Discourse

Open source forum software for long-form discussion and real-time chat, self-hosted or managed.

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Deployment Cloud Based, On Premises
Starting price $100
Free trial Available
Best for Startups, SMEs, Agencies

What is Discourse?

Discourse is open source forum software used by tech companies and online communities to run long-form discussions alongside real-time chat. It organizes conversations into categories and tags, uses a trust level system to grant experienced members more moderation ability over time, and includes tools like flagging, mute and automatic content filters to help moderators manage large communities. Because it is open source, it can be self-hosted for free on any server that supports Docker.

For teams that prefer managed hosting, Discourse offers a free hosted plan alongside Pro, Business and Enterprise tiers priced by staff seats, storage and monthly page views. Paid plans add custom themes, API access, advanced analytics, automation and AI powered features, with Enterprise adding unlimited staff seats and a 99.9% uptime guarantee.

Key Features of Discourse

Discourse lists 8 documented features, including Flat, threaded discussion forums with categories and tags, Built in real-time chat alongside long-form discussion and User trust levels for progressive moderation permissions. The list below covers what the product does rather than how it is marketed.

Flat, threaded discussion forums with categories and tags
Built in real-time chat alongside long-form discussion
User trust levels for progressive moderation permissions
Personal messaging between members
Moderation tools including flagging and automatic filters
Plugin and theme ecosystem for customization
Open source, self-hostable software
AI powered summarization and search on paid plans

Discourse Pricing

Discourse lists 2 plans, from $100 to $500.

Pro

$100

per month, 5 staff seats

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For a growing community that needs better tools to scale and manage spam; the figure was flagged as a possible add on but its context is the Pro hosting plan row itself, and the page states all prices are in USD with no card required up front.

Business

$500

per month

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For communities where the forum is a core channel and needs to expand beyond question and answer.