Why should I buy this?

[cherrysodastar]

So.. I have been looking around the forum here and I've seen some really nice themes created by people, but the pricetag is a bit intense.

I was hoping maybe some people could give me some reasons they decided to take the plunge and buy XenForo.

What was the deciding factor for you?

 

[Paul B]

next year

This year.

 

[Opus X]

from what i have seen it is a one click upgrade if you have your system set up to allow it.
it is fairly slick from the one time i was allowed to do it on the site i am staff on and theowner had backed it up before in case anything happened bad.
i have not had the chance to do it on my site as it was already on the latest version when i bought it.
from reading there will be some changes to 3.0 that could impact the way certain things are done for styling.
i have not read a definite answer that the upgrade will migrate changes that were good in this version over to 2.3 or not.
if xenforo offers what you need i would buy it now.
even if something breaks it should not be that hard to fix.

 

[⭐ Alex ⭐]

Around 3 weeks later my tiny fledgling forum was completely ruined, I was several grand out of pocket

Can I help you with your forum or something? You said in 3 weeks your forum was destroyed?

I've been running https://pawngame.com/forum for about 3 years and nothing has been destroyed so far... so maybe I can help you. Send me a private message if you want, or make a new thread so we don't pollute this one. I just like helping people. No cost associated.

 

[Aluminum Pints]

So.. I have been looking around the forum here and I've seen some really nice themes created by people, but the pricetag is a bit intense.

I was hoping maybe some people could give me some reasons they decided to take the plunge and buy XenForo.

What was the deciding factor for you?

i was looking for an alternative to vb prolly 10 or 11 years ago. i liked the themes and the community here at xenforo so i decided to buy a license. i am not a forum or site mega god with tons traffic. one person operation.

to me your question was asking me personally why I bought it. so here is why I did:

1. better tech support ( tho vbrocks kinda rocks on vb stuff )
2. fabulous aftermarket stuff mod wise, both in development and support
3. the visual presentation of xenforo seemed unparalled imho

i am a more visual person, like looking at homepage as some thng I might want to read for awhile.

 

[Korsch]

I choose Xenforo because at the time I was looking for something with a responsive design, I’ve always been a fan of Bootstraps responsive design because it allowed you to build your site one way and be displayed on a wide range of devices. I couldn’t stand going to a vb forum and having to zoom in and out everywhere from a mobile device or being prompted to download some other app to use their forum. Xenforo alleviated this issue for me. The community here is another caveat to the license, lots of experience within the forum, it’s rare to have a thead post that goes unanswered which I enjoy.

 

[Danloona]

I don't really understand, the factor of bit high price tag for XF.

Actually it's one of cheapest options of paid forum software on the market, especially when you consider that bare xF is enough to build striving community without buying ton of addons.

From other side you will have IPS with cost near 400$ for a software license and 200$/year renewal price tag.

For me actually point of consideration was simply, low maintenance cost and support with good SLA.

 

[Opus X]

I don't really understand, the factor of bit high price tag for XF.

i don't think it is high priced. it is priced near what the other programs offer when you compare what they offer on a level playing field.
i recently priced all of them but got xenforo for a great price from a friend.
it came with some plug ins already in the price i paid.

From other side you will have IPS with cost near 400$ for a software license and 200$/year renewal price tag.

as said when you compare for ability the price is about the same as you have to buy outside plug ins to get near same features between both.
it is not fair comparing a forum only against a package that contains more in it for price.
that is disingenuous.
if all you need is a forum then xenforo is much cheaper.
but i have found already that for my site i want more than just a forum to offer to push beyond what others that deal with what mine does offer.
that is why i am saving up to buy those plug ins instead of updating xenforo right now.
they are more important to me.

 

[Danloona]

it is not fair comparing a forum only against a package that contains more in it for price.

Keep in mind that i not really understand their decision over pulling plug on modularity like IPS 4 had before.
Now you need pay for entire package even in situation when all you need is just basic forum platform.
Some features which IPS have you can also get for xenForo, often for half of the price.

Overall i have problem with justifying IPS pricing model.

Another thing is that when you decided to not pay for renewal for few months, you will need pay for that few months either, and finally if you decided to not renew the license for 2 years you lose license permanently. (as far i understand their new terms)

and on the end performance of IPS is kinda poor, comparing to xF.

PS. Im not a IPS hater or some sort, just i have very mixed feelings over their latest decisions.

 

[Opus X]

Overall i have problem with justifying IPS pricing model.

from reading it seems that they really do not care about the small site owner and want big accounts that are more likely to use the software.
being able to pick out what you need is usually a better choice.

a fair comparison is to say that it is more expensive but contains several programs with it that are extra cost with xenforo.
it is like saying a ferrari is is more expensive than a hyundai.
yes both have wheels a motor and transmission, but one has more built into it than the other does.

i do not know how ipb runs so will not comment on which one is better.
i did read where now they are making you keep your license and if you wait over two years you have to buy it again.
i do not agree with that but i can see where they are using it to force income for them.
i like the xenforo licensing better and that you can tailor what you get for your site.

 

[Wanji]

Keep in mind that i not really understand their decision over pulling plug on modularity like IPS 4 had before.
Now you need pay for entire package even in situation when all you need is just basic forum platform.
Some features which IPS have you can also get for xenForo, often for half of the price.

Overall i have problem with justifying IPS pricing model.

Another thing is that when you decided to not pay for renewal for few months, you will need pay for that few months either, and finally if you decided to not renew the license for 2 years you lose license permanently. (as far i understand their new terms)

and on the end performance of IPS is kinda poor, comparing to xF.

