When comparing phpBB vs NodeBB, the Slant community recommends NodeBB for most people. In the question“What are the best web forum software packages?” NodeBB is ranked 3rd while phpBB is ranked 6th. The most important reason people chose NodeBB is:
NodeBB is free for all use cases, although the code is licensed under GPLv3, so the source code must be provided if you are re-distributing (and/or reselling) NodeBB.
Specs
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Pros
Pro Open source
Source code is available on GitHub under GNU General Licence.
Pro Premium extensions
There are many great developers creating premium extensions to make it go to the next level. With those premium extensions phpBB goes far beyond any other.
Pro Extensible
Is built to be extensible and flexible.
Pro Huge extension repository
Its the forum software with the most ready to go extension repository.
Pro Free and open source
NodeBB is free for all use cases, although the code is licensed under GPLv3, so the source code must be provided if you are re-distributing (and/or reselling) NodeBB.
Pro Has live chat
Private Messages (PMs) are live chats, just like messaging apps, allowing real-time conversations with one or a selectjkkkjkj
Pro Plugin support
A selection of plugins for NodeBB are available.
Pro Highly customizable themes
NodeBB's themes are more customizable and dispensable; use custom CSS and HTML code, integrate WordPress Themes or use one of NodeBB's themes with easy stylist functions to change colour schemes and category layout.
Pro Includes all commonly expected modern forum features
NodeBB bundles real-time updates (new posts/topics, chat messages), the ability to see "who's browsing this topic", recent/popular/unread topics, tags, post sorting, social sharing, notification system, inbound email support/reply-by-email, mobile responsiveness, favourites, bookmarks, spam control, and reputation/karma.
Pro Multilingual
Built in local support with over 50 translated languages.
Pro Has a variety of gamification plugins
NodeBB’s gamification plugins extend user engagement by motivating users to participate and complete tasks by giving them incentives like achievements, badges, points and virtual currency. NodeBB's gamification and reputation system is more than just badges, the reputation engine is used to promote good content, grant member abilities and achieve rank among leaderboards. NodeBB has several gamifications plugins that gives forum users an RPG like experience: Advanced Dungeon and Rabbits, Minecraft, PVP RPG (Battle, attack & steal points from other users).
Pro Social integration through plugins
NodeBBs plugins are built to support features like: Rich media embedding (Youtube/Vimeo), advertising integration (Google AdSense, DoubleClick, etc), third-party single-sign-on, emoji, mobile phone notifications, sound packs, CDN support, rich-text formatting/colours, static pages, galleries, and much much more.
Pro Real-time post streaming
Posts are streamed in real time, if a new post is created it appears without having to refresh.
Pro Great performance
Pro Active and engaging support community
Vibrant community is available to help guide you with installations, advise against common pitfalls, and answer any questions.
Pro Installation & maintenance easy
Documentation is complete and detail, otherwise community always find a solution
Pro NoScript support
NodeBB is one of the few modern forum software that has good NoScript support. The forum layout is the same and users can register, login, logout and post without scripts.
Pro Provides hosting solutions with multiple server locations
In addition to the hosting, NodeBB also provides support ticket access, and automatic deployment of security updates when necessary.
NodeBB's servers are located in New York, although instances can be manually provisioned in all of the other regions our hosting provider supports:
- San Francisco (west coast customers)
- London, Amsterdam, Frankfurt (European customers)
- Singapore (China, south Asia, etc)
Pro 24/7 technical support
Cons
Con Outdated look and feel
Even the latest version of the software looks like the typical '90s forums which is now pretty outdated.
Con Slow (phpBB 3.0)
phpBB 3.0 was not optimized for slow connections.
Con Poor community communication
There is a release lifecycle, but it is not adhered to. Migrations and updates cannot be planned.
Con Very complicated installation process on shared hosts
If you do not have root ssh access or node js installed, it is impossible or very hard to install on shared hosts.