google Chat if you already pay for the suite, and Hypercare or TigerConnect for clinical routing.
Frequently asked questions
Is Slack HIPAA compliant for a small practice?
Only on an Enterprise plan with an executed BAA, PHI limited to messages and files, and DLP monitoring. Pro and Business+ do not come with a BAA.
Does a signed BAA make my practice HIPAA compliant?
No. The BAA is required before a vendor handles PHI, but compliance stays the practice's responsibility: policies, training, access control and how staff use the tool.
Which HIPAA team chat app is the cheapest?
Yodl at $10 flat for 5 people. For 3 or fewer, Chanty Business at $3 per user a month billed annually is cheaper, and Celo and Hucu.ai have limited free tiers.
Do I need end-to-end encryption?
No. HIPAA treats encryption as an addressable safeguard, and most BAA-covered tools, including Slack, Teams and Yodl, skip end-to-end encryption so that audit, search and retention work.
Can I use these apps to message patients?
Spruce Health is built for patient texting. Yodl is staff-to-staff only. Slack's HIPAA terms say it cannot be used to communicate with patients.