Are you looking for the easiest way to build a website from scratch but have no coding skills or clue how to start?
Using one of the best content management systems (CMS) like WordPress, Joomla or Drupal should be your best option to try with. These top content management systems make it simple for you to create, manage, and modify your website’s content.
You don’t have to be an HTML or CSS guru to use these systems. This means that you don’t have to sweat on learning web development to join more than 63.5 million live websites.
Sounds like what you want to do? Okay, read on!
In this article, you will know what each CMS is offers, learn about the differences, the pros and cons, and by the end of this article, you will have clear understanding of what it takes to choose right CMS that suits your business needs.
Let’s dive right in.
What Is Drupal?
Truth be told, Drupal is the sixth most popular CMS platform in use!
Since was released back in 2001 by Dries Buytaert, this platform serves more than 1.5% of the websites. And you should also note that Drupal’s primary focus is providing standard features, which include:
- Powerful performance
- Strong security
- Flexible customization
Not to mention Drupal’s substantial open-source community that has more than one million dedicated developers, trainers, strategists, editors, designers, and sponsors from all over the world!
But there’s even more! Drupal organizes meetups worldwide where you can be in groups and level up your skills by participating in the skill training.
Pros
- You will get access to thousands of modules and themes to help you customize your site.
- Easy web page creation, including views, panels, and web forms, are simplified and highly secured to make your website hard to hack.
- This CMS presents you with some attractive options for customizing your modules.
- Drupal is the most secure CMS platform compared to Joomla and WordPress. This means that a website developed in this platform is more secure compared to site built with WordPress or Joomla.
Cons
- To customize your website in Drupal, you need to have basic HTML experience, with some basics of web development.
- Unlike Joomla and WordPress, Drupal requires a hosting service and domain name.
- Drupal is harder to use compared to Joomla or WordPress and requires a bit of learning curve.
Let’s jump right into the next top CMS in 2021.
What Is WordPress?
WordPress is the number one most popular CMS platform and powers approximately 35% of all websites, and has a market share of 64.7%.
But did you know that WordPress was first introduced as a blogging platform?
Well, This best CMS platform was introduced into the market back in 2003 by Matt Mullenweg, and ever since, WordPress has evolved to be a Content Management Software.
But this popularity didn’t just come easy. No, it didn’t!
WordPress ensured that they provide a highly intuitive platform for novice coders or users with no-coding skills can build and run a complete website.
With this popularity, WordPress runs websites for all types of professionals and industries. Additionally, some of the most known magazine sites like New York Post and BBC America are also run by WordPress.
Pros
- Due to its simplicity, it’s the best platform for beginners compared to Joomla and Drupal.
- Built with SEO capabilities, makes it the number one choice of digital marketers.
- WordPress has a remote install interface and also a fast installation process.
- Wide range of page builder plugins such as Elementor, Beaver Builder are available to design complex pages with no coding experience or skills required.
- Big community of designers and developers are there to help you find suitable themes and plugins.
Cons
- Since WordPress uses third-party plugins that may be out of date, close to 50,000 WordPress websites or more are hacked every year.
- Even though the WordPress team works tirelessly every year to make it better, it has a reasonably weak core code.
- WordPress core needs regular updates, which may crack your current plugins.
What Is Joomla?
Joomla is the third most popular content management system used by 2.1% of websites and has a market share of 3.3%.
Even though it’s the youngest compared to Drupal and WordPress, it has already proved to the public interest why it is here among the most popular CMS, i.e., by offering an exquisite platform for building websites.
Since its release in 2005, it has been home to millions of websites worldwide serving industries such as Businesses, Entertainment, Government, Health Technology and Educational.
But wait, there’s lot more! Like WordPress and Drupal, Joomla also has a vast open-source community that works to give all the members support, organize events, and advance the platform to make it even better.
Pros
- Comparing with Drupal, it has a relatively easy-to-use admin panel that helps you manage a vast amount of information.
- Suitable for websites that bigger, requires powerful yet flexible, easy to use interface.
- Before installation starts, Joomla allows you to preview the configurations.
- This CMS suits a multi-user environment like university sites.
