XenForo Favorite XenForo Paid Addons

[Shawn Gossman]

What are your favorite XenForo paid addons?

Who are among your favorite paid addon creators?

 

[Tracy]

Pretty much anything from Bob over at XenAddons for heavy lifting and extending the site to more than a forum with a gallery/resource site.
For some of the back end stuff is Xon.... but I'm still waiting on one of my main paid add-ons from him to get updated to 2.3 compatibility so I can upgrade.
I think one of the reasons that he's been slow to upgrade it is because XenForo did some of what his add-on offers in their new 2.3 core so he's got to redesign it. I prefer his add-on because it, as is normal with XenForo add-ons, extends the bare bones basic of what XF offers in ways that benefit the site.

 

[Shawn Gossman]

Xon and Bob are definitely good ones.

I have Xon's addon list to add as the community grows if I need extra settings for mentions, PMs, etc. Xon is good about utility addons.

 

[Tracy]

Yep, Xon's ElasticSearch Essentials was pretty much required on 2.2.x and earlier if you wanted any decent ability out of Enhanced Search other than bare basics.
His add-on allows tweaks of several of the ES search settings for priority and such. Stuff that XenForo could have easily included but for whatever reason they took the easy way out.
They have improved the search in 2.3 and as I mentioned I have a feeling this is one of the issues of the refactoring that Xon has to do and is slowing him down on it.
Xon has been one of the most stable add-on developers for core enhancements to XenForo that there is. He brings so much of what XenForo should have had core to the XF admins.
It's just sad that there is such a dependence on third party add-ons required for some admins that want to offer more than a basic forum related site. It slows down adoption of new versions when the developers, for whatever reason, cannot get their add-ons updated quickly.

I also like (and use) XFRM and XFMG, but they are in dire need of updating to make them more usable. They have sat ignored for years as far as major improvements go.

 

[Shawn Gossman]

I also like (and use) XFRM and XFMG, but they are in dire need of updating to make them more usable. They have sat ignored for years as far as major improvements go.

I like the Resource Manager

I've found no big use for the media manager yet. Even on my hiking forum, members said they'd rather post photos on the main forum.

So, I've not installed it.

 

[Tracy]

I like the Resource Manager

I've found no big use for the media manager yet. Even on my hiking forum, members said they'd rather post photos on the main forum.

So, I've not installed it.

The mirror function is nice so that it gives a central area for images for those that may not want to filter through multiple posts.
The downfall is if you use custom fields with your thread, they don't get duplicated and you only see a link to the initial post. Not the best solution and just another case of the Xenforo developers not really fully thinking fully threw tying all their add-ons together into an integrated system.

 

[Shawn Gossman]

For now, I'll probably skip on using the Media addon until I can find it useful for my forums.

Like for here, I feel like it would serve no purpose at all.

 

[AWS]

The only paid addon I use is Bob's link directory. Other than that I don't use any paid 3rd party addons.

Some of the popular paid addons are rather pricey. I seen a couple that costs as much as xenforo.

 

[Tracy]

Some of the popular paid addons are rather pricey. I seen a couple that costs as much as xenforo.

Yeah, I have a few hundred invested in the XenAddons on the site. There are a few add-ons that are even more expensive, but they tend to be rather niche.
And then you get to renew them each year in addition. It's why I've told people that just because the initial XenForo price may be less than something like Invision, your ultimate cost for the site may be equal to or more than what you would pay for Invision.