What Is an Online Community? Types, Examples, and How to Start One

You're probably in a few online communities already. Maybe a subreddit you check every morning. A group chat for your running club. A Facebook group for parents at your kid's school.

They all count; this guide is about the ones people run as a business: the eight main types, what members pay to join, and how to launch your own.

The short answer

An online community is a bunch of people who keep showing up in the same corner of the internet because they care about the same thing. Maybe it's sourdough, maybe it's a career change.

What matters most is whether members talk to each other. A big follower count on social media is an audience. It becomes a community once members start talking to each other too.

Groups that survive past the first few months tend to share a few habits:

• A clear reason to be there. Members know what the group is for.
• People who show up. A host or a core group keeps things moving.
• Something members get back. Answers, friends, skills or a sense of belonging.

Types of online communities

There's no official list, but most communities fit into one of these eight groups. The first five are the ones people run as a business.

1. Paid membership communities. There's a fee at the door, billed monthly or yearly. Members get a private space, regular content and other people on the same path. Pat Flynn's SPI Pro is one example:¹ $99 a month for his full course library and a member community.

2. Course communities. These sit alongside an online course. The course does the teaching. The group is where students show up with questions, or post a screenshot of their first sale. Marie Forleo's B-School is a well-known example.² It pairs structured video training and masterclasses with a community where students support each other.

3. Coaching groups. One coach works with many clients at once, usually through live calls and a shared group. Prices can run high. In a September 2026 study of 1,000 trending Skool groups, the most expensive listed at $1,950 a month.³

4. Masterminds. Small groups of peers at a similar level who meet to solve problems together. Entry is often by invitation. Tiger 21, a peer group for wealthy investors, lists North American dues at $34,000 a year, plus a one-time $5,000 joining fee.⁴

5. Fan communities. Built around an artist, show or creator. Lady Gaga's fans call themselves Little Monsters.

6. Brand communities. Run by a company for its customers. The Sephora Community lets shoppers swap beauty tips and product reviews. These are almost always free.

7. Interest communities. These are built around a hobby or topic. Think of most subreddits: one for home bakers, another for people who only play Elden Ring.

8. Professional and peer networks. People in the same line of work helping each other. Indie Hackers is a free forum where founders share how they're building their businesses.

Free communities and paid communities

Plenty of online communities are free. Subreddits, brand forums and Facebook groups cost nothing to join. The owner gets something else in return: ad money, happier customers or a list of people to sell to later.

Paid communities work differently. Once money changes hands, people want more than a free group gives them. In most cases, they're paying for one of these:

• An expert's time. Live calls, Q&As, or real feedback on their work.
• Fewer, better members. Less spam, fewer people selling crypto.
• A plan. Courses or monthly challenges, so they're not figuring it out alone.
• Someone keeping tabs. Go quiet for two weeks and somebody checks in.

So what do people actually pay? Two recent data sets give a good picture.

A typical paid community charges somewhere around $40 a month. A few expensive groups pull the average up. Coaching groups and masterminds are a different league, where hundreds or even thousands a month isn't unusual.

Look at that Mighty Networks figure again. Twenty-six members. You could fit them in a small classroom. That's all it took to clear $1,000 a month, no viral following needed.

Where online communities live

A community can live almost anywhere people can talk. Here are the four main kinds of places.

Social platforms. Facebook and LinkedIn groups are quick to set up, and your members are probably already logged in. What you give up is control. Facebook decides who sees each post, and the group can't follow you if you move somewhere else. We go deeper on that trade in Heartbeat vs Facebook Groups.

Forums. Threads get filed by topic, which is why an old forum answer can still turn up in Google years later. Reddit works the same way, just much bigger. It averaged 130.3 million daily active visitors in the second quarter of 2026.⁶ Many companies also run their own forum on tools like Discourse.

