Best Online Community Software

There are thousands of communities in the world and millions of people who visit them every day. But creating a nice community is not as easy as it seems at first.

You need to think about a lot of important things, such as a good design, an appropriate platform for your community, interaction features, and many other small things.

Lucky for you, some excellent community software builders on the market can help. The use of online community software simplifies the process of creating these virtual communities.

The best solutions let you give your members a fun experience that is based on the best ways to interact with people. As a consequence, you will have access to modern tools and solutions to get you started.

Have you ever wondered what’s the best online community software for you?

Why do you need to get real ownership of your community?

Social media platforms are great—they’re convenient, they’re free, and they help you reach your audience.

But they’re not yours. You don’t own them. You don’t have full control over it.

What happens if someone reports your content as abusive on Facebook? It gets removed, and then you have to spend time figuring out why it got flagged and how to get it back up.

What happens if platforms can change privacy policies or content-sharing guidelines at any time, which leaves you subject to their rules and regulations?

What happens if Twitter decides to shut its doors forever? All of a sudden, you’re scrambling around trying to find another way to connect with the people who make your whole business possible—your community.

If those cases happen you are screwed and lost your hard-working. Don’t put all your eggs in the same basket.

All of this is to say: there’s no reason not to use social media platforms to connect with your community and drive traffic but it’s just smart and sustainable business sense to get real ownership of that connection by creating your own space online where you can communicate with your audience in a safe, supportive environment.

What is community software?

Community software is a tool that makes building your community easier. It helps you guide people through the steps of joining your group, and it helps you set the culture of your group so that everyone stays on track.

Community software has been designed to help online communities thrive with all the Facebook group features and more like selling online courses or digital products, upvoting, video screening…

Why use paid community software vs free community software?

There are many free options available to anyone who wants to create a community. This is generally the most appealing choice, considering that, well, it’s free. However, managing a community is incredibly time-consuming and comes with a lot of responsibilities. It pays to invest in a paid community software solution.

Here are some key benefits of using our paid system as opposed to other (free) alternatives:

• You get a piece of mind, and you save time. Your job is not to hire a developer and create new features. You are here to onboard new members, create content, and make your community engage.

• The customer support is better. With paid service. They’ve got your back when things go wrong. You can ask questions at any time, and their customer service is fast to reply.

• You can customize it. With free community software, what you see is what you get—but with paid versions, you can customize it however you want! Make it look like your brand, add additional features that are unique to your business or project—you name it!

Which are the Best community Software, builders?

There are some great options out there, so if you’re looking to choose one, here are the top popular four:

TRIBE :

Tribe offers a robust free plan as well as two paid plans that each include additional features. It provides users with an easy-to-use interface and powerful integrations and analytics tools.

It has been around for a long time now so it is a pretty solid software.

For users looking for a highly customizable community creator, Tribe is an excellent choice.

Keys features :

• Free for up to 100 members.
• Theme customization
• data security is vital for Tribe.
• Custom domain
• Social login

Pricing :

With a Free for up to 100 members, you can test out without committing.

From there, paid plans are as follows:

• Plus Plan: $59/month for 2500 Members
• Professional Plan: $299/month for 25 000 Members
• Enterprise for brand Plan: $599/month for 100 000 Members

CIRCLE.SO

Circle.so was the first one in the market. It has also raised $24.7M Serie A to accelerate its growth. It is a good option if you want solid software that will be there for a long time.

Circle.so offers an intuitive interface that allows users to quickly create and edit their communities

It offers a variety of apps for social media integration, member engagement, live streams events, and more.

For users looking for a user-friendly community software builder with tons of features, Circle.so is a great option.

Keys features :

• Unlimited events
• Group chats & private messaging
• Accept payments with Paywalls
• Live streams & video
• Custom domain

Pricing : With a free Circle.so you can test out with a free 14-day trial and see if this platform is a good fit for you.

From there, paid plans are as follows:

• Basics Plan: $39/month for 1000 Members
• Professional Plan: $99/month for 10 000 Members
• Entreprise for brand Plan: $399/month for 100 000 Members

MIGHTY NETWORKS

Mighty Networks is built specifically for creators who want to build membership sites to support their work and connect with their audiences in new ways.

It’s perfect for creators who want to run classes or share other forms of content with their members through the membership site they build on their platform.

Keys features :

• Native Livestreaming & Video
• Chat & Messaging
• Events & Zoom Integration
• Paid Memberships
• Online Courses
• Live Cohort Course Creation

Pricing: From there, paid plans are as follows:

• Community Plan: $33/month for unlimited Members
• Business Plan: $99/month for unlimited Members

BEAM.GG

Beam is a community software builder that helps group leaders build online communities to support their members through life’s challenges together.

Beam’s platform helps group leaders create both public and private spaces for their members to connect and engage with one another as well as the leader themselves in order to achieve personal growth

Keys features :

• Multiplatform
• Gamification
• Polls
• Subforums
• SEO Optimization

Pricing: From there, paid plans are as follows:

• Basic Plan: $10/month for unlimited Members
• Plus Plan: $30/month for unlimited Members
• Premium Plan: $30/month for unlimited Members

PEERBOARD

Peerboard is a FORUM community software platform, it has fewer features, but if you want to have a simple forum, it is good to go.

Keys features :

• Start your community for free with no usage limits
• WordPress plugin
• Great for E-commerce to build a community
• Embed your forum into any website with our custom domain support and easy-to-use plugin tools.

Pricing :

From there, paid plans are as follows:

• Free Plan
• Starter Plan: $29/month for unlimited Members
• Professional Plan: $79/month for unlimited Members
• Growth Plan: $299/month for unlimited Members

What are the Key Features your community needs the most?

When it comes to community building software, many options are available.

There is no “one-size-fits-all” solution. Each platform has its own features and benefits, and ultimately you’ll want to choose the one that best fits your community’s needs.

To narrow down your choices and make sure you find the right fit, you should start by considering what features you need to include in your community.

Think about what kind of content you want to put in your community. Which key feature is the most important for your community?

• sharing
• video and images
• gamification
• voting
• group creation

Finally, make sure the software is from a stable company. Don’t pick software from a fly-by-night company that might not be around when you need support.

Conclusion

Creating an online community is a great way to keep your members engaged, especially when they’re not physically together. But, as many of you know, the easy part is picking software—it’s driving traffic to your community and creating an engaging space where your members can thrive that’s hard. So just start it will be super fun. 🚀

Certain products/services and links to products/services are affiliate links, and we may earn a commission for any purchases that you make. But this will not incur additional costs for you. Yes for you it’s FREE 👍