When choosing a CMS for your prospective website, it can be really tough to make a choice. It often boils down to the three most popular counterparts on the CMS market: Drupal, Joomla! and WordPress. They are so closely associated with each other that hearing one name you almost expect to hear the other two.
What makes differentiating these CMSs so difficult is that they are all very similar, but only at the first sight. All of them are free and open source, which means you can get your copy for no cost and can modify it to your taste.
But on the closer look, you realize these platforms are totally different. And this is the key point – if they’re different, they can’t be compared in general, like which one is better? It’s like comparing a pen, a pencil and a marker. These are writing tools, but are they the same?
In case with the three CMSs in question, you can only define which one is better for your particular project or which one excels at doing a specific task.
Looking at this research diagram from SmashingMagazine, the share of WordPress among the top 1 million websites is the greatest, the second prize goes to Joomla and Drupal is the third. What is the reason of the division like this? Let’s see!
WordPress
WordPress is famous for being very easy to install – 5 minutes is enough. If that’s so easy, no wonder so many people start their own website powered by WordPress.
It is also known as the most easy-to-use CMS among the three. However, it doesn’t mean there’s no need to learn at all. It means that you can quickly get accustomed to using the backend and master the basics. Sure, becoming an advanced user requires time and efforts.
WordPress also boasts the most available plugin and themes. This abundance attracts many users, taking into account that most of these plugins are free. These are the things WordPress is good at and which probably explain its popularity.
Joomla!
Joomla! is the type of CMS catering for different types of users – designers, developers and bloggers can employ it for building websites.
While Joomla! possesses a bit steeper learning curve than that of WordPress, it also has multiple customisation opportunities and allows seamless integration of modules to extend the site with more features. It is a frequent choice for community websites, forums and websites with user donated content.
Joomla! has robust design and branding features, which is why it is also used for company websites that require something exclusive as opposed to a number of freely distributed themes and design templates.
Drupal
The most common association connected with this CMS is that Drupal is designed for developers.
The thing is, it features the steepest learning curve and is very difficult to use for a person with no previous experience and no coding skills. On the other hand, this complexity corresponds to the abundance of opportunities you get with this CMS – you can do virtually anything with your Drupal site, provided that you know how to use and configure it correctly.
There’s no sense in selecting Drupal to run a small blog or a business-card website, it is the CMS of great possibilities. And this is the reason why it is not so extensively used. However, Drupal powers very complex sites like enterprise websites with different access levels and integrated advanced functionalities.
In Conclusion
In order to make the right choice, don’t go for popularity or exclusiveness. Consider the factors that matter most for your future website, carefully weigh your knowledge, your desire to learn more and the growth prospects. In case you’ve previously made your choice and would like to change your existing CMS software for something better suited to your demands, with aisite online migration service your switch will be as accurate and swift as possible.
