Upcoming Update?
Hi Shahjahan Jewel , Happy New Year—and congrats to the Fluent team. With respect: FluentCommunity paved the way, and it deserves the same focus and polish now going to newer projects like FluentCart.
Here’s my core feedback:
- Focus feels diverted. FluentCart is moving fast while FluentCommunity remains half‑baked.
- Shifting priorities. New launches push existing work down the queue; there’s no public roadmap.
- Missing basics. After a year, courses still lack categories—making curation and visibility tough at scale.
- Investment matters. I’ve put in $1,400 because I believe FluentCommunity can lead—with sustained attention.
What I’m asking for now:
- Publish a roadmap with clear monthly target month, near‑term and quarterly milestones.
- Lock resourcing so progress doesn’t stall when new projects spin up.
- Ship foundational improvements (course categories, curation, visibility controls) on a clear timeline.
- Communicate updates regularly— what slipped, and why.
To fellow users: if you share this concern, please add your voice here so we can advocate for a clear plan and sustained focus on FluentCommunity.
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Focus feels diverted. FluentCart is moving fast while FluentCommunity remains half‑baked.
This I noticed too. I switched to Fluent products (Fluent Community mainly) because of fast development I saw in past and now I feel like it is most overlooked product.
It's only been a little over a month since an update (Dec. 4). I think we're all spoiled by their speed that we forget most plugins only do about 3-4 major updates a year with minor updates usually only for security.
Wendy Perkins Shoef Since the launch of FC, fluent affiliate and fluentcart were launched. It's not relevant to compare the number of updates yearly provided by other plugins. The question is if fluent affliate and fluentcart were not launched, how far ahead fluentcommunity would have been by now? I get it if they are built to support FC. At least, that's how I consoled myself. But, it appears that they seem to have their own trajectories irrespective of FC. There are many other existing fluent plugins that are yet integrated properly with FC. I thought these plugins shoulg became priorities. I have bought other plugins as well in anticipation. If it can happen to FC that lots of people saw it as very visionary product, and focus is just diverted to more exciting product like Fluentcart, then the same thing can happen to fluentcart. that's why i am not buying fluentcart yet. it takes huge efforts to compete against woocommerce and other carts that have been established for decades. What if suddenly there are even more exciting projects than fluentcart? Will it share the same fate like FC?
Alexander Sugianto You completely read my mind, I exited buddy boss for FC because i saw a better opportunity ahead, but as of now buddy boss is way ahead of FC in the online community space and instead of wp ninja team to focus on updatimg FC, still not major updates...
There are important updates that should have been made but no.
Same reason I haven't gone for fluent cart... but if they still not listening to us then I think I will switch back and will only reconsider if they have all needed features
- Focus feels diverted. FluentCart is moving fast while FluentCommunity remains half‑baked..
I share many of the same concerns raised here.
Missing basics – Completely agree. Some of the fundamental features that are considered standard in similar platforms are still not available, and it does make day‑to‑day use more challenging than it should be.
Investment matters – I’ve also made a fairly significant investment into the Fluent ecosystem because the vision looked promising. But over time, it’s becoming clearer that some of the marketing created expectations that haven’t been matched by the actual development pace.
Foundational improvements – Strongly agree that features like course categories, better curation tools, and visibility controls should be prioritized. These are core building blocks, not “nice to have” additions.
Regular communication – Consistent updates would go a long way. It shows professionalism, integrity, and genuine care for the product and its users—not just the revenue side. Even small progress updates help maintain trust.
This isn’t meant as criticism for the sake of it. FluentCommunity has huge potential, and many of us want to see it succeed. Feedback like this is shared in the hope that it helps the team refocus and strengthen a product we all believe in.
Diego Maradona I do agree about the communication. They need at least a monthly newsletter (aka a post in the General discussion space). Shahjahan Jewel
I think it's hard because everyone has their own ranking for "most important" features.
Very true. Fluent Community seems overlooked. I reported a major bug with 404 error on sitemap when it is used on root domain. The bug was reported 3 months ago, and confirmed by their support yet. Unfortunately, the team still has not issued a fix yet.
I am starting to regret investing in this ecosystem.
For those calling Fluent Community half-baked, left behind, and not production-ready, how many of you are actually using it? I paid $800 for the 5-site license, launched within 6 months, made my money back, and got to let go of Learndash, Buddyboss, and Events Calendar Pro (using Pie Calendar which is just okay).
At less than $200/site one-time payment, and on the market for less than 2 years, do you all really expect it to be on the level of Skool or Circle?
If you are running huge, full-featured communities that require a ton of bells and whistles, maybe paying $300+/mo to Circle is what your business requires.
Kaneisha G. well said
Kaneisha G. Totally agree with this. I'd not feel ripped off even if they didn't release another single update. It's great value, a great product, and has made solid steady progress over the last 12 months.
Kaneisha G. we were early backers commiting to 50 sites LTD when it's version 1.** Major updates were like every 2 weeks or so, just like Fluentcart now. The pace of major updates has become every 1-2 month. You bought LTD when the updates already slowed down a lot. So, you can't compare with our expectations.
Ross FCA to be fair, you need to disclose that you build add-ons for FC. :) Honestly, you can't compare end-users' and developers' expectations. They are very different.
Alexander Sugianto so because I paid more per site, I have lower expectations? 🤔🤨
Are you actually using Fluent Community? If not, exactly what is keeping you from using it?
What are you using instead of Fluent Community that meets your needs better?
Alexander Sugianto I’m one of Ross’ customers but haven’t installed any of his add-ons yet. FC works just fine without the add-ons. FCA’s products are great bonuses but they are not what makes FC usable.
Kaneisha G. Let me get AI to assist me to get my point across: FluentCart Reveals FluentCommunity's Core Problem
The Critical Timing Issue:
FluentCart launched just months after FC, diverting focus and resources during FC's most critical development phase. This single decision explains why FC feels stuck after a year.
The Pattern Both Products Share:
Both FC and FluentCart built technical superiority (fast processing, low resources) but skipped strategic positioning:
- FluentCart: Serves both physical AND digital products without understanding why WooCommerce deliberately avoided this. Different infrastructures are needed—speed advantage wasted on a small hybrid market.
- FluentCommunity: Positioned as "BuddyPress/BuddyBoss, but faster" but missing the organizational architecture large communities need—speed advantage wasted on small support forum scale.
What's Missing After 1 Year:
- No space/course grouping for user selection
- No category filtering (users can't choose which courses to see)
- No visibility controls for mobile screens
- No organizational hierarchy for hundreds of groups
- No access management for diverse user types
The BuddyBoss Comparison:
BuddyBoss is slow but provides the architectural scaffolding for complex communities. FC is fast but lacks the foundation. At 50-200 users, speed doesn't matter (BuddyBoss performs fine). At 1,000+ users where speed matters, FC can't scale because the organizational architecture doesn't exist.
The Missed Opportunity:
If FluentCart had been delayed by one year and all resources focused on FC, the critical first year would have built:
- Organizational architecture (grouping, hierarchies, collections)
- Visibility and access controls for large user bases
- Navigation designed for hundreds of groups or more
- Administrative tools for managing complexity at scale
Result: A true game changer—the only platform that handles enterprise-scale communities without performance collapse.
Instead: Resources split between two products. Neither can compete at scale. FC stuck at support forum capability while customers like me (who spent $1,400) expected BuddyBoss functionality with FC performance.
The Core Issue:
The team doesn't run large communities themselves (this one is support forum), so foundational features get overlooked. With key decisions and coders concentrated with Jewel, and focus split between FC and FluentCart, neither product gets the strategic depth needed.
The Bottom Line:
Technical superiority without architectural clarity for scaled use cases is just expensive overhead. FC could dominate the market for large-scale communities—but only if it builds the organizational foundation that large communities actually need. Right now, it's a fast car stuck in a parking lot because the roads to enterprise scale don't exist.
I'm sharing this as a $1,400 customer (FC alone) hoping FC becomes what it promised: a better version of BuddyBoss, not just a faster support forum.
Alexander Sugianto I think you made some compelling points. I also think that each feature you mentioned could be implemented in a few months by an experienced dev using custom code. If I had the ability to gather 1k+ users in a community, and had paid $1400 for 50 sites, I wouldn’t let my ability to launch and monetize those users be blocked by a few features I could hire a dev to implement.
From what I see, FC is extensible. Hire someone to build the features you want, launch, and make way more money than the $1400 you spent. That seems like a much better business decision than angrily waiting on Fluent forever.
In fact, that mirrors my own journey a bit. I got tired of waiting on Suredash to have enough features to be usable, although I’d already paid for it, so I bought FC. Six months later, I’d launched and made my money back and more.
Did it suck paying for a tool I haven’t used yet? Yes. But I wanted to launch my community more than I wanted to be right.
Do you want to be morally superior—or do you want to unleash the tremendous earning power of monetizing these huge communities full of hundreds of courses you and others seem to have or be building?
I think the main issue is lack of communication. In the last update, it was mentioned that push notifications should go live within December. It's almost the middle of January now, but no news about it yet.
Also, many users already noticed the PWA app in FC, so it was expected that we could also receive a native app solution soon. Now, I'm stuck between building a PWA app on my own and waiting for the native solution.
If we were told what upcoming updates bring and when we can expect them, it would be easier to plan accordingly.
Marek I am in support.
Though you can try out progressify, they integrate with fluent community now
Marek in the beginning of FluentCommunity Mr. CEO Jewel explained multiple times there wont be any PWA and only native app solutions. Now we see multiple PWA solutions, one of them done by FluentTeam itself and more chaos than we could imagine, not even roadmap is there. All we get is Jewel replying to 1/100 posts right here and thats where we get news and need to plan our businesses - it's unacceptable for any business on this planet. This is not only unprofessional, but taking into account how much money WPMN makes from their products, it's disrespectful.
As someone who has also invested nearly 2k in the Fluent ecosystem, I’d like to add my two cents.
I think the problem is a mix of poor communication and deceptive marketing. Before you buy, it’s suggested that certain things exist, when in reality they don't, or they exist in a completely different form. No one can tell me that’s an accident. It’s done deliberately to generate more sales.
Even though only 80% of what was promised is actually there and working, as a customer, you expect the missing parts to be delivered soon. And that’s where communication comes into play. There are dozens of posts here with really simple questions about these features that the wpmn team could actually answer quite easily. But they often don’t, which really annoys me (at least).
I think all the Fluent plugins have great potential, but I believe wpmn needs to be careful now that trust doesn't start to crumble. Bad news is still better than no news at all.
the biggest problem here is that, in this topic, that IMHO is the most important in this space, there's no staff reply.
Tindaro Battaglia Ditto.
Tindaro Battaglia I agree on the replies in the community. Tech support is awesome and I've never been left hanging. But here in the community is another story.
I am hoping Shahjahan Jewel has something planned to help out here. I am 100% certain that the reduction in tech support tickets is due to the very active community they've built using their own amazing plugin.
I posted this about a couple of months ago! To be honest, I'm here primarily for FluentCommunity. Such an amazing product — love it! 🙌
So yes, I'd love the team to prioritize FluentCommunity. 🚀 And yes, I was kinda disappointed when focus shifted to FluentCart when there's a lot that could be done with FluentCommunity. 🙌
https://community.wpmanageninja.com/portal/space/community-meta/post/the-future-of-fluentcommunity
The GS I get that. I would probably be a little disappointed, too. But they have a team working on Fluent Community... they didn't abandoned it to work on Fluent Cart.
I used to be part of a software development team that was only 3 people and I can tell you that the speed at which Fluent moves is quite extraordinary. And if you ever have a look in their code it's very pretty code to look at.
For those of us with the whole Fluent ecosystem, having a unified cart to sell Fluent Community (along with any other offer) with the built-in integration is actually quite awesome for building a community.
Wendy Perkins Shoef Yeah! I understand your point too, Wendy! Overall, what they're building is great! Thanks for sharing your perspective. 🙌