7554156abe
The system determines a user’s active account by checking the
`active_at` field in the `account_users` table and selecting the most
recently active account:
```ruby
def active_account_user
account_users.order(active_at: :desc)&.first
end
```
This works fine when all accounts have a valid active_at timestamp.
**Problem**
When a user is added to a new account, the `active_at` value is NULL
(because the account has never been explicitly activated). Ordering by
active_at DESC produces inconsistent results across databases, since
handling of NULL values differs (sometimes treated as high, sometimes
low).
As a result:
- Mobile apps (critical impact): `/profile` returns the wrong account.
The UI keeps showing the old account even after switching, and
restarting does not fix it.
- Web app (accidentally works): Appears correct because the active
account is inferred from the browser URL, but the backend API is still
wrong.
**Root Cause**
- The ordering logic did not account for NULL `active_at`.
- New accounts without active_at sometimes get incorrectly prioritized
as the “active” account.
**Solution**
Explicitly ensure that accounts with NULL active_at are sorted after
accounts with real timestamps by using NULLS LAST:
```ruby
def active_account_user
account_users.order(Arel.sql('active_at DESC NULLS LAST, id DESC'))&.first
end
```
- Accounts with actual `active_at` values will always be prioritized.
- New accounts (with NULL active_at) will be placed at the bottom until
the user explicitly activates them.
- Adding id DESC as a secondary ordering ensures consistent tie-breaking
when multiple accounts have the same `active_at`.
Chatwoot
The modern customer support platform, an open-source alternative to Intercom, Zendesk, Salesforce Service Cloud etc.
Chatwoot is the modern, open-source, and self-hosted customer support platform designed to help businesses deliver exceptional customer support experience. Built for scale and flexibility, Chatwoot gives you full control over your customer data while providing powerful tools to manage conversations across channels.
✨ Captain – AI Agent for Support
Supercharge your support with Captain, Chatwoot’s AI agent. Captain helps automate responses, handle common queries, and reduce agent workload—ensuring customers get instant, accurate answers. With Captain, your team can focus on complex conversations while routine questions are resolved automatically. Read more about Captain here.
💬 Omnichannel Support Desk
Chatwoot centralizes all customer conversations into one powerful inbox, no matter where your customers reach out from. It supports live chat on your website, email, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, WhatsApp, Telegram, Line, SMS etc.
📚 Help center portal
Publish help articles, FAQs, and guides through the built-in Help Center Portal. Enable customers to find answers on their own, reduce repetitive queries, and keep your support team focused on more complex issues.
🗂️ Other features
Collaboration & Productivity
- Private Notes and @mentions for internal team discussions.
- Labels to organize and categorize conversations.
- Keyboard Shortcuts and a Command Bar for quick navigation.
- Canned Responses to reply faster to frequently asked questions.
- Auto-Assignment to route conversations based on agent availability.
- Multi-lingual Support to serve customers in multiple languages.
- Custom Views and Filters for better inbox organization.
- Business Hours and Auto-Responders to manage response expectations.
- Teams and Automation tools for scaling support workflows.
- Agent Capacity Management to balance workload across the team.
Customer Data & Segmentation
- Contact Management with profiles and interaction history.
- Contact Segments and Notes for targeted communication.
- Campaigns to proactively engage customers.
- Custom Attributes for storing additional customer data.
- Pre-Chat Forms to collect user information before starting conversations.
Integrations
- Slack Integration to manage conversations directly from Slack.
- Dialogflow Integration for chatbot automation.
- Dashboard Apps to embed internal tools within Chatwoot.
- Shopify Integration to view and manage customer orders right within Chatwoot.
- Use Google Translate to translate messages from your customers in realtime.
- Create and manage Linear tickets within Chatwoot.
Reports & Insights
- Live View of ongoing conversations for real-time monitoring.
- Conversation, Agent, Inbox, Label, and Team Reports for operational visibility.
- CSAT Reports to measure customer satisfaction.
- Downloadable Reports for offline analysis and reporting.
Documentation
Detailed documentation is available at chatwoot.com/help-center.
Translation process
The translation process for Chatwoot web and mobile app is managed at https://translate.chatwoot.com using Crowdin. Please read the translation guide for contributing to Chatwoot.
Branching model
We use the git-flow branching model. The base branch is develop.
If you are looking for a stable version, please use the master or tags labelled as v1.x.x.
Deployment
Heroku one-click deploy
Deploying Chatwoot to Heroku is a breeze. It's as simple as clicking this button:
Follow this link to understand setting the correct environment variables for the app to work with all the features. There might be breakages if you do not set the relevant environment variables.
DigitalOcean 1-Click Kubernetes deployment
Chatwoot now supports 1-Click deployment to DigitalOcean as a kubernetes app.
Other deployment options
For other supported options, checkout our deployment page.
Security
Looking to report a vulnerability? Please refer our SECURITY.md file.
Community
If you need help or just want to hang out, come, say hi on our Discord server.
Contributors
Thanks goes to all these wonderful people:
Chatwoot © 2017-2025, Chatwoot Inc - Released under the MIT License.