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Discourse vs Disqus: What are the differences?
What is Discourse? The 100% open source, next-generation discussion platform built for the next decade of the Internet. Discourse is a simple, flat forum, where replies flow down the page in a line. Replies are attached to the bottom and top of each post, so you can optionally expand the context of the conversation – without breaking your flow.
What is Disqus? Elevating the discussion, anywhere on the web. Disqus looks to make it very easy and rewarding for people to interact on websites using its system. Commenters can build reputation and carry their contributions from one website to the next.
Discourse and Disqus are primarily classified as "Forums" and "Commenting Service" tools respectively.
Some of the features offered by Discourse are:
- Remembers your place
- Log in with … anything
- Paste to share images
On the other hand, Disqus provides the following key features:
- Clean & Intuitive- We designed the platform to be clutter-free, which keeps people's eyes focused on the discussion itself.
- Fully real-time Live discussions- Discussions unfold in real-time. Comments stream as they are posted and user activity indicates life on your website.
- Activity indicators- Indicators make it easier for people to notice, see, and interact with new content and activity as it happens.
"Open source" is the top reason why over 20 developers like Discourse, while over 140 developers mention "Ease of use" as the leading cause for choosing Disqus.
Discourse is an open source tool with 28.6K GitHub stars and 6.47K GitHub forks. Here's a link to Discourse's open source repository on GitHub.
According to the StackShare community, Disqus has a broader approval, being mentioned in 458 company stacks & 89 developers stacks; compared to Discourse, which is listed in 42 company stacks and 7 developer stacks.
Pros of Discourse
- Open source28
- Fast19
- Email digests13
- Better than a stereotypical forum9
- Perfect for communities of any size8
- It's perfect to build real communities7
- Made by same folks from stackoverflow7
- Built with Ember.js7
- Great customer support6
- Made by consolidated team with a working business3
- Translated into a lot of Languages3
- Configurations3
- Easy flag resolution2
Pros of Disqus
- Ease of use141
- Free116
- Great ui62
- Sign-up not required45
- Wordpress integration40
- Replies26
- Up votes18
- Threaded discussion8
- Easy ghost integration6
- Tumblr Integration4
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Cons of Discourse
- Heavy on server3
- Difficult to extend2
- Notifications aren't great on mobile due to being a PWA2
Cons of Disqus
- Ads4
- Poor support1
- Bugs with migration tool1
