Introducing PWA for Your community - FluentCommunity 2.8.0
This one has been on the wishlist for a long time, and it is finally here.
Your members can now install your community on their phone. Not a bookmark. An actual PWA app. Your icon on their home screen, your name under it, and no browser bar wrapped around your content. They tap it and they are in.
The way it works is simple. There is a new Install App entry in the portal sidebar. Your member taps it once and that is the whole setup. No app store, no review process, no waiting for approval from anyone.
You get to decide how it looks. Set your App Name, a Short Name for the label under the icon, a Splash Screen Color for the moment it loads, and upload your own App Icon. The icon uploader checks the dimensions for you, so what you upload is what installs cleanly. The app follows your community theme too, light mode or dark, and the title bar keeps up.
Think about what this changes. Your community stops being a tab someone forgets to open. It sits on the home screen next to everything else they use every day.
Also in 2.8.0:
- Unlisted posts. Hidden from every feed and listing, but the direct link works fine. Good for meeting notes, drafts, and things you only share when asked.
- Sort direction on member and student lists. Oldest members first, newest first, A to Z, your call. It remembers what you picked.
- FluentCRM bounce suppression. Community emails skip addresses your CRM has marked bounced or complained, and members get a re-confirm button to switch notifications back on.
- Signed plugin updates. From now on, your site verifies that an update really came from us before it installs anything. Read more in the release post.
- Over twenty bug fixes, a full access control audit, and WordPress 7.1 compatibility.
Check out all the new features with screenshots here: https://fluentcommunity.co/blog/fluentcommunity-2-8-0/
More cooking 🙌
YESSSS!! Thank you!
We’re not worthy! 😂🙇♂️ Huge round of applause for the whole team - you guys absolutely crushed it! 👏👏👏
Jorge de los Reyes We can build cool stuff because we have the most amazing users in the whole WP ecosystem (I am 100% certain). 🙌
Shahjahan Jewel Every week it feels like there’s something new to celebrate. At this point, I’m just showing up with popcorn 🍿😂
Amazing work, as always! 🙌
I don't know how to express how amazing you guys are 😭
👏 great work team!
Ross FCA I used your PWA on my site. What will happen if I activate this one from the FluentCommunity? Thanks Ross!
George Khair I'm not sure! I've posted on my community asking for anyone to share their experience. I'll look into it and see what the differences are and ensure compatibility with my Push notifications etc. I'd hope it will just be seen as a PWA update on the client side rather than breaking anything or requiring a full reinstall.
Amazing! I’m glad we went fully Fluent ❤️
This is incredible! Been awaiting this one, thats for sure. 🙌 Does the PWA allow push notifications?
Jason Soper Good question, I would like to know as well. Shahjahan Jewel?
Jason Soper, Sascha Leem not yet. But push notification feature is enabled on this site, https://community.wpmanageninja.com/portal. If you add this site as PWA, and enabled push notifications, you will get push notifications. We will work on this in the upcoming days.
Tawsif Ahmed Riyad I added this site as PWA but I was not prompted to allow push notifications. Does that have to be enabled inside the community settings? For most PWA apps I have used it prompted on install
Jason Soper, you have to look for this.
Tawsif Ahmed Riyad got it working! I didn’t see it in the sidebar as I’m on mobile. I think it was under notification setting in my profile. was looking for it and clicked without paying attention to its location lol.
Just installed the most important one 😎
Looks super nice!! 🔥
P.S. Small piece of feedback: on iOS devices, I can’t see the “Install App” CTA. Any chance we could still show it and, when clicked, display a small pop-up with quick instructions on how to install the PWA on iOS? A short text or gif will be enough (for the non tech-savvy ones).
I think that would make the installation experience much more intuitive for iPhone/iPad users 🙌
Jorge de los Reyes +1 too haha
Jorge de los Reyes From experience, iOS is an utter pain for this and makes it so much more difficult than need be. You'll have a bit of a teething process coaching your members through it, but once it's installed it's installed so should only be temporary pain 😅
Jorge de los Reyes I cannot find the install at all on iOS. What am I missing?
Mike Cameron On iOS, you need to use the Share menu → Add to Home Screen. The docs already explain the process.
I guess the “Install App” CTA isn’t shown at all on iOS devices (and that’s precisely why I shared the feedback) 😅
It would be great if the CTA could still appear on iOS and (feature request) simply open a small pop-up explaining those steps.
Jorge de los Reyes i think always ask the same, when someones comes around with a PWA, because still i don't get it. Is there a difference between a PWA and saving the community to the home screen as usual on iOS?
Ross FCA No bueno 🥲😂
I guess the era of video tutorials has officially begun (again) haha
Jorge de los Reyes I could not get time to activate in this site. Have to do at the morning.
