Choose your plan
Every board starts on a 30 day free trial, and nothing in this guide is a decision you need to make on day one. But it helps to know the shape of the plans, because they map to stages of a community's life.
The short version
Free keeps a small board running: the full forum, modest storage, ForumSpark branding on.
Starter is the classic, lightweight edition for a simple forum that just needs to work, with room to store more.
Launch is where a serious community usually begins: branding removal, the Blog, the Media Gallery, the Marketplace, Page Studio for building a site around your forum, and AI topic summaries.
Earn adds the money and community layer: member subscriptions and paid groups, Clubs, Priority Support, Ask the Forum, and the AI page generator.
Scale is Earn with everything turned up: the most storage, the highest AI quotas, early access to new features and advanced analytics.
Prices and the full feature table live on the pricing page at forumspark.net, which is always the current source. This guide is about which plan fits which board, not the numbers.
Two things every plan includes
A custom domain: connecting your own domain works on every plan, including Free. And your data is yours: upgrading, downgrading or leaving never holds your community hostage.
Changing your mind
Plans change from Overview, then Premium in the admin panel, and take effect immediately. Features from a higher plan switch off gracefully if you move down: the data stays, the feature just goes dormant until you come back.
yourboard.forumspark.net/admin
Your plan, and everything it unlocks, in Overview then Premium.
That's the end of Getting started. From here the docs fan out: Your board for structure and settings, Design and themes for the look, Extensions for the extras.