Joe Masilotti

Free Ruby on Rails communities

Learning is better with friends! And as a solopreneur who mostly works alone, a good support system helps me keep my sanity. I use online communities to ask for help, offer advice, and keep up to date on the latest releases and trends.

Here’s a curated list of active Ruby on Rails communities that you can join today, for free. I’ve included Discord servers, Slack channels, forums, and even communities hosted on social media platforms.

In a community that isn’t on this list? Send me an email or submit a PR!

Official Ruby on Rails Discord server

The official Ruby on Rails Discord server only launched a few months ago and is still relatively new in the space. The server was originally dedicated to contributing to the framework source code. But after some gentle nudges from the community the #general channel has become more of a help desk. Check out the #contributions channel to bump old PRs or discuss future enhancements with the core team.

Official Hotwired Discord server

The official Hotwire server launched around the same time as the Ruby on Rails server. Right now this isn’t much more than an activity feed of the Turbo and Stimulus GitHub projects. But occasionally you’ll see an interesting question and answer – I expect it to only get better with time and think it’s worth joining.

GoRails Discord server

Originally a paid server, GoRails recently went free with a very active community. Channels range from general Rails help to career advice to support for Jumpstart Pro and Hatchbox. I’m fairly active on this server because folks are usually quite helpful when I reach out asking for assistance. The other day I posted a pretty esoteric error message that I couldn’t find on Google and had a fix within a few hours!

WNB.rb Slack

WNB.rb is a virtual community for women and non-binary Rubyists. They host monthly meetups powered by a Slack community of 350+ members. There’s also a CFP working group where you can have experienced speakers review your conference proposal. A huge shoutout to Jemma and Emily for running such an amazing community!

Stimulus Reflex Discord server

Another active Discord community focusing on Ruby on Rails. This is my go-to support channel for Stimulus Reflex, Cable Ready, and AnyCable. The maintainers are quick to respond with help on specific questions on the frameworks and gems. And the more general channels see a lot of Q&A style activity for folks getting help with their individual codebases.

This is the biggest private community of the bunch at over 18k members. There are 28 channels including opportunities for jobs, a place to post your latest blog, and even a dedicated channel for front-end development. Members range from avid OSS contributors, full-stack engineers, startup founders, backend engineers, and people just learning Ruby on Rails.

Kasper helps your Ruby & Rails Discord server

Kasper Timm Hansen, a previous Rails core member, started this server not too long ago. The focus, as you might expect from the name, is on helping individuals with their Ruby and Rails questions. While a bit smaller and less active than the others, there’s high quality content getting posted regularly here. My favorite channels are #find-a-pair and #domain-modeling-for-my-app.

Official Ruby on Rails forum

Hosted on Discuss, this is a more traditional message board than a live chat experience. The upsides are that everything is archived which makes searching for an existing question or answer much easier. But if you are looking for immediate help a Discord or Slack might be a better fit to ask your question. You can also follow along with all the new feature proposals to the Ruby on Rails framework.

Official Hotwire Discussion

Another Discuss community but focused specifically on the Hotwire stack. This forum is an excellent resource for asking questions about the less documented features of Turbo. I’ve seen more success in posting here than an issue on GitHub if you are looking for a quick response.

Ruby on Rails subreddit #1 and Ruby on Rails subreddit #2

Totaling 75k members, these subreddits have grown quite large. As always with Reddit, the quality of content varies drastically. I don’t recommend using these for help or asking questions. But they do serve as a valuable resource for staying up to date on the latest Rails releases, open source gems, and community blog posts.

Ruby on Rails Twitter community

Twitter communities are like super focused newsfeeds. Content on The Ruby on Rails Twitter community focuses on sharing articles, asking for advice, and highlighting interesting gems. It’s a great alternative if you aren’t a fan of Reddit.

Ruby for Good Slack

This is a small (around 2000 members) but active community working on impactful projects. It is maintained by the Ruby for Good organization.

Made it to the end but didn’t find your favorite Ruby on Rails community? Send me an email or submit a PR!