| General | Vanilla | phpBB | Beehive Forum | Phorum | SMF |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Version |
2.6.4
|
3.0.8
|
1.4.7
|
5.2.9a
|
2.0.6
|
| Release Date |
2018-10-28 (5 years ago)
|
2010-11-19 (13 years ago)
|
2015-06-03 (8 years ago)
|
2008-10-12 (15 years ago)
|
2013-10-21 (10 years ago)
|
| Last Update here |
2018-11-01 (5 years ago)
|
2011-06-22 (12 years ago)
|
2016-02-08 (8 years ago)
|
2008-10-16 (15 years ago)
|
2013-10-25 (10 years ago)
|
| Author |
Vanilla Forums Inc
|
The phpBB Group
|
Matt Beale, Mark Rendle
|
Phorum Dev Team
|
Simple Machines
|
| URL | |||||
| Free and Open Source |
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
| License |
GPL
|
General Public License
|
GPL
|
The Phorum License (BSD)
|
BSD
|
| License cost |
0
|
0.00
|
0
|
0
|
0
|
| Main View |
Both, can be configured
|
||||
| Thread-Type |
Flat
|
Flat
|
Threaded or Flat
|
Threaded or Flat
|
Flat
|
| Setup | Vanilla | phpBB | Beehive Forum | Phorum | SMF |
| Installation method |
wizard
|
wizard
|
wizard
|
wizard
|
wizard
|
| Upgrade method |
manual
|
wizard with manual interactions
|
wizard
|
wizard
|
wizard
|
| Hosting available |
Yes
|
No
|
Yes
|
No
|
No
|
| Technology | Vanilla | phpBB | Beehive Forum | Phorum | SMF |
| Programming Language |
PHP
|
PHP
|
PHP
|
PHP
|
PHP
|
| UTF-8 Support |
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
| Data Storage |
1
MySQL Database |
6
Firebird Database, Microsoft SQL Database, MySQL Database, Oracle Database, PostgreSQL Database, SQLite File Database |
1
MySQL Database |
2
MySQL Database, PostgreSQL Database |
3
MySQL Database, PostgreSQL Database, SQLite File Database |
| Other Storage | |||||
| Source Code Repo | |||||
| Issue Tracker | |||||
| Posts | Vanilla | phpBB | Beehive Forum | Phorum | SMF |
| BBCode |
Plugin
|
Yes
|
No
|
Optional
|
Yes
|
| HTML |
Yes
|
No
|
Yes
|
Optional
|
Yes
|
| Emoticons |
Plugin
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Optional
|
Yes
|
| Formatting Toolbar |
Plugin
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Optional
|
Yes
|
| WYSIWYG Editor |
Plugin
|
No
|
Yes
|
Plugin
|
Yes
|
| Quoting |
Single
|
Nested
|
Nested
|
Nested
|
Nested
|
| Syntax Highlighting |
Plugin
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Plugin
|
Yes
|
| Attachments |
Multiple files
|
Multiple files
|
Multiple files
|
Multiple files
|
Multiple files
|
| Tags |
Yes
|
Unknown
|
Unknown
|
Unknown
|
Unknown
|
| Mark as solved |
A particular post can highlighted as accepted answer
|
||||
| Forums | Vanilla | phpBB | Beehive Forum | Phorum | SMF |
| Categories |
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
| Subforums |
unlimited
|
unlimited
|
multiple levels
|
unlimited
|
|
| Last Post |
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
| Redirect Forums |
Yes
|
Yes
|
No
|
No
|
Yes
|
| Trashcan Forum |
Yes
|
No
|
Optional
|
No
|
Yes
|
| Anti-Spam and Security | Vanilla | phpBB | Beehive Forum | Phorum | SMF |
| CAPTCHA |
Yes
|
Yes
|
Optional
|
Optional
|
Yes
|
| Groups |
Multiple groups
|
Multiple groups
|
Multiple groups
|
Multiple groups
|
Multiple groups
|
| Flood Control |
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
| ACLs |
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
| Blacklist |
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
| Warnings |
Plugin
|
Yes
|
Unknown
|
Plugin
|
Yes
|
| Suspension |
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Plugin
|
Yes
|
| Bans |
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
| IP-Block |
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
| Audit Logging |
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Optional
|
Yes
|
| User Reports |
Plugin
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
