Paid forum software

Abhi

People think that when it is costly, it got quality too. Is that the same for forum software too ? Are the paid forum software better than those available for free ?

admin

Not always. But at this point, considering the development progress of free software, some paid software definitely have an edge. There was a time when vB had serious competitors among free forums.

phenomlab

admin it really depends on what you are looking for in a forum. Most of them offer the base package for free, but anything outside of that typically uncovered having to purchase add ons.

admin

phenomlab Open source projects, most of them are free in all aspects. But somehow it cease to work, Discourse is the only exception.

I saw today that bbPress is WordPress official addon. But it is still very light.

Abhi

As long as it works, I am ok no matter it is paid or free.

But some software are too old that they do not have updated SEO. If a software is more than 2 years old, it is sure to have lacking what the most latest SEO practices say.

phenomlab

admin bbpress is very dated by today's standards. Very much like BuddyPress still is despite a so called major upgrade.

Jason

Paid software has many benefits over open source projects. SEO, Like, Notification, mentions, responsive theme etc...but open source projects most of them are addons and plugins. SEO is very bad in these projects. I am using MyBB and it has zero SEO and all the basic features are plugins. If i get some money i might go for some paid software but it won't be an immediate one.

Abhi

WordPress has the resources to fix them. Why they are not doing it ?

phenomlab

Abhi WordPress has the resources to fix them. Why they are not doing it ?

There are far too many developers already angling for a slice of this market. Interestingly, the WordPress forums are all based on BBPress, but BuddyPress is an awful plugin and extremely dated. Even the launch of the Nouveau interface hasn't been very well received, and the software is still a complete mess.

If you look at what others are doing in the same space, such as wpForo, they have a by far superior design.

admin

If Flarum comes to stable, it will take away a lot of business from those paid software.

phenomlab

admin If Flarum comes to stable

I think that's more of a case of "when". There is significant impetus and momentum to drive this project forward now with the addition of more developers plus the features that one new dev from GifGaff has brought in.

Abhi

A lot of people would want to migrate. If someone know how to, that will be a big money spinner at that time.

admin

Beta 12 is schedule for early March. Do you know of any other prominent paid forum software ?

Abhi

Nothing much. XF, IPB, Woltlab. There are many other small names. Some are very costly because they are managed services.

admin

Abhi because they are managed services.

They are nothing but scammers trying to loot your money. Not all, but most of them are.

I have not come across a single cloud based managed forum software as service so far. I mean other than the main stream software. IPB, NodeBB, Discourse, all of them offers managed cloud hosting.

Jason

For the price, Woltlab is good and i suggested this to users with a tight budget. But do keep in mind themes are limited (not much as we see in Xenforo and IPB)

phenomlab

Jason looking at Woltlab it seems over priced to me for what's on offer. There's nothing really that makes this outstanding. It looks like a modern version of bbPress.

Jason

phenomlab Is it, i used Woltlab for a while and i liked it. Yes it doesn't have the bells and whistles like Xenforo and IPB but it does a good job.