discussion Guide Discourse Detailed Discourse Installation Guide 2025 Updated

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Detailed Discourse Installation Guide 2025 Updated​

Discourse is a modern, open-source forum software built on Ruby on Rails. It is SEO-friendly, mobile-responsive, and offers a powerful community management system.
In this article, we’ll explain the step-by-step process of installing Discourse using the most up-to-date method as of 2025.

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🔧 Prerequisites​

✅ System Requirements:​

• Ubuntu 22.04 LTS (or later)
• Minimum 2 GB RAM (Recommended: 4 GB+)
• 1 CPU core (Recommended: 2+)
• 10 GB disk space (Recommended: 20 GB+ SSD)

✅ Required Tools:​

• Root or sudo-enabled user
• A domain name (example: forum.yoursite.com)
• Mail service (Mailgun, Postmark, or any SMTP provider)

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☁️ Step 1: Preparing the Server​

Copy the code below and then switch to your Putty terminal.
Right-click to paste the copied code (since CTRL+C and CTRL+V don’t work in Putty).
After pasting, press the "Enter" key to execute the command.

Wait until the update process is complete.

sudo apt update && sudo apt upgrade -y

Once the update is complete, we need to install Docker and Git. Run the following commands:
Even though my server already has them installed, you should proceed and confirm with Y (yes) when prompted.

Please wait until the installation is complete.

sudo apt -y install docker.io
sudo apt -y install git
sudo apt -y install curl

Since Docker, Git, and Curl were already installed on my server, the setup completed quickly.
You might see different outputs depending on your environment.

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🧰 Step 2: Installing Required Packages​

Use the following command to create a “discourse” folder in the /var directory:

sudo mkdir /var/discourse

Then, download the Discourse files to the server using this command:

sudo git clone https://github.com/discourse/discourse_docker.git
 /var/discourse

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⚙️ Step 3: Configuring Discourse​

Now, enter the discourse directory with the cd command:

cd /var/discourse

Before running the Discourse setup script, make sure to set the correct permissions:

chmod 700 containers
sudo ./discourse-setup

The installation will now begin — this may take some time as files are downloaded from repositories.
When the process completes, you’ll be asked to provide the following information:

Hostname for your Discourse? [discourse.example.com]: Enter your site’s domain, e.g., forum.hatalar.com
Email address for admin account(s)? [[email protected],[email protected]]: Your business email address, e.g., [email protected]
SMTP server address? [smtp.example.com]: Your mail server’s SMTP address, e.g., smtp.hatalar.com
SMTP port? [587]: You can use port 587
SMTP user name? [[email protected]]: Your email username, e.g., [email protected]
SMTP password? [pa$$word]: The password for your email address
Let's Encrypt account email? (ENTER to skip) [[email protected]]: Enter your email if you’d like to receive SSL-related notifications.

 

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Once all updates are complete, you can now log in to your domain.com site address and complete your forum setup. If you encounter any errors during setup, simply provide the relevant information.