Software Alternatives, Accelerators & Startups

Discourse VS thinkific

Compare Discourse VS thinkific and see what are their differences

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Discourse logo Discourse

Discourse is an open source discussion platform built for the next decade of the Internet.

thinkific logo thinkific

Create online courses and membership sites with Thinkific and feel confident that you’ve got the easiest technology and the best support in the industry.
  • Discourse Landing page
    Landing page //
    2023-06-13
  • thinkific Landing page
    Landing page //
    2022-12-14

Discourse features and specs

  • Modern Interface
    Discourse provides a clean, intuitive, and responsive user interface that works well on both desktops and mobile devices.
  • Open Source
    Discourse is open source software, allowing for customization, self-hosting, and community contributions, which can reduce costs and increase flexibility.
  • Rich Features
    The platform includes a variety of built-in features such as threaded replies, real-time notifications, and community moderation tools.
  • Scalability
    Discourse is designed to handle small communities as well as large, active forums, making it suitable for a variety of use cases.
  • Security
    Regular updates and a dedicated security team help keep the software secure against vulnerabilities.
  • Integration and APIs
    Discourse offers extensive APIs and integrates well with various other services and plugins, facilitating seamless extensions and automation.

Possible disadvantages of Discourse

  • Resource Intensive
    Discourse can be resource-heavy, which may require significant server capacity and maintenance, especially for large communities.
  • Hosting Costs
    While you can self-host Discourse, the server and maintenance costs can be high. Managed hosting plans provided by Discourse can also be expensive.
  • Complex Setup
    Installing and configuring Discourse can be complex, particularly for those without technical expertise in server management and Ruby on Rails.
  • Learning Curve
    Users and administrators might face a steeper learning curve compared to more traditional forum software due to its modern interface and extensive features.
  • Limited Built-in Themes
    The default theme options are somewhat limited, and extensive customization requires knowledge of front-end development.
  • Dependency on PostgreSQL and Redis
    Discourse relies on PostgreSQL for its database and Redis for caching, which might complicate setup and maintenance compared to solutions that use simpler database architectures.

thinkific features and specs

  • User-Friendly Interface
    Thinkific offers an intuitive and easy-to-navigate interface which makes it simple for users to create and manage online courses without needing extensive technical knowledge.
  • Customizable Course Sites
    It provides a range of customization options for course creators, allowing them to personalize their websites to match their brand and aesthetics.
  • No Transaction Fees
    Thinkific does not charge transaction fees on course sales, which means creators keep more of their revenue compared to some other platforms.
  • Comprehensive Support
    Users have access to detailed documentation, customer support, and a community forum, which can be quite helpful in troubleshooting and optimizing their course offerings.
  • Integrated Marketing Tools
    Thinkific includes a range of marketing features such as email marketing, affiliate marketing, and coupons to help users promote their courses effectively.
  • Built-in Analytics
    The platform offers robust analytics and reporting tools that enable course creators to track student progress, engagement, and overall performance.

Possible disadvantages of thinkific

  • Pricing
    Thinkific's pricing can be relatively high for smaller creators or those just starting out, especially if they want to access more advanced features available only on higher-tier plans.
  • Limited Course Compliance Features
    While Thinkific is a strong platform overall, it lacks certain compliance features such as certifications and accreditations, which might be important for certain types of educational content.
  • Dependence on Third-Party Integrations
    Some critical features, such as email marketing automation and advanced analytics, require integrations with third-party services, leading to potential additional costs and complexity.
  • No Native Mobile App
    Thinkific does not offer native mobile apps for course creators or students, which can limit accessibility and user experience for those who prefer mobile learning.
  • Learning Curve for Advanced Features
    While the basic functionalities are user-friendly, leveraging some of the more advanced features may require a steeper learning curve, particularly for less tech-savvy users.
  • Customization Limitations
    Despite offering customization options, some users may find the templates and design capabilities somewhat restrictive compared to fully bespoke web development.

