Vanilla Forums vs Discourse

Struggling to choose between Vanilla Forums and Discourse? Both products offer unique advantages, making it a tough decision.

Vanilla Forums is a Social & Communications solution with tags like open-source, forum-software, community-forum, customizable, plugins, themes.

It boasts features such as Open source, Highly customizable, Plugins and themes, User management, Forum management, Conversations, Notifications and pros including Free and open source, Active community support, Highly extensible and customizable, Feature rich out of the box, Good documentation, Multi-lingual support.

On the other hand, Discourse is a Social & Communications product tagged with opensource, discussion, communities, organizations, conversations, teams, categories, tags, private-messages, notifications.

Its standout features include Topic-focused discussions, Real-time notifications, Private messaging, User roles and permissions, Mobile app, Categories and tags, Search, Moderation tools, Custom theming, Plugins and integrations, and it shines with pros like Open source and self-hosted, Active development community, Feature rich out of the box, Good performance at scale, Extensive theming and branding options, Robust moderation and admin tools.

To help you make an informed decision, we've compiled a comprehensive comparison of these two products, delving into their features, pros, cons, pricing, and more. Get ready to explore the nuances that set them apart and determine which one is the perfect fit for your requirements.

Vanilla Forums

Vanilla Forums

Vanilla Forums is an open source forum software that allows you to set up and run a full-featured community forum. It is highly customizable with plugins and themes.

Categories:
open-source forum-software community-forum customizable plugins themes

Vanilla Forums Features

  1. Open source
  2. Highly customizable
  3. Plugins and themes
  4. User management
  5. Forum management
  6. Conversations
  7. Notifications

Pricing

  • Open Source
  • Free

Pros

Free and open source

Active community support

Highly extensible and customizable

Feature rich out of the box

Good documentation

Multi-lingual support

Cons

Steep learning curve

Requires technical expertise to set up and manage

Limited native mobile support

Not as user friendly as proprietary options


Discourse

Discourse

Discourse is an open-source discussion platform built for modern communities and organizations. It enables fluid conversations across teams with features like categories, tags, private messages, and real-time notifications.

Categories:
opensource discussion communities organizations conversations teams categories tags private-messages notifications

Discourse Features

  1. Topic-focused discussions
  2. Real-time notifications
  3. Private messaging
  4. User roles and permissions
  5. Mobile app
  6. Categories and tags
  7. Search
  8. Moderation tools
  9. Custom theming
  10. Plugins and integrations

Pricing

  • Open Source

Pros

Open source and self-hosted

Active development community

Feature rich out of the box

Good performance at scale

Extensive theming and branding options

Robust moderation and admin tools

Cons

Can be resource intensive to self-host

Steeper learning curve than some forums

Limitations with native mobile apps

Less flexible than custom developed solutions