Manuel Müller On iOS, the installation process looks almost the same (Share > Add to home screen).
The difference is what happens afterwards 😎. With a properly configured PWA, the community can launch in its own standalone window (without the usual Browser UI), have its own icon, splash screen, app name, etc., so it feels much closer to a native app.
So yes, the way you add it on iOS is basically the same but the experience after installing it is different 🙂
A PWA can also support push notifications on iOS, (as long as the app implements Web Push 🙂): which it is not specified on the docs... So I guess, it may not be available... yet? 🫠
Jorge de los Reyes huh. I searched the docs and couldn't find anything at all on the PWA. I'll look again.
Mike Cameron I may have been a bit too optimistic with the “docs” part 😅
I meant that it wasn’t mentioned in the 2.8.0 release post. I haven’t checked the developer docs yet.
They are mentioned in the post, though, but specifically for fine-tuning the PWA design. It says nothing about push notifications. But hey, we do have those here atm. So probably is on the works now!
Jorge de los Reyes Thanks my friend!
Jorge de los Reyes Isn't this something you can always do on iOS? I've been using that for years to add "apps" to the home screen... It's not an app, though.
Sella Yoffe Manuel Müller if you add any site without PWA support to your iOS home screen its just a shortcut to that site in safari. PWA gives it an actual app like experience where it opens it its own interface without safari toolbars etc, shows separately on your app drawer, and enables support for offline cache and push notifications.
Ross FCA Thank you for the explanation.
Ross FCA maybe that’s why I didn’t get it in the First Place, because the toolbar part is wrong….no Safari toolbars Even without pwa🤔
Manuel Müller You won’t get the time, mobile connection, or battery status, though 😆
Basically, this is the first step toward push notifications :)
Manuel Müller that's this community though? Which has had PWA running for a while. If you add to home screen on a community without it you should just get a basic shortcut to safari.
Jorge de los Reyes Connection and Battery is shown in every App…..
But I get it now that PWA is not about Design (at least for iOS Users), but other things like push….
Ross FCA mine and your Community always looked like this on iOS (i never installed your PWA)….maybe it‘s an iOS thing that it automatically displays it this way 🤔
Manuel Müller Ops. totally right 🫡. I got confused with the screenshot I took 😄
Jorge de los Reyes I have an Android phone and I can't see the Install option of this community 🤷🏽
JF have you enabled it first under “features and add-ons” (settings)? 😄
Shahjahan Jewel A member of my community is trying to comment in unlisted post, it says:
Error
This post is not published yet
Bryan William That's a bug for sure. Will report to devs.
Shahjahan Jewel okay thanks
Jorge de los Reyes I didn't mean my community, I meant this community. Shahjahan Jewel said later that he didn't have time to activate here, but it's done now and I installed it. Thanks
GOD BLESS YOU GUYS!
Now this is what I call an update... 💚
Finally PWA is here... Oh my goodness, this is breathtaking.
I can't find that button either, and I'm not sure how to add the PWA to my community. What am I missing?
Sella Yoffe please check the release note blog post. You have to enable that from addons settings.
Shahjahan Jewel
As far as I understand now, on iOS, it's not showing the button, even though it is enabled.
About FluentCRM bounce suppression:
“Community emails skip addresses your CRM has marked bounced or complained, and members get a re-confirm button to switch notifications back on.”
Does this new setting also skip contacts whose status is Unsubscribed in FluentCRM?
For example: someone is subscribed to both the newsletter and the community. One day, they unsubscribe from the newsletter.
Would that also stop them from receiving community notification emails, even though they haven't opted out of community notifications?
Jorge de los Reyes CRM Unsubscribes still get email from community as users can manage their email notifications in the community. FCOM will skip for bounced/complained subscribers by default.
Shahjahan Jewel Thanks for clarifying! I’d still love to see a cohesive, global setting for this one day, though! I know there are already add-ons that can handle this, but having it built into the core would be super handy for ensuring better GDPR compliance.😄
Jorge de los Reyes community emails are actually transactional and they are your registered users and every email goes with link to customize their email notification preference. It should not be merged with CRM which is mostly used for marketing.
We added this feature because if an email got bounced then it’s just a waste of credits and bad for email sending reputation.
Shahjahan Jewel I agree regarding bounces and email reputation 👍
Sharing the bounce status between FluentCRM and FluentCommunity definitely makes sense 😅
BUT…
I’d not classify all community emails as transactional, though.
Under EU ePrivacy / direct marketing rules (and GDPR), the classification depends on the purpose and content of the email, rather than on whether the recipient is a registered user or whether the email is technically sent as a community notification.
