head to head · open source
Flarum vs answer
Flarum has 16,441 GitHub stars, 1,676 forks, 1 open issues and last shipped 25 days ago. answer has 15,708 stars, 1,382 forks, 137 open issues and last shipped 13 days ago. Flarum leads on adoption by 5% (16,441 vs 15,708 stars). Flarum is written in PHP under MIT; answer is written in Go under Apache-2.0. Flarum has attracted 10% as many forks as stars, answer 9%. answer was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (forum), so they are genuine substitutes rather than adjacent tools.
Two open source projects, one decision. Both are free and self-hostable — the differences are community size, license terms, language stack and release pace.
← all 20902 open source comparisons
Side by side
| Flarum | answer | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 16K | ★ 16K |
| License | MIT | Apache-2.0 |
| Written in | PHP | Go |
| Last push | 2026-10-09 | 2026-10-21 |
| Forks | ⑂ 1.7K | ⑂ 1.4K |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Flarum if
- You weight community size — 16K stars and counting
- You want the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches PHP
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick answer if
- You want the answer feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Go
- You evaluated both and answer fits your workflow better
About Flarum
About Flarum Flarum is a delightfully simple discussion platform for your website. It's fast and easy to use, with all the features you need to run a successful community. It is designed to be: Fast and simple. No clutter, no bloat, no complex dependencies. Flarum is built with PHP so it’s quick and easy to deploy. The interface is powered by Mithril, a performant JavaScript framework with a tiny footprint. Beautiful and responsive. This is forum software for humans. Flarum is carefully designed to be consistent and intuitive across platforms, out of the box. Powerful and extensible. Customize, extend, and…
read the full Flarum overview →
About answer
Apache Answer Build Q&A platform A Q&A platform software for teams at any scales. Whether it’s a community forum, help center, or knowledge management platform, you can always count on Answer. To learn more about the project, visit answer.apache.org. Screenshots Quick start Running with docker For more information, see Installation. Plugins Answer provides a plugin system for developers to create custom plugins and expand Answer’s features. You can find the plugin documentation here. We value your feedback and suggestions to improve our documentation. If you have any comments or questions, please feel free to…
read the full answer overview →
More in Content & Publishing
Related comparisons
More Community Platforms projects
Compare either of these against the rest of the Community Platforms field.
Frequently asked questions
Is Flarum or answer more popular?
Flarum has 16,441 GitHub stars and answer has 15,708. Flarum has the larger community by that measure.
Are Flarum and answer free?
Both are open source. Flarum is licensed under MIT and answer under Apache-2.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Flarum and answer?
Flarum is written in PHP and answer in Go. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, Flarum or answer?
Choose Flarum if you want the larger community (16,441 stars) or its MIT licence terms. Choose answer if its feature set, stack or Apache-2.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.