Open Source Forum Software
Forum software provides a structured environment for hosting public or private online discussions and knowledge bases. These tools organize community conversations into threads and categories to prevent information from becoming disorganized. This type of software serves community managers and team leads who need a dedicated space for Q&A and member interactions. Self-hosting these apps ensures that discussion histories and user profiles remain on private servers. This approach avoids reliance on external platforms and allows for custom moderation rules tailored to specific community needs.
This page lists 14 open source tools in the Forum category. The most popular are Discourse, Flarum and Apache Answer. Most use the Apache-2.0 or GPL-2.0 license, and 11 offer an official Docker image.
Discourse
A community platform for hosting online forums with real time chat and customizable discussion spaces.
Flarum
A lightweight discussion platform for websites that provides a responsive interface and an extensible API for community management.
Apache Answer
A self-hosted Q&A platform for building community forums, help centers, and internal knowledge management systems for teams.
Apache Answer
A Q&A platform for teams to build community forums, help centers, and knowledge management systems.
NodeBB
A forum software powered by Node.js that uses web sockets for real-time interactions and notifications.
Lemmy
A decentralized link aggregator and forum that connects independent communities through the ActivityPub protocol and fediverse.
Misago
A modern forum solution with comprehensive moderation tools, flexible user permissions, and extensive OAuth provider support.
phpBB
A free open-source bulletin board system written in PHP for creating and managing online community forums.
Talkyard
A community discussion platform combining forum threads, real-time chat, and embeddable blog comments in one system.
MyBB
A free and open source forum software for building and managing online community discussion boards.
Scoold
A Q&A and knowledge sharing platform for teams designed to facilitate internal information exchange.
Simple Machines Forum
Community forum software for creating and managing online discussion boards with professional grade features.
ENiGMA½
A modern bulletin board system server with support for retro terminal protocols and federated social networking.
Storyden
A community platform combining discussion forums, wiki functionality, and content curation for building permanent and discoverable knowledge bases.
Join our newsletter to get shiny new open source software delivered to your inbox. Unsubscribe anytime.