Hi, I'm trying to get some suggestions as to a reliable free forum hosting service. It's been kind of exasperating as I've been trying all kinds of Google searches to come up with reviews of forum hosting services and/or discussions of such, but no luck. This seems like the best forum hosting thread I've found yet, so I thought I'd try my luck here. Thought I'd see a thread on forum hosting services, but don't see one, so I'll ask the question here. We're currently using ForumUp.co.uk, which has turned into a disaster of late as it's continuously down. The whole system now seems precarious as it's maintained by a single person with notoriously poor communication with other mods. Anyway, found a list of free forum hosting services (www.awesomestyles.com/resources/free-forum-hosting), but without any real feedback on them. So if anyone can suggest one that's more reliable than others, I'd be grateful. Lastly, as a related aside, as we're on a phpbb forum at the moment if we moved to another phpbb provider, would we be able to migrate the forum/data over? If so, can anyone point me to some info on how we'd do that? Thanks!
Don't know, hadn't considered it. We just have a small board and the free hosting has been fine until the ForumUp server crapped out this week. Seems like there are many similar free hosting services out there, just can't seem to find any reviews/feedback on them.
ProphpBB.com offers free phpBB 3 hosting, as well as premium plans (hosted by ProphpBB, not third party). You can transfer your data over, however any mods or styles should be removed. Whilst ProphpBB doesn't have as many modifications as other hosts, It's stability is unmatched. Only 250 minutes downtime since January 08. You can always start your a new forum and see if you like the service and support before moving your forum. http://prophpbb.com
If you can try hosting yourself. I use Vidahost and you can either pay for the year or pay monthly. Well worth it and you get a free domain name too
Ideally, you don't want to use a "Free Forum Host" such as Forumotion, FreeForums, prophpBB or any of the above. Like ascensions said, you ought to host yourself. http://fi.st is a reliable post to host (cPanel hosting) service that a number of members from our community have turned to for hosting. There's nothing to lose besides a few minutes of your time (making a handful of posts every month), and you'll reap the rewards from being self-hosted. You won't be stuck within the restrictions of a free forum host, and you'll have full control on how to expand, being able to install whichever mods / add-ons / styles you want...as well as being able to take a database backup and move whenever you like.
ForumMotion is always reliable. ! I would recommend CreateMyBB but, one day it lost some forums DB's including mines.
I used to use Free hosting for my forums and realized its not so great when your forum start growing. If you can find 5$ worth ads then try Godaddy economy hosting.