MyBB vs. XMB vs. phpBB vs. Vanilla vs. SMF vs. Phorum

General MyBB XMB phpBB Vanilla SMF Phorum
Version
1.6.3
1.9.11
3.0.8
2.6.4
2.0.6
5.2.9a
Release Date
2011-04-16 (12 years ago)
Febuary 28, 2009
2010-11-19 (13 years ago)
2018-10-28 (5 years ago)
2013-10-21 (10 years ago)
2008-10-12 (15 years ago)
Last Update here
2011-06-22 (12 years ago)
2012-03-02 (12 years ago)
2011-06-22 (12 years ago)
2018-11-01 (5 years ago)
2013-10-25 (10 years ago)
2008-10-16 (15 years ago)
Author
MyBB Group
The XMB Group
The phpBB Group
Vanilla Forums Inc
Simple Machines
Phorum Dev Team
URL
Free and Open Source
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
License
Custom
General Public License
General Public License
GPL
BSD
The Phorum License (BSD)
License cost
US$0
0.00
0.00
0
0
0
Main View
Both, can be configured
Thread-Type
Threaded or Flat
Flat
Flat
Flat
Flat
Threaded or Flat
Setup MyBB XMB phpBB Vanilla SMF Phorum
Installation method
wizard
wizard
wizard
wizard
wizard
wizard
Upgrade method
wizard
wizard
wizard with manual interactions
manual
wizard
wizard
Hosting available
No
No
No
Yes
No
No
Technology MyBB XMB phpBB Vanilla SMF Phorum
Programming Language
PHP
php
PHP
PHP
PHP
PHP
UTF-8 Support
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Data Storage
3
MySQL Database, PostgreSQL Database, SQLite File Database
1
MySQL Database
6
Firebird Database, Microsoft SQL Database, MySQL Database, Oracle Database, PostgreSQL Database, SQLite File Database
1
MySQL Database
3
MySQL Database, PostgreSQL Database, SQLite File Database
2
MySQL Database, PostgreSQL Database
Other Storage
Source Code Repo
Issue Tracker
Posts MyBB XMB phpBB Vanilla SMF Phorum
BBCode
Yes
Yes
Yes
Plugin
Yes
Optional
HTML
Yes
Optional
No
Yes
Yes
Optional
Emoticons
Yes
Yes
Yes
Plugin
Yes
Optional
Formatting Toolbar
Yes
Yes
Yes
Plugin
Yes
Optional
WYSIWYG Editor
Plugin
No
No
Plugin
Yes
Plugin
Quoting
Nested
Nested
Nested
Single
Nested
Nested
Syntax Highlighting
Yes
No
Yes
Plugin
Yes
Plugin
Attachments
Multiple files
Multiple files
Multiple files
Multiple files
Multiple files
Multiple files
Tags
Unknown
Unknown
Unknown
Yes
Unknown
Unknown
Mark as solved
A particular post can highlighted as accepted answer
Forums MyBB XMB phpBB Vanilla SMF Phorum
Categories
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Subforums
unlimited
one level
unlimited
unlimited
unlimited
multiple levels
Last Post
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Redirect Forums
Yes
No
Yes
Yes
Yes
No
Trashcan Forum
Plugin
No
No
Yes
Yes
No
Anti-Spam and Security MyBB XMB phpBB Vanilla SMF Phorum
CAPTCHA
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Optional
Groups
Multiple groups
Multiple groups
Multiple groups
Multiple groups
Multiple groups
Multiple groups
Flood Control
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
ACLs
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Blacklist
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Warnings
Yes
Plugin
Yes
Plugin
Yes
Plugin
Suspension
Yes
Plugin
Yes
Yes
Yes
Plugin
Bans
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
IP-Block
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Audit Logging
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Optional
User Reports
Yes
Yes
Yes
Plugin
Yes
Yes
Other
Akismet plugin available.
