Side by side
HelloBox vs Scoold
Both stand on customer community software. Which one you can start free with, which one lets you read the code, and what each costs once you pay.
Free plan APIWeb
Choose HelloBox if you want a hosted community with flexible publishing, member controls, newsletters, and integrations. The free plan has limited features and modest member and view caps; paid plans begin at $5 a month.
Visit HelloBox
Free plan APISelf-hostedWeb
Scoold combines Q&A, forum and knowledge-base functions with self-hosted deployment and an API. Its free caps are specific, while Pro adds identity and chat options; check the plan limits against your setup.
Visit ScooldThe facts
| HelloBox | Scoold | |
|---|---|---|
| Free plan | Yes | Yes |
| Open source | No | Not published |
| Runs on | API, Web | API, Self-hosted, Web |
| Lowest paid plan | Starter: $5 a month | Scoold Pro: €499, paid once |
| Plans published | 6 | 3 |
| Maker | Not published | Not published |
| Website | hellobox.co | scoold.com |
| On customer community software | #3 of 37 | #7 of 37 |
HelloBox: what it does well
- Hosting, scaling, backups, and SSL are handled by HelloBox.
- Communities can be public or private, with member approval options.
- Editor includes rich-text, inline, Markdown, and four block types.
- AI assistant can revise, summarize, continue, and draft posts.
- Automatic posting to Twitter, Slack, and Discord is listed.
What to know first
- Free plan is limited to 50 members and 10K monthly views.
- Free plan has limited features and uses a .hellobox.co subdomain.
- Paid memberships and premium content are described as roadmap items.
Scoold: what it does well
- Self-hosted deployment keeps data on a team's infrastructure.
- Full-text search indexes community content.
- Markdown, media, files and code snippets are supported.
- A RESTful JSON API has an OpenAPI specification.
- Pro includes updates and support for 12 months.
What to know first
- Free plan caps spaces, admins and whitelisted identity domains.
- Chat integrations are marked Pro.
- Deployment requires Java 21 or higher and a Para backend.
Alternatives to HelloBox Alternatives to Scoold The whole list