
In April 2011, the top 100 IRC networks served more than half a million users at a time. IRC usage has been declining steadily since 2003, losing 60 percent of its users. Examples of programs used to connect include Mibbit, IRCCloud, KiwiIRC, and MIRC. Users connect, using a client which may be a web app, a standalone desktop program, or embedded into part of a larger program to an IRC server, which may be part of a larger IRC network.

The chat process works on a client–server networking model.

Internet Relay Chat is implemented as an application layer protocol to facilitate communication in the form of text. IRC is designed for group communication in discussion forums, called channels, but also allows one-on-one communication via private messages as well as chat and data transfer, including file sharing. Internet Relay Chat ( IRC) is a text-based chat system for instant messaging.

The first IRC server,, a Sun-3 server on display near the University of Oulu computer centre
