NodeBB vs SocialEngine

NodeBB is a community discussion platform for forums and online communities, including brand communities and product support boards. Members can write topics and replies using a visual editor or Markdown, chat in real time, and receive notifications for follows, likes and topic subscriptions. They can form groups with activity feeds, tag topics and follow tags for updates. Administrators can create unlimited moderator and administrator accounts and set their permissions. More than 500 plugins and themes can be installed through the control panel, and public Read and RESTful Write APIs support integrations. Spam-prevention integrations include Akismet, StopForumSpam and Project Honeypot. Self-hosted NodeBB is free to download and install under GPLv3; hosted plans start at $20 a month and include priority support. Basic full-text search uses the bundled database engine; Solr and Elasticsearch search require third-party plugins. Installation guides cover Linux, macOS, Windows and cloud deployment options including Docker.

SocialEngine is a paid platform for building online communities on the web, iOS, and Android. It provides event hosting, private spaces, and moderation tools, with mobile apps for members. Cloud plans are billed monthly. Development costs $29 a month and allows five active users with 1 GB memory, 2 TB transfer, 40 GB SSD disk, and a two-core processor. Higher cloud tiers include Early Stage at $49 a month, Startup at 99.00 USD, Growth at 149.00 USD, Expanding at 199.00 USD, and Professional at 349.00 USD, each with different infrastructure allocations and, on some plans, staging sites. Self-hosted Essential and Advanced licenses are listed at $199 a month and $399 a month respectively, each for one domain; the fee is described as one-time. SocialEngine was founded in 2007. There is a 14-day trial and no free plan.