When building a website, choosing the right Content Management System (CMS) is crucial. WordPress, Joomla, and Drupal are the three most popular open-source CMSs in the world. But which one is best for your project? In this comprehensive comparison article, we help you make the right choice.

Market share and popularity

Let's start with the numbers:

WordPress clearly dominates, but popularity isn't everything. Each CMS has its specific strengths.

Ease of use

WordPress: The king of simplicity

WordPress is designed with user-friendliness as priority:

• Installation time: 5 minutes (via Installatron)
• Learning curve: Low - beginners can start immediately
• Interface: Intuitive dashboard
• Adding content: Easy with the Gutenberg block editor
• Updates: One-click updates

Ideal for: Beginners, bloggers, small businesses, anyone who wants to get online quickly.

Joomla: The middle ground

Joomla offers more capabilities than WordPress but requires more knowledge:

• Installation time: 10-15 minutes
• Learning curve: Medium - some technical knowledge needed
• Interface: Extensive but complex
• Adding content: Via articles and categories system
• Updates: Relatively easy via backend

Ideal for: Advanced users, community websites, membership sites.

Drupal: The power user choice

Drupal is built for complex sites and developers:

• Installation time: 30+ minutes
• Learning curve: High - developer knowledge recommended
• Interface: Powerful but technical
• Adding content: Via content types and views
• Updates: Technical, often via Drush/Composer

Ideal for: Enterprise websites, government, universities, developers.

Functionality and extensibility

WordPress

Strengths:

• Largest ecosystem
• Plugin for every function
• Excellent e-commerce capabilities
• Huge community

Weaknesses:

• Can become slow with many plugins
• Security requires attention
• Less suitable for very complex sites

Joomla

Strengths:

• Powerful user management (ACL)
• Good for membership sites
• Multilingual built-in
• Flexible content organization

Drupal

Strengths:

• Ultimate flexibility
• Best security
• Scalable for enterprise
• Powerful taxonomy

Security

Security winner: Drupal

Performance and speed

Cost comparison

When to choose which CMS?

Choose WordPress if:

• You want a blog or news website
• You need a small to medium business website
• You want to start a webshop (WooCommerce)
• You're technically limited
• You want to get online quickly

Choose Joomla if:

• You're building a community or forum website
• You need complex user permissions
• You want a multilingual website
• You're building a membership site

Choose Drupal if:

• You're building an enterprise website
• Security is priority number 1
• You have very complex content structures
• You're building a government or university website
• You have a large development team

Our recommendation

For most users: Start with WordPress. It's the best choice for 80% of all website projects thanks to its ease of use, huge community, and extensive ecosystem.

For advanced projects: Consider Joomla if you need complex user permissions or multilingual support.

For enterprise: Choose Drupal if security, scalability, and complexity are your priorities.

Getting started

All three CMSs are available via Installatron at Theory7:

• Install WordPress
• Install Joomla
• Install Drupal

Still unsure? Contact our support team for personal advice!

Need help?

Can't figure it out? Our support team is here for you! Submit a ticket through the customer portal and we'll usually help you within a few hours.