Plugin-based CAPTCHA system, Newly Registered Users permissions
Community Curation & SPAM removal
An Akismet mod is available
Aksimet Plugin
Notification MyBB XMB phpBB Vanilla SMF Phorum
RSS/ATOM
Yes
Plugin
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
E-Mail
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Instant Messaging
Jabber
0
Bookmarks
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Plugin
Yes
Community MyBB XMB phpBB Vanilla SMF Phorum
Avatars
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Plugin
User Ranks
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Plugin
Rating/Karma System
Yes
Plugin
Patch
Yes
Yes
Plugin
Signatures
Yes
Yes
Yes
Plugin
Yes
Yes
Users Online List
Yes
Yes
Yes
Plugin
Yes
Plugin
Private Messaging
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Custom profile fields
Yes
Plugin
Yes
Plugin
Yes
Yes
Moderation MyBB XMB phpBB Vanilla SMF Phorum
Moderators
global and forums
global and forums
global and forums
global, forums and threads
global, forums and threads
global and forums
Move Threads
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Split Threads
Yes
Yes
Yes
Plugin
Yes
Yes
Close Threads
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Shadow Topics
Yes
Yes
Yes
Plugin
Yes
Yes
Sticky Threads
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Important Threads
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Plugin
Yes
Search MyBB XMB phpBB Vanilla SMF Phorum
Full-text search
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Author search
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Advanced search
Yes
No
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Unread Topics
Database tracked
Session tracked
Database tracked
Database tracked
Database tracked
Database tracked
Customization MyBB XMB phpBB Vanilla SMF Phorum
Languages
0
0
0
141
Afar, Abkhazian, Afrikaans, Amharic, Arabic, Assamese, Aymara, Azerbaijani, Bashkir, Byelorussian, Bulgarian, Bihari, Bislama, Bengali; Bangla, Tibetan, Breton, Catalan, Corsican, Czech, Welsh, Danish, German, Bhutani, Greek, English, Esperanto, Spanish, Estonian, Basque, Persian, Finnish, Fiji, Faroese, French, Frisian, Irish, Scots Gaelic, Galician, Guarani, Gujarati, Hausa, Hebrew, Hindi, Croatian, Hungarian, Armenian, Interlingua, Indonesian, Interlingue, Inupiak, Icelandic, Italian, Inuktitut, Japanese, Javanese, Georgian, Kazakh, Greenlandic, Cambodian, Kannada, Korean, Kashmiri, Kurdish, Kirghiz, Latin, Lingala, Laothian, Lithuanian, Latvian, Lettish, Malagasy, Maori, Macedonian, Malayalam, Mongolian, Moldavian, Marathi, Malay, Maltese, Burmese, Nauru, Nepali, Dutch, Norwegian, Occitan, Oromo, Oriya, Punjabi, Polish, Pashto, Pushto, Portuguese, Brazilian Portuguese, Quechua, Rhaeto-Romance, Kirundi, Romanian, Russian, Kinyarwanda, Sanskrit, Sindhi, Sangho, Serbo-Croatian, Sinhalese, Slovak, Slovenian, Samoan, Shona, Somali, Albanian, Serbian, Siswati, Sesotho, Sundanese, Swedish, Swahili, Tamil, Telugu, Tajik, Thai, Tigrinya, Turkmen, Tagalog, Setswana, Tonga, Turkish, Tsonga, Tatar, Twi, Uighur, Ukrainian, Urdu, Uzbek, Vietnamese, Volapuk, Wolof, Xhosa, Yiddish, Yoruba, Zhuang, Chinese, Chinese Traditional, Zulu
0
0
Mobile View
Unknown
Unknown
Unknown
Yes
Unknown
Unknown
Templates
global and forum specific
global and forum specific
global and forum specific
global and forum specific
global and forum specific
global and forum specific
Custom BBCodes
Yes
Plugin
Yes
Plugin
Plugin
Plugin
Skin-Editor
Yes
Yes
Yes
Plugin
Yes
No
Smiley Packs
Yes
Optional
Yes
Plugin
Yes
Plugin
Plugins
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Special Features MyBB XMB phpBB Vanilla SMF Phorum
Statistics
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Plugin
Polls
Yes
Yes
Yes
Plugin
Yes
Plugin
Calendar
Yes
Plugin
No
Plugin
Yes
No
Friendly URLs
Plugin
Yes
Plugin
Yes
Plugin
Plugin
Data Management MyBB XMB phpBB Vanilla SMF Phorum
Available Importers
All platforms use: https://open.vanillaforums.com/addon/porter-core
Pruning
Plugin
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Archiving
No
No
No
Yes
Plugin
No
Export Formats
SQL Dumps in .sql, sql.gz, and .sql.bz2
Proprietary or MySQLDump
WAP(2), IMode
Export private messages
Yes
No
Yes
Yes
Plugin
No
Lo-Fi View
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Optional
remove MyBB remove XMB remove phpBB remove Vanilla remove SMF remove Phorum