Choosing a content managements system can be confusing, to say the least. There are so many different options on offer, finding the best CMS can be difficult. Out of all the possibilities populating the Internet, three products stand out way above the rest. They are Drupal, Joomla and WordPress. Even once the choice has been narrowed down to these three ‘big’ options, making a decision is hard, especially as they are getting more and more alike. To help make it a little easier, here are some of the pros and cons for each of them.

Drupal

The latest online demo for Drupal features Drupal 7, but depending on what modules (the little add-ons that provide extra features) will be required, users may be better off starting with Drupal 6. While the core of Drupal is somewhat basic, the modules turn it into something much more flexible and complex.

Pros – Designed to get additional features via stacks of add-on modules, Drupal allows user s to do just about anything they want. Many of the modules are maintained for clients by professional developers, but this does not stop them being free.

Cons – For non-developers, Drupal can be a little complicated, although Drupal 7 is a lot friendlier to ‘ordinary’ users. It is, however, still not as easy to use as WordPress.

Summary – Drupal is the ideal solution for users looking to create very complex sites, even though this may mean having to hire a developer.

Joomla

Joomla also uses a variety of features to add functionality to sites. Here, they are called extensions. The extensions are subsequently divided into plug-ins, modules and components.

Pros – The out-of-the-box interface of Joomla is user-friendly, yet extremely powerful. For handling lots of articles, this is definitely the best choice. The powerful component K2 is perfect for adding extra features.

Cons – Joomla sits in the middle of the spectrum. It is not as pretty and easy as WordPress, but it also fails to be as helpful to developers as Drupal. While tons of modules are available, they are often hard to locate and can be difficult to maintain.

Summary – While being great for handling large numbers of articles, Joomla is not the best choice if you need plenty of extra features.

WordPress

Offering a plethora of additional modules to add features, in this case, they are known as plug-ins, WordPress is more than just a great blog CMS.

Pros – Extremely easy to learn/ use, WordPress has a great, very user-friendly interface. It is able to handle specialised content types, multiple authors and just about anything one could possibly expect from a good CMS.

Cons – In spite of more than 15,000 available plug-ins WordPress can not be customised as heavily as Drupal. This is largely due to the fact that the core needs fairly frequent updates, which in turn has the capacity to ‘break’ plug-ins. This, of course, can cause serious issues with the site.

Summary – Quick and easy to use, WordPress is great for those who do not need heavy customisation. For straight-forward requirements and ease of use, this is certainly the best choice.