| Other |
Community Curation & SPAM removal
|
Plugin-based CAPTCHA system, Newly Registered Users permissions
|
Worming, Pilllorying
|
Aksimet Plugin
|
An Akismet mod is available
|
| Notification | Vanilla | phpBB | Beehive Forum | Phorum | SMF |
| RSS/ATOM |
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
|
| Instant Messaging |
Jabber
|
Yes
|
0
|
||
| Bookmarks |
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Plugin
|
| Community | Vanilla | phpBB | Beehive Forum | Phorum | SMF |
| Avatars |
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Plugin
|
Yes
|
| User Ranks |
Yes
|
Yes
|
No
|
Plugin
|
Yes
|
| Rating/Karma System |
Yes
|
Patch
|
Yes
|
Plugin
|
Yes
|
| Signatures |
Plugin
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
| Users Online List |
Plugin
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Plugin
|
Yes
|
| Private Messaging |
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
| Custom profile fields |
Plugin
|
Yes
|
Optional
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
| Moderation | Vanilla | phpBB | Beehive Forum | Phorum | SMF |
| Moderators |
global, forums and threads
|
global and forums
|
global, forums and threads
|
global and forums
|
global, forums and threads
|
| Move Threads |
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
| Split Threads |
Plugin
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
| Close Threads |
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
| Shadow Topics |
Plugin
|
Yes
|
No
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
| Sticky Threads |
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
| Important Threads |
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Plugin
|
| Search | Vanilla | phpBB | Beehive Forum | Phorum | SMF |
| Full-text search |
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
| Author search |
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
| Advanced search |
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
| Unread Topics |
Database tracked
|
Database tracked
|
Database tracked
|
Database tracked
|
Database tracked
|
| Customization | Vanilla | phpBB | Beehive Forum | Phorum | SMF |
| Languages |
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
|
0
|
0
|
| Mobile View |
Yes
|
Unknown
|
Unknown
|
Unknown
|
Unknown
|
| Templates |
global and forum specific
|
global and forum specific
|
CSS only
|
global and forum specific
|
global and forum specific
|
| Custom BBCodes |
Plugin
|
Yes
|
No
|
Plugin
|
Plugin
|
| Skin-Editor |
Plugin
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
No
|
Yes
|
| Smiley Packs |
Plugin
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Plugin
|
Yes
|
| Plugins |
Yes
|
Yes
|
No
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
| Special Features | Vanilla | phpBB | Beehive Forum | Phorum | SMF |
| Statistics |
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Plugin
|
Yes
|
| Polls |
Plugin
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Plugin
|
Yes
|
| Calendar |
Plugin
|
No
|
No
|
No
|
Yes
|
| Friendly URLs |
Yes
|
Plugin
|
No
|
Plugin
|
Plugin
|
| Data Management | Vanilla | phpBB | Beehive Forum | Phorum | SMF |
| Available Importers |
All platforms use: https://open.vanillaforums.com/addon/porter-core
|
||||
| Pruning |
Yes
|
Yes
|
No
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
| Archiving |
Yes
|
No
|
Unknown
|
No
|
Plugin
|
| Export Formats |
Proprietary or MySQLDump
|
SQL Dumps in .sql, sql.gz, and .sql.bz2
|
WAP(2), IMode
|
||
| Export private messages |
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
No
|
Plugin
|
| Lo-Fi View |
Yes
|
Yes
|
Yes
|
Optional
|
Yes
|
| remove Vanilla | remove phpBB | remove Beehive Forum | remove Phorum | remove SMF |