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Flarum vs Simple Machines Forum: catalog facts
Flarum	Simple Machines Forum
Free Free and open source under the MIT licence.	Free Free and open source under the BSD-3-Clause license.
Self-hosted	Self-hosted
Large ecosystem of community extensions Group permissions and built-in moderation	Release packages install without extra build steps Permissive BSD license
Needs a PHP server to host Version 2.0 is still a release candidate	Traditional forum layout rather than a modern discussion interface Needs a PHP and database server to host
Self-hosted	Self-hosted
Open source	Open source
License: MIT	License: BSD-3-Clause
No account needed	Not stated if an account is needed
Needs internet	Not stated if it works offline
Official website Full listing and sources Checked October 2, 2026	Official website Full listing and sources Checked October 2, 2026

Catalog facts only. Anything “not stated” is unconfirmed. Check full listings for details.