PS. Im not a IPS hater or some sort, just i have very mixed feelings over their latest decisions.

Even though I already had a plan to save up to buy an IPS license. Reading your opinion faded my desire to buy. The strange thing that I experienced, I contacted them several times via support email but never got a reply.

 

[Danloona]

Even though I already had a plan to save up to buy an IPS license. Reading your opinion faded my desire to buy. The strange thing that I experienced, I contacted them several times via support email but never got a reply.

That actually is a classic for them.
Previously IPS was my way to go, until IPS 4 and now 5.
I not gonna lie, im past IPS customer, until they decided go thus weird path.

They really stop care over hobbyists regarding forums, and decided shift their pricing and development model to big players.
Another nail to the coffin, imho was closing their official addon-store called IPS Marketplace.

 

[Suzanne O]

IPS is too expensive and has too many restrictions on it for anyone to use.

 

[Opus X]

Even though I already had a plan to save up to buy an IPS license. Reading your opinion faded my desire to buy. The strange thing that I experienced, I contacted them several times via support email but never got a reply.

from what tracy said unless you want to be looking at moving over to their cloud i would not think about them.
he said something about after the next version it was going to pure cloud unless they changed their mind when we talked about the different options.
with xenforo you do not have to deal with that.
you can install it where you want that supports it.
it was one of the reasons that i bought his license.
well it was cheap also.

 

[Black Tiger]

Even though I already had a plan to save up to buy an IPS license.

What's IPS? Is that Invision? If yes, I had it, keep away from it. It's more expensive than Xenforo. And you need to have a valid forum url.
You can change that a couple of times per year. If you pause your license like you can with Xenforo, then you can use the support forums anymore.
Only the chat part.

Worse, you got a lifetime licence and in that case, you can't even change your forum url anymore (if you plan it to use on some other domain) before you have a full active license again, meaning you have to pay the full upgrade price to change your url, even if you don't want to upgrade your version. Normally if you change 3 times with an active license, changing domain url costs 15 dollar.
So they are in fact abusing your license as you can't change your license url without active license. Limiting your use that way.

Xenforo still supports BBcode, which is also reason I came over here, next to some great coders which I knew from before from vBulletin. They went away there (lucky for us) and started Xenforo, after vB was taken over and various changes were made which didn't become a lot of customers very well.
Great support here too and imho development is better. And it's cheaper too.
And you can use it without an active license also. So better for hobbyists which don't always have the money to upgrade right away.

 

[sascha78]

themes (by ThemeHouse, IIRC) but they required a special addon for certain things to work well

I have read this tip very well. Which app is required here, or from which provider?

I got a bit stuck with ThemeHouse because the visual UX/UI design suits me very well and clearly stands out from the standard.

 

[CTS]

Why XF, hmmmm,...

Excellent support
Highly configurable
Feature rich
large add-on community
exceptionally stable framework

I've used most all the others over the years.
And you get what you pay for especially in community software.

 

[Suzanne O]

Reason why i got XF was because of the old fill out forms on vBulletin system. It got tricky and didn't work even if you put everything in correctly.

I'm looking forward to seeing more and more new versions of this software.

It's the best one to use by far and it seems to be better than most of the others.

I remember talking my mate @BIG LLC into getting this software as he was having hassles with database errors on vBulletin.

 

[Black Tiger]

then you can use the support forums anymore.

typo.. should read CAN'T use... sorry.

 

[Wing]

Reason why i got XF was because of the old fill out forms on vBulletin system. It got tricky and didn't work even if you put everything in correctly.

I'm looking forward to seeing more and more new versions of this software.

It's the best one to use by far and it seems to be better than most of the others.

I remember talking my mate @BIG LLC into getting this software as he was having hassles with database errors on vBulletin.

IMO to get proper forms functionality in Xenforo, you will be required to utilize Ozzmodz Advanced Forms https://xenforo.com/community/resources/ozzmodz-advanced-forms.5632/

 

[Hareon]

A week ago I decided that I wanted to migrate my phpBB forum to a more modern platform.

So I searched for Xenforo and Invision. I had known about Invision for a long time because in 2009 when I started using forums, my first contact was with a forum that used Invision (when there was a free version).

For me, Invision is the most beautiful forum and comes standard with features that other forums (including Xenforo) require a third-party addon. Addon for Badges, Credits, Level/XP... I believe it should already exist in the platform's core. Invision already officially offers it out of the box, so when Invision updates, there are no compatibility issues because the features are officially integrated and I really like that.

But reading this topic I ended up discovering (and even seeing what I couldn't see) that Invision costs a lot higher. As I live in Brazil and the dollar costs more than R$5.00, it is very complicated because for me it costs R$2,582, an extremely high value.

But another thing I discovered here was about license usage. If you don't use it for 2 years, you lose it? If waiting longer to pay for a renewal consumes the months that were left without renewing? This is absurd, an anti-consumer practice. It's really sad.

Despite the problem that Xenforo is not as complete as Invision and depends a bit on external developers (who eventually abandon their applications), I decided to choose Xenforo because in addition to being cheaper, apparently the usage license is permanent to renew.

I want to maintain a forum as a hobby. Not much earnings, just some ads to help pay for hosting. I don't intend to sell any content, it's just fan content. So it doesn't make sense for me to have to spend 200 dollars a year on renewal because I don't have the income to do so.

And Xenforo offers more free addons. It would be very interesting if some third-party addons could be officially offered by Xenforo, such as Resources, Media Gallery and Importers. This would make Xenforo more complete and stable.

Anyway, I've just decided that I'm going to buy a Xenforo license soon. I will definitely be satisfied with my new forum after the migration.