Community website builder
Members, spaces, messaging and moderation from one free plugin, on hosting you choose. Not a hosted builder with a monthly bill, and this page is upfront about what that trade costs you and what it buys.
How you build it
This is the whole job. It is admin work on a WordPress site, not a development project, and most of it is decisions rather than clicks.
BuddyNext is a WordPress plugin, so it goes on a site you already have or a fresh WordPress install. There is no separate account, no subdomain and no export problem later.
Three or four to start, not fifteen. Empty rooms read as abandoned, so open the ones your members will actually use and add more when they ask.
Profile fields, with per-field privacy each member controls. Keep the list short; people finish short forms.
It restyles from CSS tokens rather than forcing a bundled theme, so the community looks like the rest of your site. BuddyX and Reign are built for it if you want a head start.
Members sign in with standard WordPress accounts. If you already have users, they are already members.
The short answer
To build a community website on WordPress, install a community plugin, decide who can join, open a few spaces and invite a first group. BuddyNext is that plugin. It adds a feed, member profiles, a directory, spaces, messaging, notifications and moderation to a site you host.
"Builder" can mean a drag-and-drop tool, and this is not one. It is closer to adding a store with WooCommerce: you install it, set it up in the admin, and the site becomes a community. The upside is that you keep the domain, the members and the data.
Everything above is BuddyNext Free. The line-by-line split with Pro is on the Free vs Pro page.
An existing site
Install BuddyNext on the site you already run. It does not replace your theme or move your content. It adds community pages beside what you have, and your current users can sign in to them.
You need WordPress 6.9 or newer, PHP 8.1 or newer and pretty permalinks. If your permalinks are set to Plain, BuddyNext shows a one-click button that switches them to Post name.
Upload the plugin under Plugins, Add New, then activate it. It creates the Activity, Members, Spaces, Notifications and Login pages with readable links, plus Messages when WPMediaVerse is active.
Seven short steps set the name, colour, registration mode, profile fields, space categories and pages. Nothing in it is permanent, and the pages you already have are left alone.
The community pages are normal WordPress pages. Add them to your menu, or let the wizard make the feed your home page if the site still shows the default blog.
Members sign in with standard WordPress accounts, so people who already have an account on your site are already members. Choose open, invite-only or admin-approval registration for everyone new.
Spaces are the groups. Open three or four, post a welcome in each and invite a first small group by email or an invite link.
BuddyNext draws its own community interface: the navigation rail, the feed, spaces, the directory, profiles and messaging. Your theme supplies the header, footer, base fonts and site colours around it. So you can keep the theme you have. BuddyX is free and built for community sites, and BuddyX Pro and Reign are premium themes from the same team. The theme guide shows the same community on two themes.
Your options
Four routes get you a community website. Each wins somewhere, so here is a fair comparison.
Choose a hosted builder if you want nothing to maintain. Choose WordPress if you want to own the domain and the member list, already run a WordPress site, or want to add paid access without a platform fee. For the cost side, the community platform cost guide shows how the models differ.
Pick a shape
The same pieces combine into very different sites. These are the common shapes, with the tier each one needs. The worked examples further down go deeper on each pattern.
Mixing is normal. A paid cohort can sit next to a free public feed on the same site, because access is decided space by space. Start with the shape closest to yours and change it as members show you what they use.
Before you launch
A community website is never finished. Spend the first month answering every post, then look at what members actually use and drop the spaces they ignore. Pin one post per space so newcomers see what the room is for. Ask a few early members to help moderate, because shared moderation keeps replies quick as the numbers grow. Your theme, your menu and your content stay yours the whole time.
The Free plugin costs $0. You pay for hosting and a domain. Pro is optional: $149, $249 or $399 a year for 1, 5 or unlimited sites, or a one-time lifetime licence. There is no per-member fee, and BuddyNext takes no cut of what you charge. When you add paid plans, payments go through your own Stripe or PayPal account. The pricing page has the tiers and a worked three-year example.
Most community websites start on Free. Add Pro when you want to charge for access with membership plans and gated spaces, send broadcast or welcome email, get real-time updates, or see analytics. Pro installs on top of Free and never removes anything you use. See how membership plans work.
BuddyPress and BuddyBoss communities move with the free importer. From a hosted platform there is no direct importer: export members' emails where the platform allows it, then send a bulk invitation from a CSV file. The migration guides cover the details.
Community website examples
22 worked examples, each written up as its own guide: what the pattern needs, what it costs to run, and where it usually goes wrong.
All of them live in the use cases hub.
Where you are now
The right next step is different depending on what you are running today, so here are four, rather than one button for everybody.
