Software Alternatives, Accelerators & Startups

MyBB VS Discourse

Compare MyBB VS Discourse and see what are their differences

MyBB logo MyBB

MyBB is a discussion board software that runs on PHP and MySQL

Discourse logo Discourse

Discourse is an open source discussion platform built for the next decade of the Internet.
  • MyBB Landing page
    Landing page //
    2023-07-10
  • Discourse Landing page
    Landing page //
    2023-06-13

MyBB features and specs

  • Free and Open-Source
    MyBB is free to download and use. Its open-source nature allows for complete customization and transparency.
  • User-Friendly Interface
    The software offers a clean and intuitive interface, making it easy for both administrators and users to navigate.
  • Community Support
    A large, active community provides extensive documentation, plugins, themes, and support.
  • Extensible
    MyBB supports a wide range of plugins and themes, allowing users to extend its functionality and appearance easily.
  • Built-In Features
    It offers a variety of built-in features like private messaging, multi-quote, user tagging, and more.
  • SEO Friendly
    MyBB includes SEO-friendly URLs and settings that help improve the forum's visibility on search engines.
  • Security
    Regular security updates and a dedicated security team help ensure that the platform is secure.

Possible disadvantages of MyBB

  • Outdated Design
    Some users may find the default themes and design elements outdated compared to modern forum software.
  • Limited Built-In Modern Features
    While MyBB has a lot of basic features, it lacks some modern functionalities out of the box, requiring additional plugins.
  • Learning Curve for Customization
    While it is highly customizable, new users may find it challenging to modify the software to fit their needs without digging into the documentation or community forums.
  • Performance
    The performance may degrade with a large number of users and posts, requiring additional optimizations or server resources.
  • Plugin Dependence
    To add advanced features, users often need to rely on third-party plugins, which may not always be up to date or secure.
  • Less Frequent Updates
    Compared to some other forum software, updates and new releases are less frequent, which can lead to delays in receiving new features or bug fixes.

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.

MyBB videos

How to Build a Forum Website Free! MYBB review: Demo + Quick Setup Tutorial

More videos:

  • Review - Host your Own Forums with MyBB
  • Tutorial - How To Create / Set Up Your Own MyBB Forum 2019

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

Category Popularity

0-100% (relative to MyBB and Discourse)
Forums And Forum Software
Forums
26 26%
74% 74
Community Platform
26 26%
74% 74
Social & Communications
100 100%
0% 0

User comments

Share your experience with using MyBB and Discourse. 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 MyBB and Discourse

MyBB Reviews

Top 10 Best Free Open Source Forum Software to Setup own Discussion Forum
MyBB is a free application for discussion forums which is scripted in PHP language and uses MySQL database. The application includes almost everything which is required to run an effective and fascinating community smoothly. It uses an instructive discussion board set up so which allows viewers to begin and respond to interactions and tag their posts. In order to keep the...
Source: technofizi.net

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...

Social recommendations and mentions

Based on our record, Discourse should be more popular than MyBB. 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.

MyBB mentions (8)

  • Best way to host a small forum?
    Excellent! Glad we could get you sorted! Hosting can be scary and it's okay to be afraid to touch things or not understand certain settings or terms. Especially if you're new. The key is to read the documentation. For your forum needs, this can be found at https://mybb.com and https://phpbb.com. Source: over 1 year ago
  • PhpBB
    I actually recommend myBB [0] over phpBB for anyone looking to set up a LAMP forum. It's cleaner, better written, and possibly better maintained and with a much less scary vulnerability history. I believe it started off as an attempt to create an OSS version of IPB (or was it vB?). [0]: https://github.com/mybb/mybb. - Source: Hacker News / almost 2 years ago
  • How can I create a forum using HTML, CSS, and JavaScript?
    As u/Marble_Wraith mentioned. You will find more help and information at r/webdev. That being said, building a Forum is somewhat complex, if you're planning to do so from scratch without any prior knowledge this could be a challenging first task. If it's also an option to use a pre-build app, then https://mybb.com/ is a good starting point. You can also find some information on YouTube about how to get it running. Source: over 2 years ago
  • What happened to the new offsite backup project?
    If you want something done and nobody is doing it, it is best to do it yourself. Source: almost 3 years ago
  • Got Me Kicked Off Nanny Job Fb group!!
    She probably intimidated the group moderator, I can't see how any of that would have gotten you kicked out of a group. I suppose you could start your own group or even start one of those free forums like https://mybb.com/ and you decide how members will be vetted and of course everyone use a pseudonym. She probably has an alternate account that isn't her real name., hence why you can't block her. I suppose you... Source: about 3 years ago
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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
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What are some alternatives?

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

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.

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

XenForo - Intuitive. Social. Engaging. Fast. XenForo brings a fresh outlook to forum software.

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

NodeBB - NodeBB Forum Software - A better community platform for the modern web. NodeBB is a next generation forum software that's free and easy to use.

FluxBB - FluxBB is a fast, light, user-friendly forum application for your website.