So you've decided to create a new website. First of all, congratulations! A web design or redesign project can be a big undertaking and we want to help simplify this process for you by getting one big decision out of the way. 

You have a few options when it comes to deciding on a content management system. WordPress, Joomla and Drupal are the three most popular CMS choices online and are all open-source and free to download and use. How will you ever decide? We've made it easy for you by comparing these three CMS providers in terms of features, flexibility, capability, and ease-of-use. Below, we take a look at the advantages and disadvantages of each solution:

Wordpress

Over 68 million websites use WordPress, making it the world's favorite blogging software. Wordpress powers sites like the New York Times, CNN, Forbes and Reuters.

• Pros
  • User-friendly
  • Can accommodate multiple authors
  • SEO-capable
  • Expansive plugin library
  • Easy to customize
  • Flexible
• Cons
  • Security - WordPress is often the target of hackers. You will have to install third-party plugins to boost your site's security.
  • Limited in terms of design options: Even though WordPress is customizable, WordPress sites often look like WordPress sites.
  • Incompatible with older plugins
  • Limited CMS capabilities: You may find that WordPress is incapable of handling a very large volume of content. WordPress is often called a 'mini CMS.'
• Recommended use
  • Wordpress is perfect for those who manage simple, good-looking sites or blogs with or without multiple authors

Joomla

With 50 million downloads to date, Joomla powers sites like cloud.com and linux.com

• Pros
  • User-friendly
  • Smooth and easy to install
  • Expansive extension library: Joomla extensions are divided into five different categories - components, plugins, templates, modules and languages
  • Content management capable: Joomla is far more capable at managing a large volume of articles than WordPress
  • Robust developer community
• Cons
  • Brittle codebase makes it difficult to extend or customize your site
  • The learning curve isn't as steep as with Drupal, but the installation and management process can be intimidating
  • Lacks SEO capability
  • Limited access control (ACL) support
  • Limited to a single level of sections and categories
• Recommended use
  • Joomla is a great option for consumers and small to mid-tier e-commerce brands. If you want something more powerful for enterprise use, consider Drupal.

Drupal

Drupal was created by Dries Buytaert and first released in 2001. This CMS option powers over 763 thousand feature and data-intensive sites like whitehouse.org and data.gov.uk.

• Pros
  • Extremely Powerful & Flexible: Drupal can do almost anything. It's easily extendable and there are modules available to customize your site
  • Thousands of modules
  • Offers unlimited article nesting using taxonomy, or by using the Category module
  • Fast: Caching improves the speed and performance of your site
  • Developer-friendly
  • Robust developer community - over 30,000 participants
  • Supports Multi-sites
  • Strong version control and ACL capabilities
  • Stable and scalable: Drupal is enterprise-ready and can be easily scaled to support even the world's busiest websites
  • SEO-capable
• Cons
  • Steep learning curve: Drupal requires the most amount of technical skills, so you either have to be dedicated enough to learn, or have a strong team of drupal developers and consultants who can help you with your site. The DrupalAnswers team understands these challenges and can help you get started and be your partner throughout the Drupal journey.
• Recommended use
  • Drupal is the ideal CMS option for complex and professional sites or any large project where stability, scalability and power are of the upmost importance. If your project requires customization, or finely grained access control - Drupal is what you are looking for. 

WordPress, Joomla and Drupal vary in terms of features and capabilities. We hope this information helps you to choose the CMS that best fits your requirements! We at DrupalAnswers invite you to contact us with your website or CMS needs and any further questions you may have. We look forward to hearing from you!

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