XenForo Is So Superior to vBulletin its ridiculous....

XenBurger

Active member
Figured I'd throw this into the Pre-Sales forum for anyone who is debating whether to switch.

vBulletin user for 10 years. Two sites. 60,000+ members. 700,000 posts, etc.

XenForo versus vBulletin: Google SEO Optimization

Switched to XenForo, was able to clean up all our thin content (noindex user profiles, noindex threads with less than 100 characters, require minimum # of words in a Thread Title, and a ton of other SEO related functions with the addons available for this software). SEO options that come default with the software are above and beyond VB by leaps and bounds.

Result: 6 months later our forum traffic has quadrupled. We are averaging 165 users in Analytics "realtime" right now, and the forum software reports upwards of 700 active user sessions browsing the forums in a given 15 minute period, as mass quantities of high quality threads are getting indexed, and Google is removing all our "thin content" pages.

XenForo versus vBulletin: Preventing Spam

Spam handling is just incredible. one of our vBulletins - with all the bells and whistles of spam registration prevention turned ON - was still overrun with nearly 20,000 fake accounts that we simply couldn't stop from registering.

Result: Over the last 6 months, with Question and Answer, registration timers, and several other XF spam handling functions enabled, we have had a grand total of ZERO spam registrations succeed to go through, and on an average week, I might get 1 user that would have made it through, had it not been for XF's "safety net" that prompts me to approve or reject them - kindly telling me that the user's email or username or IP matches a previously banned user, or blacklisted account.

XenForo vs vBulletin: Usability

I have a forum full of grumpy people who are miserable. They hate change. And when I have switched forum softwares in the past, I had to listen to months of complaining. When we switched to XF, the reaction was not a single complaint from anyone. People absolutely love the UIX theme (its gorgeous in my opinion - the best one on the market hands down - great job @Mike Creuzer ), and it has caused participation to skyrocket in our first several months.

XenForo versus vBulletin: Mobile Friendliness

I wont even try to tell you how terrible vBulletin is for mobile. XF dominates in this regard as well.

XenForo versus vBulletin: Notices and User Communication

Floating notices (a sexy opaque, dismissable black box that appears bottom right when you want to alert people) have enabled me to communicate with users non-invasively for the first time anytime I need to. This has helped me push hundreds/thousands of views to specific threads, or new articles we've posted outside the forums. There are also options for a marquee with default functionality.

XenForo versus vBulletin: Addons and Extensions

The addon community for XF is staggeringly better. I wont mention any website names, but there are highly professional groups that major in creating addons, as well as many proficient users here who create them - to do anything and everything you could possibly imagine. The whole process is far more polished and well-done for XF compared to vBulletin.

In any case - I came here to say thanks to the XF devs for doing an amazing job and thought it might actually be a useful thing to put into Pre-Sales. If you're debating whether you should switch from vBulletin to XF - do it. The vBulletin team has, in my opinion, stopped putting out a quality product.
 
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Because of my job i have to find and watch a lot of boards; the most ones are still vb4. The most beautiful ones are still vb4. I would not change my xf to a vb4, but i understand that a lot of people just dont want to switch, because they know what they have, they like what they have and they still miss some add-ons.
 
xenforo is an upgrade to vbulletin in many ways. Mobile friendliness, spam cleaner, UIX, But its also a step back in some area's. I had to abandon my events, can't send a newsletter to my members without breaking laws, no friends which is mainly problem with privacy issues, no reputation.
I have to install dozens of addons for basic functionality. Xenforo has a mass of addons that are buggy and problematic or that conflict with each other. There is a serious quality issue in the XF resources. My bug tracker currently has 86 bug reports for XF addons.
Thankfully there also are a small number of amazing developers who create high quality addons, functions, services and are very reliable. I do hope to discover more.
All in all the move from vb4 to xf has been a major step forward which my members enjoy.
 
Aside from anything else, good or bad, (much of which is a matter of taste anyway) my biggest gripe is that XF doesn't properly handle Moderator permissions. By which I mean - they work but are stupidly cumbersome to create/maintain
 
Aside from anything else, good or bad, (much of which is a matter of taste anyway) my biggest gripe is that XF doesn't properly handle Moderator permissions. By which I mean - they work but are stupidly cumbersome to create/maintain
Can you elaborate, please? I ask because I find them easy to maintain, though my usage case may be different to yours.
 
...the UIX theme (its gorgeous in my opinion - the best one on the market hands down...
I couldn't agree more. I can always tell when I visit a XF forum. It just has that "smooth as glass" look to it.
Floating notices (a sexy opaque, dismissable black box that appears bottom right when you want to alert people) have enabled me to communicate with users non-invasively for the first time anytime I need to.
I love the black opaque floating notices. The functionality, as well as probably being one of the coolest things I've seen on the internet (as well as the hover effect on the nodes' descriptions).
 
Can you elaborate, please? I ask because I find them easy to maintain, though my usage case may be different to yours.
Simple example. This refers to permissions that Moderators have ONLY within "their" area of responsibility - not board-wide. Suppose we wish to (newly) allow Moderators to do something they previously couldn't do - or vice-versa. Maybe they couldn't edit others' posts but now we want them to (but only in "their" areas); or maybe we have a new add-on with a separate permission we want to allow.

vB: One checkbox.
XF: n checkboxes on n separate pages, where n is the number of moderator-forum combinations we have. Ours is 231.
 
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