Salesforce communities can be classified two ways — by audience (who logs in) and by template (which Experience Cloud builder template the site is built from). Most interview answers cover both.
By audience
| Audience | Use case |
|---|---|
| Customer community | Self-service help, case management, knowledge base, account-info |
| Partner community | Channel partner portals — leads, deal registration, opportunities |
| Employee community | Internal collaboration, HR, project hubs (uses internal licenses) |
| Public / unauthenticated | Public help centers, knowledge articles, lead-capture sites |
By Experience Cloud template
Choose a template when creating the site:
- Customer Service — most popular; cases, knowledge, search.
- Partner Central — channel partner workflows out of the box.
- Help Center — knowledge-heavy with light authentication.
- Build Your Own (LWR) — modern Lightning Web Runtime template, pure LWC, best performance.
- Build Your Own (Aura) — older blank-canvas template on Aura.
- Aloha (Salesforce Tabs + Visualforce) — legacy template that exposes standard tabs to community users.
- Microsites — small marketing sites built on LWR.
- Industry templates — pre-built sites for healthcare, financial services, etc., when industry clouds are licensed.
Aura vs LWR
LWR (Lightning Web Runtime) is the newer generation — faster, smaller bundle, pure LWC. Aura templates predate it but are still supported. Salesforce’s strategic direction is LWR for new builds.
Quick interview answer
“By audience: customer, partner, employee, and public. By template: Customer Service, Partner Central, Help Center, Build Your Own (LWR), Build Your Own (Aura), and the legacy Aloha. LWR is the modern generation; Aura is older but still supported.”
Verified against: Salesforce Help — Experience Cloud Templates and Trailhead — Experience Cloud Basics. Last reviewed 2026-05-17.