Popular WordPress forum plugins for forums and online communities
Image Source: Clker-Free-Vector-Images – Pixabay.com / License: CC0 Public Domain There are a handful of WordPress forum plugins available that allow you to create fully integrated online communities using WordPress. Long gone are the days of having little option but to install an entirely separate forum board solution which requires users to endure another membership registration and login process. You can of course still opt in for this method of providing visitors an area to discuss topics, using software such as IP Board, MyBB, vBulletin, or phpBB – but there are downsides to this. Let’s see what they are and which WordPress forum plugins you can use instead.
Disadvantages of stand-alone forum boards
Firstly, as mentioned above, unless you run the gauntlet by attempting to integrate both sets of user tables from both WordPress and forum database’s, you’re going to be forcing your users to manage two separate user accounts. There are guides and products available that claim to do this, but they are a bit hit & miss, with many resources being vastly out-dated or seemingly abandoned leaving you stuck in the wilderness should you require assistance
Source: https://managewp.org/articles/13445/popular-wordpress-forum-plugins-for-forums-and-online-communities
source https://williechiu40.wordpress.com/2016/09/22/popular-wordpress-forum-plugins-for-forums-and-online-communities/