Discourse vs Flarum (2026): which should you pick?

Pick Discourse if

• Fits if you want a discussion forum where members ask and answer questions
• Works for small communities that can stay inside 2 staff seats and 10 categories

Look elsewhere if

• Tight if you grow: the free plan stops at 2 staff seats and 10 categories
• Pricey if you need SSO or events, which start at $500 a month
• Skip it if you want to sell courses, because it has no course checkout
• Watch out: plans are sold by staff seat, not by member count

Pick Flarum if

• Fits if you can run a server and want a forum you control
• Works for communities that want extensions and themes

Look elsewhere if

• Skip it if you can't manage PHP, a database and SSH access
• Not for you if you want courses, memberships or payments, as it has none
• Watch out: support comes from the volunteer community forum, not a paid vendor
• Watch out: no official migration tool, only the third-party Nitro Porter

Discourse

• The free plan caps staff seats at 2 and categories at 10.
• SSO, workflows, events and gamification are on Business ($500 a month) and above.
• Plans are sold by staff seats, not by members; members are unlimited.
• It is a discussion forum, not a course platform, so it has no built-in course checkout.

Flarum

• You run it yourself: the installer needs PHP 8.3 or newer, a supported database and SSH access, which rules out much shared hosting.
• No official migration tool; the docs point to Nitro Porter, a third-party import and export tool.
• It has no courses, memberships or payment features, only forums.
• Support comes from the volunteer community forum rather than a paid vendor.

Discourse

Topic-based forum

Organizes discussion into categories and tags with unlimited members on every hosted plan.

Trust levels and badges

Members earn abilities as they participate, and badges reward chosen behaviors.

Built-in chat

Adds channels for short-form conversation alongside long-form topics.

AI and translation

Uses daily AI credits and translates content into a plan-dependent number of languages: 2 on Free up to 10 on Enterprise.

Plugins and API

Official plugins plus an API that covers what the interface does; API and webhook access starts at Pro.

Mobile apps

Free iOS and Android apps with push notifications for hosted communities.

Flarum

Groups and permissions

Assign permissions to groups, control member access across categories, and use built-in moderation and flagging.

Extensions

Hundreds of community-built extensions add features, and bundled ones include Tags, Messages, Realtime, Statistics and Markdown.

Themes and styling

Change the look through admin settings, install themes, or add custom CSS that applies across the whole forum.

Editors

Supports lightweight Markdown editors and full WYSIWYG editors, depending on the extensions you install.

Notifications

In-browser notifications and email digests, with real-time updates available through the bundled Realtime extension.

Choice of database

Flarum 2.0 runs on MySQL, MariaDB, SQLite or PostgreSQL, and search can be swapped to another engine through search drivers.

Discourse

• Free$0

  2 staff seats, 10 categories, 5GB storage, 20k monthly emails and 100k AI daily credits.

• Pro$100

  per month

  5 staff seats, unlimited categories, 20GB storage, 100k monthly emails, API and webhook access, 15+ plugins.

• Business$500

  per month

  15 staff seats, 100GB storage, SSO, workflows, events, gamification and priority support.

• EnterpriseCustom

  Unlimited staff seats, 99.9% uptime guarantee, custom migration and design services; sold through sales.

Flarum

• Flarum$0

  Free MIT-licensed software that you install and run on your own server.