Then the fastest way to judge this is to use it. The sandbox spins up a real community you can post in, and you can throw it away afterwards.
The bill grows with your membership and the members sit on their servers. Moving is the part people assume is impossible, so it is worth reading what it actually involves before you renew.
Your members keep their WordPress logins, so nobody re-registers. The free BuddyNext Importer brings the rest across: members, profile fields, groups, activity, forums, media and private messages.
Migrating from BuddyPress Migrating from BuddyBoss What the importer moves
A full REST API ships in the free core, so a custom front end or an integration is a first-class path rather than a retrofit. The plugin source is public, so you can read it before you commit a client to it.
See it for real
Every screen below is BuddyNext running inside a real WordPress theme. Click any screen to open it full size.
Sandbox demo
One click builds a private copy of our demo community, with members, spaces and posts already in it. InstaWP asks for an email to create it, it lasts four hours, and nobody else sees what you change.
Prefer to watch first? See the tutorials.
What to try in the demo
From the same team
BuddyNext runs on its own. These are separate plugins from the same team, for when the community needs more than a feed and spaces.
MediaVerse A separate plugin for direct messages and photo or file posts. Its bridge is part of BuddyNext Free, and the free WPMediaVerse is enough to start. Visit MediaVerse → 
Jetonomy A separate plugin for discussions and forums. Its bridge adds a Forum tab inside spaces and is part of BuddyNext Free. Visit Jetonomy → 
Learnomy A separate courses plugin. Its bridge surfaces courses in the community and ships in BuddyNext Pro. Visit Learnomy → 
Eventonomy A separate events plugin. Its bridge shows events in the community and ships in BuddyNext Pro, which also supplies RSVPs. Visit Eventonomy → 
WP Career Board A separate jobs board plugin. Its bridge surfaces jobs in the community and ships in BuddyNext Pro. Visit WP Career Board → Questions
Not in the Wix or Squarespace sense, and it is worth being clear about that. BuddyNext is a WordPress plugin: you install it on a WordPress site and configure spaces, profile fields and permissions from the admin. What you get for that is a community you host yourself, with no per-member pricing and no platform that can change its terms. If you want a hosted builder with nothing to install, Circle and Mighty Networks do that well and we compare against both.
Member communities of most shapes: alumni networks, coaching and membership communities, brand and customer communities, marketplaces, internal team spaces, neighbourhood groups, fan communities and product feedback boards. Each of those is written up as a worked example on this page, with what the pattern needs and where it usually goes wrong.
To launch, no. Installing a plugin and choosing your spaces is admin work, not development. A developer becomes useful if you want a custom front end or an integration, and for that a full REST API ships in the free core.
The community software is free and GPL, including the companions for forums, media and gamification. You pay for WordPress hosting, which for a small community is a few dollars a month. Pro is optional and adds group and real-time messaging, gated and tiered spaces, and paywalls.
If you are on BuddyPress or BuddyBoss, yes, and with the free BuddyNext Importer: members, profile fields, groups, activity history, forums, media and private messages. If you are on a hosted platform, our team has run those migrations through the source platform API, so ask us rather than starting over.
Install BuddyNext on the site you already run, activate it, and run the setup wizard. It creates the Activity, Members and Spaces pages, and spaces are the groups. Existing users become members because BuddyNext uses standard WordPress accounts. It works inside any theme, so nothing about your current site has to move.
Install a community engine on WordPress, decide who can join, open a few spaces and invite a small first group. With BuddyNext the plugin is free and setup is a seven-step wizard. Most of the work is deciding what members will do there, not the clicks.
Yes. BuddyNext brings its own community interface, and your theme controls the header, footer, base fonts and site colours around it. BuddyX is free and built for community sites, and BuddyX Pro and Reign are premium options, but you do not need any of them.
Yes. Members are standard WordPress accounts, so anyone who already has an account on your site can sign in to the community. New sign-ups follow the registration mode you pick in the wizard.
The core plugin is free, so you pay for hosting and a domain. Pro is optional, from $149 a year for one site or from $399 once for lifetime, and there is no per-member fee or cut of what you charge. The <a href="/pricing/">pricing page</a> lists every tier.
See it in action
How to build a community website on WordPress, then real ones: a creator academy and a local community, each on one site.
Install the free core on a WordPress site and open your first space today.
What a community platform has to do, and what changes once you host it yourself.
What a social network plugin has to include before it can replace a stack of add-ons.
The build itself: the steps involved and what it actually costs to run.
The two kinds of membership site, and which software each one actually needs.
Charging for access to the community itself, and where that differs from gating content.
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