And this could become problematic really soon!
For example, “someone replied to your post” or “your account was approved” would clearly be service/transactional notifications.
But if a community notification or digest contains promotional content (a product launch, an offer, an upsell, etc.), it can qualify as direct marketing.
And that’s where you could run into issues 😅
Having a link to manage notification preferences doesn’t by itself change that classification.
So I think there are actually three separate things here, in case it helps as feedback:
- Email deliverability / bounce status
- Community notification preferences
- Marketing consent
Sharing the first one between CRM and Community makes perfect sense. I’d just be careful about treating community notifications and marketing consent as legally equivalent categories. That’s why I was suggesting a global setting (because you never know if you’re going to share something with commercial purposes…).
If you post marketing/promotional content in the community and then notify users about that content by email, that notification itself qualify as direct marketing under EU rules (even though FluentCommunity technically treats it as a community notification). 😅
Just my two cents!
I’m mentioning it because I’ve seen similar cases where companies got into trouble for mixing service/transactional emails with promotional content without being able to demonstrate the appropriate consent or another valid basis for the marketing communication.
Something as simple as “We’ve updated the app! By the way, here’s a 20% discount” or “We’ve improved this feature , check out our new paid service” can turn what looks like a purely transactional/service email into a marketing communication under EU rules.
So I thought it was worth flagging before Community emails start covering more and more use cases 😄
Great work! FluentCommunity has really come a long way. 🙌
Finally, I've been waiting for native PWA since last year. Any news on push notifications?
+1 on push notifications. I love that native PWA is here.
I already made a custom PWA for the other Fluent plugins I use. It's kind of a Fluent Hub PWA of my own.
Marek I was asking the same, the PWA is really great, but now push notifications is really needed
Marek, push notifications will also come in the upcoming releases.
This is easily one of the best 2026 update. PWA option is a massive milestone for the fCommunity.
Brilliant job on executing this so perfectly!!! This is Amazing!
If possible:
-
please add a shortcode so we can place "Install App" button/block anywhere on the regular WP site since PWA (the regular WP site outside fCommunity will work also as PWA i guess but as a Hybrid - no offline mode for regular WP pages due to missing Service Worker)
-
add an option to force mobile access for Community only via PWA (*Pro) if possible of course - Admin could disable access without PWA (for free users or users with a tag) and show screen with a Install app button.
Note: to consider a SEO impact for using forced PWA access only - spiders should be able to crawl Public Community content somehow in this case
// Check if the app is running as an installed PWA
const isPWA = window.matchMedia('(display-mode: standalone)').matches
|| window.navigator.standalone
|| document.referrer.includes('android-app://');
if (!isPWA) {
// Hide your app container and show a blocker screen
document.getElementById('app-container').style.display = 'none';
document.getElementById('pwa-only-message').style.display = 'flex';
}
- can the starter PWA screen be more customizable (txt, img, link) by Admin (*Pro) - even add a delay x sec option to the app loading screen
- what is the best way if the user is logged out from PWA (ex: automatic browser cookies clean up) to display to the user only one field: login (no other fields like password, lang, forget pass) and once the login is provided a magic link is send to the user to login to PWA directly (when the user click the magic link can the PWA version be opened on mobile)
Fix needed: Firefox Focus browser doesnt show Install App button - I am not sure why (is it related to missing local storage/cache and blocking some scripts by the browser?)
That's awesome! Thanks for the fantastic update =)
There is a huge gap between 'Install App' button and 'Feed' if we set it to 'Sidebar Top' position.
Test device width is 384 px.
Diego Maradona, fixed in dev.
Tawsif Ahmed Riyad Awesome. Thanks
This is amazing!!! I just can't wait to try it out later... Thank you team so much. What an important update!!!
Awesome ! Thank you Team !!!
Best news EVAAAAAAH! Can't wait to take it for a spin! Thank you, guys! ❤️
PWA, very cool! I could see that being useful for other products as well, FluentCart for example. You could then have a nice PWA for your online store. Add push notifications and such and you've got a native e-commerce app experience of sorts.
Is PWA install button working also out of /portal/ slug? I mean on WP pages. I have my own PWA solution and I am thinking about switching to native one.
Not working...so i'm not switching yet 😣
Diego Maradona means same for me.
Tawsif Ahmed Riyad maybe you should think about this.
Diego Maradona it doesn't work even if the WP page is wrapped in the FluentCommunity Frame?
Jason Soper I am pretty sure not. I use also FC frame as many others.
Jason Soper A page is considered part of the PWA only when it falls within the service‑worker scope (for example, /portal/*) and successfully loads the PWA shell. Pages outside this route continue to open in the same browser tab, but they are treated as non‑PWA pages. Please let me know if I have misunderstood anything... ✌️😎🥹
Diego Maradona gotcha! Thanks for clarification.
