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  • What are some of the alternatives to XenForo?

    Kaustubh Katdare

    Kaustubh Katdare

    @kaustubh
    Updated: Nov 10, 2025
    Views: 2.2K

    XenForo is a dominant player in the world of community platforms. I’d like to know about the latest forum and community platforms in the market that are alternative to XenForo?

    I’ll start:

    1. Flarum: I like it a lot. It’s got a nice interface and the UI doesn’t add any cognitive load. It’s smooth and fast. The biggest advantage is that it’s open sourced and you can run it on your own servers.

    2. Discourse: Discourse is open sourced too; and a worthy XenForo alternative. I however don’t like their UI - it has not been updated since ages. But a good software in general.

    3. Simple Machines Forum: This has been under existence for a long time; and I don’t know if it’s still under active development. A lot of large forums in the past were hosted on SMF.

    Would love to know from you.

    5
    Replies
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  • Rahul Roy

    @rahulroy • 11mos

    Why did you not mention Jatra as an alternative to XenForo? I think you used to run XenForo in the past. Flarum is good in general; but the moment you install it on a server - it becomes problematic. I have been following their development for the last 2 years. Original developer of Flarum started his own forum software. Anyway, I'll continue the list.

    1. phpBB: You forgot the OG of the forum software. It still powers good amount of forums. But it's lost its charm.
    2. vBulletin: Lost its charm after the original developers left it to build XenForo. I think vBulletin had a great future; but I lost interest in it after seeing sluggish progress on vB5.
    3. Vanilla Forums: They are open source, but controlled by Higher Logic. HL has its own software and I don't think they are focused on building Vanilla. A good software; but lost to corporate wars.
    4. Commune: I think they are looking at AI to power their communities. But the reason I love communities is that it still has real humans.

  • Steve Miller

    @1SciMAi • 11mos

    I'll contribute to the list. I'll pick a few I've personally used to run community forums.

    1. NodeBB: Built when NodeJS was gaining popularity among the PHP-powered forums. Requires lot of customization to run community.
    2. MyBB: An old open source forum software. Good software, but dated compared to modern community platforms.
    3. BuddPress: I got my hands on BuddyPress back in 2011. It offered lot of Facebook-like functionality. I'd not call it a community platform; but a social-network tied to the WordPress ecosystem.
    4. Invision Community: They are a premium forum software that combined forums, blogs and e-commerce. Were pretty ahead of their times; but I personally never liked their UI.
    5. FluxBB: My favorite - and lightweight. But limited features-set. Ideal for small communities.
    6. Tiki: Briefly used it for a project I was working on, but gave up. I liked their Gallery feature.

    Community forums have evolved. I think there are other platforms like Circle and Mightly Networks that are good alternatives to XenForo. Jatra - of course is my most favorite among all. I think Jatra will take over the world of communities.

  • Monica Beckwith

    @moni • 2w

    I have been researching on Xenforo alternatives for nearly 3 months. I've reviewed at least 60% of the forum software in the list shared above - Discourse, Flarum, vBulletin, phpBB, NodeBB, Buddypress - you name it. The reality is that these alternatives have not evolved to cater modern communities. I have come to a conclusion that Jatra is the best alternative to Xenforo.

    I really like Jatra's approach to forum software. It's only after a call with Kaustubh (founder of Jatra) that I realised how they approach community building. On Jatra, you can host discussions, articles, jobs, feedback, quizzes through custom post types. Everything is optimized for SEO. In addition, I like their approach to UI and the UX. They have a central feed that shows latest activity, and you can visit category index for specific content type.

    If anyone is looking for a forum software or switch from XenForo - Jatra stands out:

    1. SEO-first approach: They add structured data to all post types. This helps search engines understand the content.
    2. For Businesses: It's versatile enough to host large business communities as well as hobby forums.
    3. No plugins: I first thought this would be a disadvantage. However, managing plugins and compatibility is a headache. Jatra solves this by offering native support to all post types.
    4. White label: You can own the community, have 100% control over user data and reap the benefits of SEO by hosting it on your own domain or subdomain.

    Xenforo was a fresh attempt at forum software in 2010. Communities are now the new content hubs. These are new customer spaces where businesses and customers can have a dialogue. Jatra is arguably the best forum software out there right now.

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