Real-Time Collaboration

Real-time collaboration removes delays from remote and hybrid work by keeping members and stakeholders connected to a shared, synchronized environment.

What Is Real-Time Collaboration?

Real-time collaboration (RTC) is a workstyle where multiple people work on the same task at the same time online, with changes visible almost immediately. Everyone stays in the loop, whether they’re engaged in heads-down creative work or discussing goals in a video call.

Consider a company building a fintech app. Their product team might message each other as they update their project tracker, while their sales and legal teams meet with an international client to draft an outline of their support and compliance requirements.

Real-Time vs. Asynchronous Collaboration

By definition, real-time collaboration is synchronous. Participants interact instantly, without waiting for responses or handoffs.

This contrasts with asynchronous collaboration, where work progresses over time through delayed communication and approvals. In practice, most teams use both, combining real-time collaboration with async workflows to support remote and hybrid work.

How Does Real-Time Collaboration Work?

As an online mode of work, RTC depends heavily on SaaS solutions. Companies might use a dedicated platform, multiple tools, or integrate supporting functionality into an internal app.

While the specifics vary, RTC is typically facilitated through a combination of the following shared elements:

• Cloud-based synchronization: All user activity (like document edits or file uploads) happens in the cloud, keeping data in sync across devices and locations.
• Low-latency infrastructure: A mix of hardware, software, and protocols keeps latency to a minimum, enabling the “real-time” aspect of RTC.
• Version control: This is a record of each update to a document or file with the author and time, so teams can review and revert to an older version when mistakes happen.
• Presence awareness: Visual indicators show a user’s current status, such as whether they’re online and available for an impromptu meeting or they’re out of the office.
• Shared workspace access: All users connect to the same workspace where their messages, files, and activity are stored for quick reference.
• Channels and threads: Organizations use channels and threads to organize their messages and files by project, topic, or department.
• Push and in-app notifications: If a user is online but looking at a different window, notifications alert them to a conversation they should hop into.
• Access control: The creator of a document or file can set its permissions so that internal team members can make edits and outsiders can have limited access.

Types of Real-Time Collaboration

RTC can be broken down into two main categories:

• Synchronous communication: One-on-ones, group meetings, brainstorming sessions, and other forms of discussion required to complete tasks.
• Cooperative work: Writing, editing, coding, designing, and all other labor that produces the actual product.

Like in-person collaboration, most RTC sessions will involve both, but this distinction matters because each function is likely to be handled by its own tool or platform component.

For example, text-based chat can happen:

• In a dedicated app
• On a larger, multi-purpose platform
• In a built-in window of a video call or project management tool
• Via integration with another app

Let’s look at each type and its associated software more closely.

Synchronous Communication

Real-Time Messaging

Chat is the base layer of most RTC solutions, giving team members a searchable and persistent place for conversations. Most apps will support file and image uploads, channels, threads, direct messages, voice notes, and other features that complement real-time workflows.

Real-time chat is usually built with WebSockets or XMPP to keep latency low and enable supporting live features, such as polls, unread counts, presence awareness, and typing indicators.

Calls/Huddles

Voice and video calls make RTC feel more like in-person work and allow for quicker conversations than messaging.

Common features relevant to synchronous collaboration include screen sharing, whiteboards, timers, breakout rooms, file and image uploads, transcriptions and captions, translations, call recording, and polls. In-app chat is often included, as well.

Most solutions use WebRTC with SFUs and SFU cascading for ultra-low-latency calls. They also typically support adaptive bitrate streaming to accommodate slower or less stable connections.

Cooperative Work

Co-Editing

Co‑editing lets multiple users edit the same documents and files simultaneously.

This could be a marketing department working on a new campaign in Google Docs, frontend developers building a UI in VS Code, or the design team creating assets in Figma.

In addition to file upload and storage, version control, live syncing, and presence awareness, other common features are comment threads, reactions, and visual indicators that show where other users are currently working.

Live Tracking

Dashboards, project trackers, and similar information displays are common across a variety of departments and industries.

They’re not inherently part of synchronous collaboration, but they can be in certain scenarios, such as:

• Project planning sessions, where team members actively create and update tasks and milestones
• Emergency responses, such as a cybersecurity department pulling data from a SIEM dashboard to address an ongoing incident

Like chat, both live tracking and co-editing are typically built with WebSockets.

