Ayttm (pronounced "item" or "A-Y-T-T-M") is a multi-protocol instant messaging client. It is the heir of the EveryBuddy project.

Ayttm primarily supports one-to-one and group chatting on MSN, Yahoo!, ICQ, AIM, XMPP and IRC. It also has support for sending rudimentary emails via SMTP, which may be used to send SMS via email to SMS gateways. Ayttm also supports webcams on Yahoo! Messenger, and voice chatting over MSN using Ekiga (formerly GnomeMeeting).

Service summary:

When contacts belonging to the same person - but in different protocols - are grouped together, Ayttm can automatically continue the conversation using another protocol, when the original protocol connection fails. It is known as fallback messaging to its developers.

When a contact is tied to a particular language, messages can be automatically translated using Babelfish. As with most electronic translators, its accuracy can be dubious.

Aycryption is a filter that facilitates encrypted chat using GPG keys. All outgoing text is encrypted using the remote contact's public key, and incoming encrypted text is decrypted using the local private key.

Ayttm's plugin architecture makes it possible for new protocol support to be added without modifying the core application. Plugins must be compiled against a version of the core and will only work with core versions that are binary-compatible with the core version that the plugin was built against.

Five types of plugins are supported: