5 Best Open Source PHP CMS in 2020

  Supriya Rathi    April 30, 2020    1633

 

Every business is unique and this truism is depicted in the kind of website a certain business has. The web development requirements of each company are different, but the only factor that is common for business is that they all prefer the Content Management System (CMS) for designing websites.

A CMS is software that comes with almost all the features we would expect to make a fully functional website. It serves as a great tool for marketers and business owners and helps them to run their website without broad technical knowledge. You no need to begin from scratch, instead choose from the given templates & set-up navigations, libraries, databases, file management, etc.

CMS comes in multiple languages, but the choice of PHP CMS offers you a chance to get maximum functionality with minimal coding. Most of the trendiest CMS tools like WordPress, Magento, and Joomla are built on PHP. You also can hire PHP developers to customize the PHP CMS for your particular requirement.

So, you are convinced with PHP CMS and your next action should be choosing the best CMS. The selection might be difficult to make, as there are multiple numbers of choices available. It doesn’t matter how good your content is, in case the CMS is not capable to manage it right, your business won’t have half the result it deserves.

To avoid being getting lost in the jungle out there, here is an overview of the best PHP CMS.

Why choose open source CMS over Proprietary software?

When deciding on which CMS to opt for, the biggest decision is whether to choose open source CMS or proprietary CMS. Open-source CMS is created and maintained by the project community, whereas proprietary CMS is developed & owned by a particular company. The open-source tools are available free for all, and anyone can make what they want with it. For using proprietary CMS, you should pay a license fee to use it.

Cost-effectiveness, global usage, regular updates, customization, and community support are the major reasons that make Open-source CMS a better option.

5 Best Open Source PHP CMS

1.WordPress

There is no denying the prominence of this PHP CMS as it powers over 32% of the websites worldwide and still it is rapidly growing. Its extensive directory of themes and plugins, and simple to use front-end editor, attracts many brands to design their websites, apps or blogs with little technical support. WordPress CMS uses MySQL and PHP and supports almost all web hosts. WordPress can give your website the edge in terms of performance, reliability, and speed. While CMS is designed for blogging, WordPress website can be turned into a portfolio, e-commerce store, newspaper websites, static content website or anything else you want. Another best feature of WordPress is its intuitive user-friendly interface.

Pros of WordPress

  • Its free & paid Plugins are easy to understand and use
  • Ensures fast-loading as the CMS is built with minimal PHP code
  • Attractive Menu choice makes the site attractive & easy to navigate
  • Enhance search engine rankings
  • Larger community support

Cons of WordPress

  • Requires the advanced knowledge on CSS to make unique themes
  • Using too many plugins affects the overall performance
  • MySQL backend is more vulnerable to hacking

2.Joomla

This versatile PHP CMS is used for everything from personal websites, blogs to complex app for media, education, corporate, and e-commerce. Its features like easy to install, reliable, simple to manage and flexibility made it the most powerful CMS on the planet. Its core focus has been on extensibility and usability. Joomla comes with four extension types like modules, components, templates, and plugins. You can also make the difference based on whether the extension is used for front-end or back-end. Through its variety of features like simple updates, multilingualism, search function, banner management, and front end editing you can create diverse designs and concepts.

Pros of Joomla

  • Provides intuitive usability
  • Easy & flexible plugins
  • Wide range of helpful community and free tutorials
  • Valid HTML & CSS
  • Not too developer-oriented

Cons of Joomla

  • Slightly complex to make custom design
  • Limited market place for modules and add-ons
  • Compatibility issue during the simultaneous installation of extensions, modules & plugins

3.Drupal

Drupal offers the modern web content management capabilities to build, function and optimize websites and access across any device, channel, and customization strategy. Because of its robustness, flexible infrastructure, open-source modules, and innovative design, it becomes a top PHP CMS solution. It also offers you access to a myriad of free tools as well as information to help you to figure out the right functionality, features, and design.

Drupal complies with security standards like OWASP and defines the basic security measures that a web project should meet. It can also be used as a back-end framework, business collaboration as well as knowledge management. It remains the right choice for building a full-blown social community, a blog, an informational site, and a brochure company.

Pros of Drupal

  • Known for solid-rock security measures
  • Modules and functionality come in 90 different languages
  • Includes clean code, modern web-publishing tools, and powerful SEO modules
  • Advanced user and graphic management
  • Scalability aids you to meet your website sizes

Cons of Drupal

  • More complex and requires basic coding skills
  • Most of the modules are not free
  • Bad module compatibility results in performance issues

4.Magento

Magento is a most powerful eCommerce CMS platform that offers online businesses with complete control over the functionality and control of their eCommerce sites. This PHP CMS is loaded with a myriad of extraordinary features like unparalleled flexibility, powerful marketing, catalog management, and search engine optimization. You can also integrate the Magento eCommerce website with 3rd party apps using its SOAP and XML/RPC web services. By offering critical information, enhances the site's visibility to search engines.

Pros of Magento

  • Magento sites are simple to upgrade or migrate to a new version
  • Offers various marketing promotional tools like newsletter management and landing page creation
  • Site can be integrated with the third-party interface and multiple payment gateways
  • Offers advanced testing capabilities
  • Themes are highly customizable

Cons of Magento

  • Requires experienced Magento developers
  • Though the community version is free, the enterprise version is highly expensive
  • Difficult to customize

5.Concrete5 CMS

Concrete5 is a reputable and stable PHP CMS platform widely used for building and running small and medium business websites. It relies on the MVC controller framework. Like the WordPress platform, it facilitates to login as well as manage content without any assistance from a web developer. Its simple dashboard includes many statistical reports. Its built-in sitemap makes it more powerful over other popular CMS.

It allows users to add metadata and image to the web page, thereby ensures hassle-free SEO management.

Pros of Concrete5

  • Easy to set-up and customize
  • Native content block makes it easy to edit
  • Ability to assign permission based on the level of admiration
  • Automatic add-on update notification
  • Better search engine optimization

Cons of Concrete5

  • It has smaller community support
  • Only fewer themes are available
  • Poor documentation

Wrapping up

Undeniably, there are several other open sources available to select from. Here I have listed the top-notch PHP CMS for you. Every platform has its benefits and limitations and serves different purposes. It is up to your requirements. Just consider your resources’ web design skills, objective and budget to choose your favored one. I also recommend you to try more than one CMS before settling down one, which serves better for you.


 Article keywords:
php development companies, hire php developers

 


 Share this article: 
Print Digg StumbleUpon del.icio.us Facebook Yahoo! Buzz Twitter Google Bookmarks LinkedIn MySpace Orkut PDF Scoopeo Viadeo Add to favorites
      

© Copyright - Articles XP