Benefits of Synchronous Collaboration

Greater Flexibility for Working Hours and Locations

Distributed teams have a shared space they can jump into as needed, giving them more flexibility than purely in-office workplaces. Teammates can work outside of scheduled meetings by sending an invite to whoever’s listed online, regardless of their location.

Improved Alignment and Fewer Bottlenecks

With activity tracking and instant feedback, there’s no waiting for updates. When someone edits a task, adds a comment, or updates a file, everyone else sees it right away. This reduces delays caused by handoffs, missed messages, or outdated files. It also keeps clients up-to-date on project statuses.

Faster Issue Resolution and Crisis Response

Real-time communication and co-editing features allow you to put out fires faster.

If a new update introduces a major bug in your app, you can start a call and hop into the code editor with the rest of the engineering team to address it immediately, instead of waiting for them to see an email.

Better Productivity

Shared execution improves both speed and total output without increasing employee workload. When teams share a single document or codebase, it removes the rework caused by version conflicts.

Common Challenges and Solutions

Time Zone Gaps

RTC functions best when participants are online together, but this is unrealistic for global teams that have members and customers spread across time zones.

There are two ways to address time zone gaps:

• Set aside at least one time a week for global teams to meet. For instance, the US-based developers might hop on in their morning to meet with their European or African counterparts in their evening.
• Use the asynchronous features of your collaboration tools, like meeting transcripts or recordings.

Uneven Participation

In some workplaces, confident or more senior team members can accidentally take over discussions in video calls. Shyer or newer employees may have great ideas that get missed if they don’t feel like they’ve had the chance to jump into the conversation.

Tracking speaking time with an in-app stopwatch, using the handraise button, and encouraging the use of the chat window can grant some of your quieter coworkers more opportunities to share their insights.

Information Fatigue and Burnout

The always-in-sync nature of RTC can overload workers with a non-stop stream of notifications, especially for those who have them installed on their mobile devices.

This could lead to production slowdowns when important messages get lost amid less pressing ones or, worse, burnout for employees who feel pressured to always be at work.

Organizations can avoid this by encouraging workers to silence their notifications and to set their statuses to out of office when they’ve finished their hours or tasks for the day.

Technical Issues

RTC only works when your team’s devices and connections do. Spotty Wi-Fi and outdated hardware can lead to productivity loss.

The occasional frame drop or network outage won’t affect a business in most cases, but for situations where there is no room for error, you can minimize the chances of something happening by:

• Using wired Ethernet connections
• Keeping software up-to-date
• Supplying employees with hardware that meets or exceeds recommended requirements

Most Commonly Used Tools

Google Workspace

Google Workspace is an all-around collaboration platform for businesses. Its RTC-enabled offerings include:

• A shared workspace (Drive) with co-editing tools (Docs, Sheets, Slides, and Vids)
• Google Chat for messaging
• Google Meet for audio and video calls

It also comes with Gmail, Google Calendar, Gemini, and more.

Microsoft Teams

Microsoft Teams is another full suite of software that supports RTC, like web-based versions of its Office software, as well as both text-based and audio/video-based communication.

Other notable Teams features are its PBX-style calling support and Microsoft Copilot integrations.

Zoom Workplace

Zoom started as a primarily video-based collaboration tool, but it’s expanded into a broader collaborative platform with Zoom Workplace. It comes with comparable offerings to Google Workspace and Microsoft Teams, as well as thousands of third-party integrations.

Slack

Slack is known for being one of the best chat apps for businesses, but it also offers simplified video conferencing, project management, and file sharing features. Additionally, Slack integrates with many other popular business software, including Zoom.

Asana

Asana is a work management tool that focuses on planning and execution. Teams create tasks, assign owners, set dependencies, and track work across projects. It also supports goal tracking, automations for updating statuses, moving tasks, and sending alerts. It has a built-in messaging feature, but it requires integration with an app like Zoom or Teams for calling.

Trello

Trello is another project management tool that uses boards, lists, and cards to track work visually. It uses Kanban boards to show work moving through stages. Users have cards that hold checklists, attachments, comments, and due dates. Communication features are only available via integrations.

Miro

Miro is a visual collaboration platform used for brainstorming, planning, and workshops. Users can draw, write, vote, and build diagrams together at the same time with a built-in chat window. Conferencing and more robust messaging features require integration with other apps.

Frequently Asked Questions