Cons
- Unfortunately, Joomla has a relatively sluggish built-in performance.
- Unlike wordpress the plugins of Joomla are not easily available, you have to dig deep into your pockets.
- Compared to Drupal, Joomla is not developer-oriented, not very plugin friendly which sometimes requires additional coding knowledge to fix plugins because they fail at times.
Now that you already know what these CMS are let’s deep dive even further.
Comparison Between Expenses And Costs
I hope that you are sitting tight because it’s about to get bumpy pretty quick.
Here is what nobody wants you to know; all of these top three CMS are FREE, but here is the catch, these CMS are only accessible on themselves! What does this mean for you?
This means that you can download them either directly from their official sites, which I have to note is very simple, but you will incur other additional costs that you have to take all by yourself, and these involve mainly two things: web hosting and a domain name.
To ensure that we are on the same page, a domain name is your website’s address on the web, for example, google.com. And you can get a domain online for $10 per year.
Web hosting setup ensures that your visitors can access your site. You should also note that the cost in terms of domain name and hosting varies depending upon the provider to choose from, but similar in regards to the chosen CMS.
Before I forget…I should mention that even though these platforms are free to download, you might wish to cheer up your feature sets of your favorite CMS with different designs or modules.
WordPress plugins for $0 – $200
Joomla plugins for $0 – $70
Drupal plugins for $0 – $100
And also, find themes (these are installable design packages).
WordPress themes for $0-$250
Joomla themes for $0-$200
Drupal themes for $0-$80
Additionally, you should know that these best CMS have add-ons of almost the same price range. But you should not dig deeper into your pockets if you are on a budget. And by the end of it all, you will have only used roughly $41 a year!
How did I come to that price?
Well, assuming that you decide to only go for the basics, your budget will be something like this:(domain name) $10 + (hosting services) $3*12(1 year plan) = $41 a year.
How Experienced Should You Be To Use WordPress, Drupal, And Joomla
You are here obviously because you want a CMS that will help you build a website from scratch with little or no coding experience.
With this in mind, you will find that these CMS vary depending on the technicality or complexity of the website you want to build. Furthermore, it also comes down to what you hope to get.
There is no question that, WordPress is possibly the simplest to use. It presents you with large variety of themes and plugins, making it friendly way of expanding your website’s functionality as you continue to find and customize the designs.
Have you heard “WordPress hosting”?
This is a service that is offered by many companies nowadays. These companies make your life easier by taking care of the server’s technical setup and installing WordPress for you.
As we switch over to customization, WordPress still presents you with an approachable interface for your site’s look. Some of the changes that you can make in minutes are related to changing – Colors, Backgrounds and other visual element.
Unlike WordPress, Drupal and Joomla are more centered on developers. This means that you have to know basic HTML and PHP, especially when you want to build a website that is more customized and technical.
When it comes to add-ons, you should not expect flexible add-ons on either CMS. Even though you will get some on these platforms, they are not as polished as the ones you can find in WordPress.
Updates And Security
With WordPress, you should always expect a version update roughly every 50 – 60 days. And the vast amount of these updates focus mainly on fixing minor bugs and any other issues that might be available. For more significant WordPress releases, you will have to wait a couple more times every year.
Unlike WordPress, Joomla updates are more frequent and can be expected every 10 – 40 days. And its more extensive updates may take even years. For example, Joomla 3, the latest release, has never been updated for seven years.
When it comes down to Drupal, it also comes with a different update plan that doesn’t match WordPress and Joomla.
Drupal works on a set release schedule, which means that they provide you with one security update and one bugfix update every month, with more significant updates or major versions coming around two times a year.
When it comes down to security, it’s no lie that Drupal tops the chart, and this can be proven by the number of government agencies that have trusted it due to its security. On the other hand, WordPress tops the charts of the most hacked CMS.
Conclusion
WordPress is undeniably the master in user-friendliness, and you want to pick WordPress if you are a novice and want to put up a website quickly. But if you have the patience to learn, Joomla is the CMS you want to settle for.
Unlike Joomla and WordPress, Drupal requires you to have good knowledge of web development.
Have you ever used any of these CMS before?
If yes, please share your experience in the comments.
