# What message board has the most members?

**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-message-board-has-the-most-members/146146
**Category:** Factual Questions
**Created:** [January 2, 2003, 4:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-message-board-has-the-most-members/146146 "2003-01-02T04:02:46Z")
**Posts on this page:** 6
**Page:** 1

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### Author: ![raz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/9f8e36/32.png) [@raz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/raz)
#### Post date: [January 2, 2003, 4:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-message-board-has-the-most-members/146146/1 "2003-01-02T04:02:46Z")

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The one with the most members that I’ve found so far is the forums at [FatWallet.com](http://FatWallet.com), with somewhere like 58,000 members.

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### Author: ![scr4](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/59ef9b/32.png) [@scr4](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/scr4)
#### Post date: [January 2, 2003, 5:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-message-board-has-the-most-members/146146/2 "2003-01-02T05:46:54Z")

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I don’t think there is a good answer to that. Many message boards don’t require registration, and some keep inactive accounts open longer than others so it’s hard to tell how many active members there are. There are also companies that provide message board services to various groups, like ezBoard and Yahoo! Groups. Do you count the whole system as a message board? ezBoard, for example, [claims 10 million members](http://www.ezboard.com/corporate/pressroom/2002_08_01.html).

If you count entire systems, I think the largest is Usenet.

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### Author: ![Aaron\_Silver](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/a9a28c/32.png) [@Aaron\_Silver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aaron_Silver)
#### Post date: [January 2, 2003, 6:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-message-board-has-the-most-members/146146/3 "2003-01-02T06:50:57Z")

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From what I understand of what you’re wanting… boards such as the ones over at [somethingawful.com](http://somethingawful.com) and [arstechnica.com](http://arstechnica.com) are going to be the biggest on the net.

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### Author: ![Trader\_of\_shorts](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/90ced4/32.png) [@Trader\_of\_shorts](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trader_of_shorts)
#### Post date: [January 2, 2003, 8:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-message-board-has-the-most-members/146146/4 "2003-01-02T08:02:02Z")

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I would say [Fark.com](http://Fark.com)

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### Author: ![eno801](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/c2a13f/32.png) [@eno801](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eno801)
#### Post date: [January 2, 2003, 7:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-message-board-has-the-most-members/146146/5 "2003-01-02T19:26:36Z")

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IGN boards at [ign.com](http://ign.com) has 754,542 members most active boards i have ever been to. sometimes i think this board moves way to slow when it takes more than a few seconds to get a response.

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### Author: ![d12](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/71c47a/32.png) [@d12](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/d12)
#### Post date: [January 2, 2003, 9:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-message-board-has-the-most-members/146146/6 "2003-01-02T21:47:24Z")

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Ezboards IIRC will require you to register for each Ezboard you use which would bring their member numbers up. Also they still count those people who register a million names and only use one. It’ll be very very hard to get an accurate number.