Discourse videos

Why We Chose The Discourse Platform For Our Forums

More videos:

  • Review - Why Discourse is the Best Forum Software Out There (No, Really) | Location Rebel
  • Review - A Grammar Review for Discourse Analysis

thinkific videos

Thinkific Review - A Complete In-Depth Video Review

More videos:

  • Review - Thinkific vs Teachable: Which is Course Builder is Better?
  • Review - Thinkific Review

Category Popularity

0-100% (relative to Discourse and thinkific)
Forums And Forum Software
Education
0 0%
100% 100
Forums
100 100%
0% 0
Online Courses
0 0%
100% 100

User comments

Share your experience with using Discourse and thinkific. For example, how are they different and which one is better?
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Reviews

These are some of the external sources and on-site user reviews we've used to compare Discourse and thinkific

Discourse Reviews

20 Telegram Alternatives to Chat With in 2024
Discourse is a basic forum function that could be an alternative to Telegram if you want to stick to text discussions. It's pretty analog, missing both video and livestreaming tools. Instead, Discourse is a basic community that lets you organize discussions--it feels a bit like having your own reddit or Quora.
18 Best Discord Alternatives 2020 | Expert Reviews
Discourse comes in a couple of flavours. You can self-host it yourself in which case the software is free, and you simply need to sign up for server space, or you can pay Discourse for a hosted-for-you option, though self-hosting is a lot cheaper the premium option takes care of the technical side.
IndieHackers: Best forum software
I used Flarum when trying to get a community set up for my product (ended up abandoning it to revisit when we have a larger customer base). It worked fairly well and I enjoyed it but it's definitely beta and unless you're fairly tech savvy it's not quite worth the setup / maintenance. Lots of config changes, crashes, huge issues with plugins, and some features missing. I'd...

thinkific Reviews

9 Teachable Alternatives in 2024 Ranked
However, the right platform depends on your needs and goals. If you need a more affordable Teachable alternative, Podia or Thinkific should fit the bill quite nicely. If you are eyeing free Teachable alternatives, Thinkific’s free plan and Podia are good options. But for increased functionality and flexibility top your list of priorities, Teach is the best option to consider.
Source: teach.io
8 best Teachable alternatives for course creators (Features & pricing)
Like Teachable, Thinkific is designed for course creators. You can sell live lessons, pre-recorded videos, self-paced courses, and cohort programs. Thinkific also offers course completion certificates, assessments and assignments, and lesson prerequisites. You can even use Thinkific to build a storefront or website for your courses.
Source: www.podia.com
The Top Free and Paid Teachable Alternatives For Creators
Thinkific doesn’t have a free plan, but it offers a 14-day free trial across all plans except Plus. Paid plans start at $36/month (billed annually) and go up to $374/month depending on the tier. Check out Thinkific’s pricing page to see what you get with each plan.
14 Best Free and Paid Coursera Alternatives For Creators (2024)
Try Thinkific for yourself!Accomplish your course creation and student success goals faster with Thinkific. Please enter a valid email
Top 11 Thinkific Alternatives for Online course Creators in 2023
Lessonly is one of the best Thinkific Alternatives. Lessonly meets all the needs of their respective business better than Thinkific. When comparing the quality of ongoing product support better, you need to select Lessonly rather than Thinkific. For any feature updates and roadmaps, chose the direction of Lessonly over Thinkific. its user interface is simple and easy to...

Social recommendations and mentions

Based on our record, Discourse should be more popular than thinkific. It has been mentiond 23 times since March 2021. We are tracking product recommendations and mentions on various public social media platforms and blogs. They can help you identify which product is more popular and what people think of it.

