In reply to Sally G..

I’ve used many forum software over the years and I’ve pretty much settled with Invision for sites that want a more traditional forum style, and Discourse for everything else. I experienced compatibility issues after upgrade decided to keep my site/content separate from my community, hence no bbpress or the likes that rides on WordPress. Discourse is the best solution out there right now IMHO but it is resource heavy and users who are familiar with the traditional forum approaching might find the modern take jarring.

It goes down to the number of users you have, how active they are, and the types of features they use more often. I’ve come to realise that users don’t need or use all the bells and whistles. They are there for the engagement and everything else is a plus.

FSE themes seem to be mostly single-column themes. I’ve been looking for some with sidebars, but sidebars seem to run counter to the current theme design trend. I don't see how bbpress would be able to fit in this approach.