Pidgin's interface is somewhat minimal compared with many proprietary chat clients. Although there are proprietary multiprotocol instant message clients, such as Trillian, Pidgin's open-source development paradigm means that not only is it available without cost, but its code is freely accessible and extensible, and it has an active developer network. Multiprotocol instant message clients such as Pidgin are not inherently associated with any individual system, and so they are free to consolidate multiple protocols and features into one application. This tends to discourage interoperability with alternative systems. Proprietary instant messaging systems are materially invested in their own protocols and clients. What this means in practical terms is that a Pidgin user can seamlessly exchange instant messages with others who use the AOL, Microsoft, Yahoo!, or Apple chat clients (as well as many others). Pidgin is an instant message (online chat) client that works with many different protocols simultaneously, which eliminates the need to run multiple proprietary clients.

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