Discourse mentions (23)

  • Qilin: A Starter Project Template For Every Open Source Project
    GitHub Discussions can also be a great place for support as long as these are regularly monitored. Another option along the same lines is Discourse and the Open Source Matrix which is used by quite a few Open Source and community-based projects. - Source: dev.to / about 1 year ago
  • Ask HN: How to run an old-school mailing list?
    A lot of communities use [Discourse ](https://discourse.org). [LPSF](https://forum lpsf.org) migrated to it when Yahoo Groups was discontinued. Some of the advantages are that it's open source, self-hostable, and can be configured to work as both a traditional mailing list and modern forum. - Source: Hacker News / about 1 year ago
  • My Fediverse use – I'm hosting everything myself – PeerTube, Mastodon and Lemmy
    More like https://discourse.org/. You can run it yourself, but I can also just have them ding a credit card every month and not think about it again (I do this for a community). - Source: Hacker News / over 1 year ago
  • Reddit faces content quality concerns after its Great Mod Purge
    Discourse perhaps? I've seen it in use in a few places; it has a modern look and feel to it at least. https://discourse.org/. - Source: Hacker News / over 1 year ago
  • So Long, Twitter and Reddit
    I fully agree with you see my comment here[0] -- I think you may have misread my comment, it says "Discourse" (as in the forum software[1]), not Discord. [0]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37245220. - Source: Hacker News / over 1 year ago
View more

thinkific mentions (5)

  • Migrate from Thinkific to WordPress. #1 Planning and data preparation
    In this series of 5 articles, I propose to write about how I migrated from the e-learning platform Thinkific to WordPress, how I exported the data from Thinkific, what technologies I used, how WordPress Command Line Interface (WP-CLI) helped me, and how I made other minor changes to templates or using WordPress API hooks. Below, I leave you the list of articles in the series:. - Source: dev.to / 2 months ago
  • Free Introduction To OSINT Course from My OSINT Training
    I recommend using VPNs for OSINT to increase your privacy, project your presence, and to increase your anonymity. Unfortunately, the platform my courses are hosted on, thinkific.com, may restrict access to their site when you use a VPN. I have no control over this but I think we both can understand why they might do this as our reasons for using VPNs are in conflict with their reasons for blocking some of them. Source: almost 2 years ago
  • Job Ideas for Dentist non-clinical
    Hey I think a course is great idea, she has tons of experience that’s in demand by young clinicians. I have experience in course creations (thinkific) let me know if I can help, good luck. Source: almost 2 years ago
  • How to download thinkific videos.
    If you want to watch the thinkific.com videos offline on your Mac or Windows computer or portable devices like iPad, iPhone, iPod, Xbox, Apple TV, PSP, Samsung TV, Samsung phone, Blackberry phone, etc., you will need to download and convert videos from thinkific.com. In this article, we will introduce a professional yet easy to use thinkific.com Downloader and a step by step guide on how to download thinkific.com... Source: over 2 years ago
  • How to download thinkific.com videos.
    Ever wish to download videos form thinkific.com, but failed? If so, you come to the right place. The aim of this article is to recommend a free and green thinkific.com downloader, without virus, malware, plug-ins, adware, etc. With this thinkific.com Download, users are not only able to save countless thinkific.com videos to your pc or devices like phone, pad, TV, etc. Source: over 2 years ago

What are some alternatives?

When comparing Discourse and thinkific, you can also consider the following products

Flarum - Flarum is the next-generation forum software that makes online discussion fun. It's simple, fast, and free.

Udemy - Online Courses - Learn Anything, On Your Schedule

phpBB - Raspberry Pi. The Raspberry Pi is a cheap, credit-card sized computer. The official website uses phpBB for their discussion forums. phpBB is not affiliated with nor responsible for any of the sites listed on the showcase.

Adobe Learning Manager - Adobe Learning Manager (formerly Adobe Captivate Prime LMS) is easy to setup and helps in delivering engaging learning experiences in a personalized manner across devices.

Vanilla Forums - Build an engaging community forum using Vanilla's modern cloud forum software.

Moodle - Moodle is the world's most popular learning management system. Start creating your online learning site in minutes!