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LOLYO alternative

Updated June 2026 · by tchop

The LOLYO alternative for teams that ship

LOLYO is an Austrian social intranet: bookable online, cancellable monthly, with a points system that rewards employees for taking part. tchop trades that for your own name in the app store and audiences beyond the payroll.

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White-label native appEU-sovereign hostingGDPR by defaultLive in 8–12 weeks

Choose LOLYO if

You have fewer than 500 employees, want to start this week, and need a published price a managing director can approve without a quote. The participation points are the reason you are buying, and your logo inside the vendor's app is enough.

Recommended

Choose tchop if

The app has to carry your organisation's name in the store with no upgrade tier attached. Members, alumni or subscribers belong on the same platform as employees. Editorial structure matters more to you than gamification.

tchop is a white-label, mobile-first internal-communication and community platform, and a LOLYO alternative for mid-market teams that need to reach every employee, including the deskless.

How to choose an employee communication app

Five questions decide whether a communication app ships and gets opened, or stalls in procurement. Answer them before you compare vendors, because they rule most of the market in or out on their own.

Does it reach people with no work email?

Eurostat put employees with internet access for business purposes at 64.63 % across the EU in 2025, and at 46.34 % in food and beverage manufacturing. If your workforce is in that gap, the app has to work on a personal phone.

Whose name is on the app in the store?

A branded native app gets installed more often than a vendor app with your logo inside it. Check whether white label is the default or belongs to a higher price tier.

Will it still be opened in week eight?

Installation is not the problem. The second month is. Ask for the activation rate at 90 days and ask what holds it: editorial work, push, points, or all three.

What will the works council ask?

In Germany a system that scores activity can measure performance, which brings it inside the works council's co-determination right. That is an agenda item, not a blocker.

How long does the contract tie you in?

Monthly cancellation lowers the cost of a wrong choice. An annual contract lowers the price. Decide deliberately which of the two you need.

Feature comparison

The rows compare what decides this purchase: whose name is on the app, who can be reached, how content is structured, the participation mechanic, the AI, where the data sits, the contract commitment and the size band each product is built for. LOLYO cells reproduce its public product and pricing pages as they stood on 21 September 2026.

Feature comparison: LOLYO and tchop
Feature	LOLYO	tchop
Category	Mobile social intranet for phone and PC, 30 plus features from the start	White-label communication platform, mid-market to enterprise
Vendor	cycoders GmbH, Parkring 2, 8074 Raaba, Austria	tchop GmbH, independent, German vendor
Own app in the store	From LOLYO plus: own app icon, own app name. Listed as an option on the base tier	Every project: own name, own icon, own store listing
Branding on the base tier	Upload a logo and set colours in the design tool	No base tier without your own app
Participation mechanic	MITMACH-Booster: virtual points for active participation	No points system. Participation through channels, comments and surveys
Internal and external audiences	Employees. External audiences are not a marketed use case	Employees plus members, alumni, retirees, subscribers
Content structure	Newsfeed, chat, pinboard, library, forms, custom pages	Channels, mixes, editorial approval flow, branded web front door
AI	Aisha as AI assistant and Helpert as AI chatbot. LOLYO plus KI from 1.19 EUR	AI agents included: drafting, summaries, segmentation, workflows
Single sign-on	Entra ID and Google ID listed as an option	Included. Azure AD, Okta and standard identity providers
Hosting and processing	Azure in ISO certified data centres in Germany, DPA, Cybertrust Austria Platinum label	All servers in Germany, DPA and TOMs, EU-sovereign hosting option. ISO 27001 certified by TUV Sud, October 2025
Works council material	None published	System description on request. No model works agreement
Contract commitment	Cancellable monthly, online, to the end of the month	Annual contract
Size band	Base tier for organisations up to 500 employees, LOLYO plus above that	500 to 10,000 employees
Time to launch	Bookable online, ready immediately	8 to 12 weeks to a branded app with content structure

Pricing comparison

LOLYO publishes its prices openly, which is rare in this market. On 21 September 2026 lolyo.de/preise listed three tiers with real figures. tchop has no pricing page; it publishes ranges by segment, and tchop.io/pricing resolves to a contact form. The two price on different units, so read the model as well as the number.

