Growing an audience
Running the business
Both cover website builders. Here is what separates them on price, billing, what you can take with you, and coverage.
| Discourse | Framer | |
|---|---|---|
| Starting price | From $100 | From $10 |
| Pricing model | Free plan, paid tiers | Free plan, paid tiers |
| Free tier | Yes | Yes |
| Billing | Monthly or annual | Monthly or annual |
| Free trial | Not stated | None |
| API | Yes | Not stated |
| Data export | Everything, in an open format | Not stated |
| Their cut | Not stated | Not stated |
| Runs on | Web, Linux | Web |
| Covers | Community Platforms, Website Builders | Website Builders, Landing Pages & Funnels |
| Works with | Nothing in particular | Nothing in particular |
| Founded | Not listed | Not listed |
| Reader rating | No reviews yet | No reviews yet |
| Live deals | None right now | None right now |
Forum software, hosted or run yourself
Discourse is the forum the internet settled on: threaded, searchable, indexed by Google, and open source, so a community that outgrows the hosted plans can take the database and run it on its own server. That escape hatch is the argument for it over anything closed. The hosted pricing starts where a hobby project stops, and self-hosting swaps the bill for a sysadmin.
Our note
The reason to choose this over Circle or Mighty Networks is that the conversation is public and indexed, which makes the forum an asset rather than a cost. The reason not to is that it is a forum, and an audience raised on Discord will find it slow.
Only on this side
Design a site and publish it from the same canvas
Framer collapses the gap between designing a page and shipping it: the canvas is the site, and publishing is a button rather than a handoff. For a creator that means a portfolio or launch page that looks designed without hiring anybody. The CMS is real but small, so a blog with hundreds of posts belongs elsewhere.
Our note
Carrd is a tenth of the price and enough for a link page. Framer earns the difference when the site has to grow, has repeated content, or has to look like nobody used a template.
Only on this side
Ratings are the average of reviews readers left. The facts are stated by each tool’s own listing and are not verified by CloutStack. How we make money.