head to head · open source
Flarum vs symphony
Flarum has 16,400 GitHub stars, 1,668 forks, 1 open issues and last shipped 22 days ago. symphony has 2,939 stars, 507 forks, 2 open issues and last shipped 9 days ago. Flarum leads on adoption by 458% (16,400 vs 2,939 stars). Flarum is written in PHP under MIT; symphony is written in Java under AGPL-3.0. Flarum has attracted 10% as many forks as stars, symphony 17%. symphony 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.
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Side by side
| Flarum | symphony | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 16K | ★ 2.9K |
| License | MIT | AGPL-3.0 |
| Written in | PHP | Java |
| Last push | 2026-08-27 | 2026-09-09 |
| Forks | ⑂ 1.7K | ⑂ 507 |
| 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 symphony if
- You want the symphony feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the AGPL-3.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Java
- You evaluated both and symphony fits your workflow better
About Flarum
Flarum is an open source forum software project for building and running online community discussions on a website. It is positioned as a simple discussion platform with a fast interface and a PHP based application, and it is distributed under the MIT License. It lives in the PHP web application ecosystem, and its topics include forum, Laravel, and PHP.
read the full Flarum overview →
About symphony
Symphony is a community platform implemented in Java under the AGPL 3.0 license. It combines a discussion forum, a Q&A site, a social network with sharing, friends, and games, and blog like publishing in one system. The project lives in the Java ecosystem and is published through the B3log website and official discussion area.
read the full symphony overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Flarum or symphony more popular?
Flarum has 16,400 GitHub stars and symphony has 2,939. Flarum has the larger community by that measure.
Are Flarum and symphony free?
Both are open source. Flarum is licensed under MIT and symphony under AGPL-3.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Flarum and symphony?
Flarum is written in PHP and symphony in Java. 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 symphony?
Choose Flarum if you want the larger community (16,400 stars) or its MIT licence terms. Choose symphony if its feature set, stack or AGPL-3.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.