Chat apps. Discord, Slack and WhatsApp run on the same energy as your family group chat. Discord says about 19 million servers are active each week.⁷ One stats roundup found that roughly nine in ten have fewer than 15 members.⁸ That's fine for fast replies. Try finding a useful tip from last Tuesday, though, and you'll be scrolling for a while.

Dedicated community platforms. These are built for running a community as a business. You get payments, courses, events and the member chat behind one login. You own the member list and set the rules. We compare the main options in our guide to the best online community platforms.

What makes an online community work

Great communities come in every size. The ones that keep members tend to get these five things right.

1. One clear purpose. People should know in a sentence why the group exists. Indie Hackers is for founders sharing how they build. Someone new can scroll for two minutes and figure out what to post.

2. A regular rhythm. If nothing is scheduled, people drift off. Even one fixed thing helps, like a Thursday live call or a thread every Monday asking what everyone's working on.

3. A host who shows up. Someone has to start conversations, welcome new people and answer questions early on. In a coaching group, that's the coach. In a brand community, it's often a paid community manager.

4. Simple, visible rules. Good rules keep the space useful. On most subreddits, the rules sit right in the sidebar and mods remove posts that ignore them.

5. Members helping members. The best sign of a healthy group is when members answer each other before the host can. On a forum like Stack Overflow, that's the whole point: people post a question and other members answer it.

How to start one in five steps

1. Pick who it's for. Name one group of people and one thing they want. "New dog owners who want a calmer puppy" beats "pet lovers."

2. Decide free or paid. Free makes it easy to grow. Paid gives you income and more committed members. A common path is to launch free, watch which posts get the most replies, and build the paid tier around that.

3. Choose a home. Go back to the four options above. Charging money? Then a dedicated platform is worth it, because chasing payments by hand in a Facebook group gets old fast.

4. Invite your first 20 to 50 people. Don't wait for strangers to find you. Email past clients, message people who already reply to your posts, and ask them in by name. A room of 20 people who chat is worth more than 2,000 who lurk.

5. Set a weekly routine. Write a welcome post. Pick one regular event and put it on the calendar. For the first month, reply to every single post yourself. You'll know it's working the day a member answers a question before you do.

Where Heartbeat fits

Heartbeat is a dedicated community platform for people who run a community as a business. Members get channels, chats and voice rooms in your own branded space, with public or private areas for cohorts, tiers or sub-groups. You can run live events with Zoom set up for you and recordings that come back to the community, and add courses next to the conversation. Matchups pairs members automatically for introductions, so new people meet someone in their first week.

Checkout handles monthly, yearly and one-time prices, and you keep your member list. Heartbeat has a 14-day free trial, with no card required to start.

Frequently asked questions

What is an example of an online community?

A subreddit for home bakers is one. A paid group where a business coach hosts calls every week counts too. So does the Sephora Community, where shoppers trade beauty tips. Different topics, same idea: people return because they want to keep talking.

What are the biggest online communities?

By sheer size, the big social sites lead. Reddit averaged 514.6 million weekly visitors in the second quarter of 2026.⁶ Discord says about 19 million of its servers are active each week.⁷

What is the meaning of online community?

Put simply, it's people who meet online over a shared interest, goal or identity. An audience listens. A community talks back, and talks to each other.

How do I find an online community?

Start with Google: type your topic plus "subreddit" and see what comes up. Facebook and LinkedIn groups are worth a search too. And if there's a podcaster or creator you already follow, check their site. Many run a group of their own. You can also browse a community directory, like the one we keep of paid communities on Heartbeat.

Are paid communities worth it?

Depends on whether you'll actually use it. Scroll the free preview if there is one. Is the host still posting? Are members? And find out if you can get a refund in the first week or two.

How much does a paid online community cost?

Many charge around $40 a month. A September 2026 study of 868 trending paid groups on Skool found a median price of $39 a month.³ Coaching groups and masterminds can run into the thousands.

Can a small online community be successful?

Yes. Mighty Networks found that the median creator selling paid plans earned $1,000 a month from just 26 members.⁵ Small groups are often easier to keep active, too.