Pricing comparison: LOLYO and tchop
Pricing	LOLYO	tchop
Entry point	LOLYO: 2.10 EUR per user a month plus a 109 EUR monthly base fee	No self-service. Setup from 2,000 EUR
Next tier	LOLYO plus: from 0.99 EUR per user a month plus 4,990 EUR one-off setup	Licence 999 to 1,499 EUR a month
With AI	LOLYO plus KI: from 1.19 EUR per user a month plus 4,990 EUR one-off setup	AI agents included in the licence at no extra cost
Free trial	60 days. After that the free subscription converts automatically into a paid one	No self-serve trial. Demo with your brand on request
What the price covers	30 plus features in one licence. Branded app, SSO, e-mailbox, Learning and on-premise are listed as options	Native app, web front door, editorial tools, AI agents, EU hosting
Contract commitment	Cancellable monthly, online, no cancellation fee	Annual contract

The LOLYO figures are the vendor's list prices. The tchop figures are published ranges, not a quote. A head price plus a base fee and a setup fee plus a licence only compare over a three-year total.

Where tchop wins

Four differences decide most deals above 500 employees. Each is built into how tchop works, not negotiated into a contract.

The branded app is the standard deliverable.

Every tchop project ships as a native iOS and Android build published under the customer's own developer account, with their name, icon and store listing. There is no tier below that and no setup fee attached to it.

Internal and external on one platform.

The same platform carries employees, members, alumni and subscribers. An organisation running a community alongside a workforce otherwise buys two systems and signs two contracts.

Editorial structure, not a scoreboard.

Channels, mixes and approval flows keep an app worth opening after the novelty fades. AI agents take on drafting, summaries and segmentation so two people can run it.

All servers in Germany.

tchop runs on infrastructure in Germany, with an EU-sovereign hosting option, a data processing agreement and technical and organisational measures on request. The information security management system was certified to ISO 27001 by TUV Sud in October 2025.

What does LOLYO do well?

The price is on the page and the commitment is short.

2.10 EUR per person a month plus a 109 EUR base fee, bookable online, 60 days to try it. LOLYO's FAQ says there are no restrictive contracts and no hidden costs, and that the licence can be cancelled online in one click to the end of the month. Almost nobody else in this market combines a list price with a monthly commitment, tchop included.

The MITMACH-Booster addresses the failure mode everyone else ignores.

Employees earn virtual points for taking part. Anyone who has launched an employee app knows the real risk is not installation, it is the app being installed and never opened. LOLYO builds an answer to that into the product rather than leaving it to the editorial team.

All features in one licence.

LOLYO's FAQ says that apart from the add-ons you get all current and future features in one licence. Newsfeed, chat, pinboard, library, forms, events, custom pages, a contact directory and an employee referral programme are there from day one.

Data protection is evidenced, not asserted.

Azure hosting in ISO certified data centres in Germany, a data processing agreement, two-factor authentication, and the Cybertrust Austria seal at Platinum level. Sophie Degenfeld of F/LIST GmbH says on LOLYO's security page: "Es war uns sehr wichtig, eine Mitarbeiter-App zu wählen, die unseren Anforderungen an Datenschutz und Datensicherheit gerecht wird. Bei LOLYO sind wir fündig geworden."

Where does LOLYO fall short for brand-led organisations?

Your own app in the store costs the next tier.

On the base tier you upload a logo and set colours in a design tool. Own app icon and own app name belong to LOLYO plus according to the pricing page, and that starts at 4,990 EUR one-off setup. If your own brand in the store is a requirement, 2.10 EUR is not the number you are budgeting.

The base tier is aimed at organisations up to 500 people.

