I’ve been using vBulletin again after many years of not using it.
A Little History: I used vBulletin back in the day when 3.X was popular. After company changes and 4.X and 5.X, I left and headed over to the newly launched XenForo. I pretty much stayed on XenForo since then.
I saw that vBulletin came out with a new version. For right under $200 (one-time payment), you get all of version 6 downloads for free. So, I gave it a shot to see what it’s like.
Purchasing it was simple. However, I made a mistake on my address and vBulletin delayed the purchase until they confirmed my correct information. I applaud them for doing that because security matters and they were taking it seriously.
Once I got in downloaded – I created OFF TOPIC FORUM with it.
I have to say, so far, I’m pretty impressed with vBulletin 6.0.7 (the only version I’ve used so far).
It’s no XenForo by any means. They need to add more features to get it even close to XenForo. Judging by the tracker, it looks like more features are on the way or at least they are being suggested and upvoted. I even made a suggestion. My suggestion is a feature to allow forum title icons to be created per channel. I think that would be an interesting feature.
Feature-wise, vBulletin has plenty of great ones, including:
- A modern forum
- A powerful AdminCP
- Built-in member blogs
- Built-in member articles
- Built-in member social groups
But they’re behind on a lot of things, too, including:
- Alerts – you get notifications, but you have to go to a separate page to see any information about them.
- Signatures – The signature is in a really odd spot in terms of editing it. It should be moved into the profile editing location, IMO.
- Auto-embed – You have to use BB code to embed a YouTube video, and it doesn’t render the title. I think just pasting a link and it auto-embedding would be better.
- Addons – There is one person making addons for vBulletin 6. There is a lack of addons for the software.
- Themes – There aren’t a lot of options for this, either.
I hope to see more changes to this particular version of vBulletin. It is very promising and could be a great platform if they continue to make it better.
Support-wise. It almost seems that Wayne Luke is the only guy giving support. I think I saw another guy, too. But they’re still fast about it and friendly. I really try to figure stuff out myself before asking for help.
If you like discussing all topics, please join OFF TOPIC FORUM to help support me and to give vBulletin 6 a test drive as a user.
Comment below and tell me what you think about vBulletin 6 or the platform in general!