WordPress vs. Joomla – Which CMS Is The Best For Your Website?

If you are thinking about creating a website for your business, you might be having trouble deciding which content management system to choose. Undoubtedly, there are many options out there and it is crucial to understand what each option can give you. 

In today’s article, we are going to compare two of the most popular CMS platforms, WordPress and Joomla. Ready? Let’s get started then.

What is WordPress?

You might not know this, but WordPress was originally launched in 2003 as a blogging platform. Today it is considered the most popular content management system, powering more than 40% of all websites existing on the internet. There are many features that make WordPress a top-notch CMS. We created a quick overview on the topic, discussing the top 10 reasons why WordPress is a great choice for businesses. You can read it here. 

On the tech side, WordPress is written in PHP and paired with a MySQL or MariaDB database. It comes with a plugin architecture and a template system allowing you to customize your website to perfectly fit the type of your business, whether it is a blog, online store, portfolio, service, etc.

What is Joomla? 

Joomla, launched in 2005, is a free open source content management system, one of the most popular platforms in the world. This CMS platform also comes with a broad range of web content applications such as e-commerce, user communities and other web-based applications, photo galleries, forums, etc.

Just like WordPress, Joomla is written in PHP and stores data in a MySQL database.

The pros and cons of WordPress and Joomla

But how is one better than the other? To help you decide which CMS you should choose for your website, here’s a quick comparison of the advantages of both platforms you should take into consideration:

The advantages of WordPress

• Low development cost: Thanks to the easy development process and large WP community, the cost of development work is budget-friendly. 
• User-friendly interface: Based on the feedback of both experienced developers and beginners, WordPress is considered the easiest CMS platform to use.   
• Best CMS for blogging: As WordPress was originally a blogging platform, it still has the features that make it the best CMS for blog posts. 
• Extensible and customizable: Compared to other content management systems, WordPress has the largest number of plugins and themes, which allow you to extend and customize your website until it meets your needs perfectly.
• Huge support community: As you could already see, WP is highly popular and this means that once you start to use it, you will benefit from a huge support community that you can always rely on. There are forums, YouTube channels, Facebook groups offering quick solutions to any WordPress related issues you could come across. 

The advantages of Joomla

• The possibility to use multiple templates: While in WordPress you can use only one theme for your website, Joomla allows you to use different themes for different parts of your website.
• Different content types: When using Joomla, you can benefit from more flexibility when it comes to displaying non-standard content. 
• Advanced user management: Compared to WP, Joomla has a more advanced user management system, especially when it comes to user access controls.
• Multilingual support: Users can benefit from the inbuilt multilingual support. 

WordPress or Joomla: Which option is the best choice for you?

At this point it is important to mention that there is no such thing as one best option for everyone. Depending what type of business you have and what type of website you want to create for your business, both WordPress and Joomla can meet your needs. 

If you are a beginner developer or someone with no experience, you should opt for a WordPress based website.

On the other hand, if your goal is to create an e-commerce website with loads of products, you might want to try Joomla.

There is really no bad decision you can make. Just think about the features you need for your website and pick one. Both content management systems are top level platforms, which is already a really good reason to trust them.