LOLYO explicitly recommends LOLYO plus from 500 employees upwards. For a 2,000-person employer the cheap entry price is not the price under discussion.

Branded app, SSO, on-premise and multi-tenancy sit under options.

The pricing page lists them separately from the 30 plus included features. "Everything included" has a boundary, and it runs exactly where the IT department and the brand owner have their requirements.

The free trial converts by itself.

LOLYO's FAQ says the free subscription converts automatically into a paid one after the 60 days are up. It is clearly announced and it still puts a deadline on an evaluation, which procurement should know about.

There is no works council material.

LOLYO publishes no dedicated page, template or legal assessment for the introduction of the app. Other DACH vendors do. tchop does not either, and in both cases that costs preparation time in Germany.

Where these numbers come from

Roughly a third of employees have no work internet access. Eurostat's 2025 figures put Austrian manufacturing at 65.99 %, Austrian construction at 59.04 % and Austrian accommodation and food service at 57.91 %. Germany across all covered activities is 68.4 % and the EU average 64.63 %.
Eurostat, Dataset isoc_ci_cm_pn2, 2025 data, 2026
In food production, fewer than half are reachable. The same dataset puts EU food, beverage and tobacco manufacturing at 46.34 % for 2025 and the German figure at 39.15 %.
Eurostat, Dataset isoc_ci_cm_pn2, 2025 data, 2026
Gallup's State of the Global Workplace: 2026 Report says that "global employee engagement fell to 20% in 2025, its lowest level since 2020, costing the world economy an estimated $10 trillion in lost productivity", down from a 2022 peak of 23 %. The study covers 263,810 respondents surveyed from January to December 2025.
Gallup, State of the Global Workplace: 2026 Report, 2026
A points system that measures activity belongs in the works council conversation. German works councils co-determine the "Einführung und Anwendung von technischen Einrichtungen, die dazu bestimmt sind, das Verhalten oder die Leistung der Arbeitnehmer zu überwachen": the roll-out and use of systems that can track how staff behave or perform.
Bundesamt für Justiz, gesetze-im-internet.de, Works Constitution Act, section 87, 2026
A processor contract is required, in writing. Article 28(3) of the GDPR says that processing by a processor "shall be governed by a contract or other legal act under Union or Member State law".
GDPR, Article 28, General Data Protection Regulation, 2016

Frequently asked questions

How much does LOLYO cost?

2.10 EUR per person a month plus a 109 EUR monthly base fee on the base tier. LOLYO plus starts at 0.99 EUR per person a month plus 4,990 EUR one-off setup, and LOLYO plus KI at 1.19 EUR plus the same setup. There is a 60-day free trial. Checked on 21 September 2026.

What does tchop cost by comparison?

The published internal communications ranges: setup 2,000 to 20,000 EUR, monthly licence 999 to 1,499 EUR, plus 0.50 to 2 EUR per user a month. At 300 employees LOLYO is cheaper. At 3,000 employees with your own app in the store the comparison shifts, because that is LOLYO plus with a setup fee attached.

Is LOLYO an Austrian or a German product?

The vendor is cycoders GmbH in Raaba, Austria, and the product is sold in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, France, Italy and internationally. Data is stored via Azure in ISO certified data centres in Germany, according to LOLYO's own security page.

Does tchop have anything like the MITMACH-Booster?

No. tchop has no points or rewards mechanic. Participation comes from channels, comments, surveys and push, and from AI agents keeping the feed worth opening. If a points system is the reason you are buying, LOLYO is the better answer.

Does the introduction need a works agreement?

In Germany, usually yes, and with LOLYO it deserves particular attention. A system that scores activity can measure performance, which is exactly what section 87 of the Works Constitution Act covers. That is an agenda item, not a blocker.

Can we move content out of LOLYO?

Documents, user lists, groups and contact profiles can be exported and rebuilt. Chat histories and points balances cannot. Budget two weeks of parallel running so nobody is left without information mid-move.