Sociable: a real community for your Joomla site

Most Joomla sites end up with a registration form and then nothing for members to actually do once they log in. Sociable fixes that. It gives your visitors a place to introduce themselves, post updates, react to each other, form groups, message friends, and earn recognition for showing up. It gives you the controls to keep the whole thing tidy.

You can launch it in an afternoon. You can grow it for years.

What your members get

• A profile they actually want to fill in. Multiple profile types (members, mentors, partners, students, whatever you need), custom fields per type, avatars, and an activity history that proves they belong here.
• A feed worth scrolling. Posts, reactions, comments, mentions, link previews, and media uploads, with the moderation tools to keep it healthy.
• Groups and events. Public, private, or invite-only groups. Events with feature flags so you only show what you've configured.
• Direct messaging. One-to-one conversations with reactions and read receipts, so members can keep talking without leaving your site.
• Notifications that respect them. Email and on-site notifications, per-channel preferences, and unsubscribe links that actually work.
• A reason to come back. Badges, points, login streaks, and configurable activity rules. The gamification piece is a separate engine, so you can tune it without touching code.

What you get as the admin

• Onboarding that scales. Send invitations from the back end, plug in social login (Google, Facebook, GitHub, Apple), or open referral links so existing members bring their friends.
• Profile Assignment Rules. New users land on the right profile type automatically, based on rules you write once.
• Moderation without the babysitting. A reports queue, ban/restrict actions, and approval workflows for activity and comments. Spammers do not survive long.
• Email you can actually edit. A full email template manager with previews. No hunting through PHP files.
• An admin SPA that feels modern. Built with React 19 and TypeScript. Searchable, keyboard-driven (Ctrl+K opens the command palette), with light and dark themes.
• Privacy-aware by default. Privacy plugin exports user data on request and removes it cleanly on deletion. Consent settings respected throughout.

Built for production, not for demos

Sociable is not a weekend hack. It runs on Joomla's own MVC and DI container, uses Joomla's ACL, ships proper SQL migrations, and treats security as a first-class feature.

• CSRF protection that is fail-closed on every mutating endpoint
• SSRF guards and response-size caps on link previews
• Strict input sanitization on user content and event descriptions
• OAuth flows hardened against signature replay and untrusted redirects
• Path-traversal and unsafe-upload blocks on media handling

You can read the changelog. Real fixes for real reports, shipped weekly.

Technical details

• Joomla 5 and Joomla 6 supported. PHP 8.2 or newer.
• MySQL 8.0+ or MariaDB 10.6+.
• React 19 and TypeScript front and back, served as a single bundle through Joomla's web asset manager.
• Mobile-friendly out of the box.
• Translatable everywhere. All user-facing text lives in language files.
• Sits alongside Joomla's built-in MFA, com_users registration settings, and the Joomla Scheduler.

What's in the package

The installer drops one package that includes:

• The main component (com_sociable)
• Site modules for the feed, members list, groups, and notifications
• Plugins for authentication (social login), content, user, system, privacy, and rewards
• The shared Shondalai core library (email, storage, PDF, payments)

Everything is wired up on first install. There is no manual plugin enable dance.

Who it fits

Sociable is built for the people running:

• Schools and learning communities
• Membership sites and associations
• Creator and fan communities
• Customer support and peer-help networks
• Internal staff networks behind a login

If you want a private network with real moderation power, you are the audience.

Support and updates

Every purchase comes with regular updates, written documentation, and access to our support team. We respond.

See the documentation | Open an issue | Contact support

Ready to give your members something to do?

Get Sociable