Tawsif Ahmed Riyad May I kindly ask for your confirmation on this? I’m a bit confused now. Based on the image I uploaded (FC 2.8.1), the PWA version of FluentCommunity seems to work correctly, but the WordPress post or page does not. The difference can be clearly seen at the top section of the screen in both images...😩😄
Diego Maradona, Jason Soper, Drive Zone, we will work on to make all the WP pages under the PWA.
Please ignore this message. It has been resolved lickety split (in just a few hours!) thanks to the amazing guys at WPMN! And thanks Shahjahan Jewel.
So far this feature release looks like a big blunder on WPMN part. It has all us EXPERIENCED DEVELOPERS going in circles, and the praise is coming from people who haven't tried it yet. You guys need to get your act together and produce VIDEOS showing exactly how to make it happen in iOS as well as Android. In the Apple world in which I work, if I can't even see the "Install App" button anywhere how in the h**l am I going to get the non-tech-savvy clients to become even more easily engaged in our community. THIS ROLLOUT IS UNACCEPTABLE. Jeez.
Mark Halvorson Your anger is premature; what WP Ninja has done is the most honest and valuable gift to the community. You will soon realize how it works and just how much money and stress you will save. I take my hat off to WP Ninja; they have confirmed that choosing this team was the right decision.
Artur Abakarov You seem to be speaking to me as though I don't have 52 years of experience in software engineering, as though I didn't start creating websites in the late '90s, and as though I don't already own every WPMN product including a lifetime license to FluentCommunity. Using your customers to debug and point out flaws in a rollout is not good customer relations. This rollout feels rushed. If my time is being wasted, then I'm not the only one. It's not because "I don't understand." And I'm not angry, I'm disappointed in the company and people I love so much to use every product they produce.
Here is the point: IOS does not have API to create the PWA icon from a click, and that failed. We tested on Android and it worked with the click. So user have to manually add from the context menu of IOS browser. We are adding instructions as popup in the next version.
We already have a manifest file for this site so we have to migrate that first and enable here. We also have Push Notification service so that is also a blocker, as we have to make sure to add that to the manifest.
Shahjahan Jewel so push notifications through the PWA is currently in the works for a future version?
Jason Soper push notifications will be available in couple of weeks.
Shahjahan Jewel awesome!
Shahjahan Jewel amazing... Looking forward. Thank to you and the whole team
Amazing, Fluent team you are the best Shahjahan Jewel 😀👍
OMG, thank you so much! My Community kept asking about an App and I am so happy to tell them the good news immediately 🤩
Quick question: Will we be able to see in the Analytics, how many have the App installed, which device they are using how often, etc? Don't know if that is possible with PWAs
IT'S AWESOME!!! I've just talked to a client and pretty interested in getting it because of the app! :D Thanks! it's a very nice surprise!
Although, the logo doesn't show with Firefox in Android :S
Thank you, team! Great job. 👊
does it work on both iphone and Android?
Manoj Sharma Yes it does
On the migration question raised by Ross FCA and George Khair, still the open one in this thread.
Same situation here: FluentCommunity on a dedicated subdomain, with a PWA already in production through a third party service, installed base and push subscriptions included. Three things that would help those of us migrating rather than starting fresh.
Manifest. The browser only honours the first rel=manifest link in the DOM, so with two sources injecting one, the winner comes down to load order. Is there a filter to skip injection when a manifest is already present?
Scope. Per Diego Maradona the SW scope is /portal/*, which is why coexistence works today: a third party SW at / keeps its registration and its push subscriptions. But Tawsif Ahmed Riyad said the plan is to bring all WP pages under the PWA. Once the scope widens to /, it replaces any existing root scope registration and those push subscriptions die with it, silently, with no error. The notifications just stop arriving. Worth flagging in that release note.
id and start_url. Ross, your "PWA update on the client side" only holds if these match the existing manifest. If they differ the browser sees a separate app: the old icon stays and the new install adds a second one beside it. Are they among the six filters? If so, matching the old values would carry the installed base over instead of forcing a reinstall.
Shahjahan Jewel given push is a couple of weeks out, a short "migrating from an existing PWA" note in the docs would land at exactly the right moment for a lot of people in this thread.
can this be added to the side menu of the spaces instead?
Something I don't understand: If I log out or after a period of time, I need to log back into the PWA app.
I only use "login with email" in my community, and I'm using Magic Login Pro.
It always opens in the browser instead of the app. What's the correct way log back to the PWA app?
Sella Yoffe same comment
Sella Yoffe +1