Although today there is an ever expanding number of Content Management Systems (CMS) that a user can choose from, very few CMS platforms have gained as much popularity as Joomla and WordPress.
A good number of people have the mistaken conviction that the two are hugely popular by virtue of being the oldest in the market.
The fact is that the two are neither the pioneers nor the oldest in the CMS space. There are quite a good number of CMS platforms that were in existence even prior to the turn of this century.
Actually, WordPress didn’t appear until 2003, while Joomla only showed up around 2005.
What has contributed to the immense popularity of the two platforms is largely due to the ease with which they can be used.
The entry of open source Content Management Systems has accorded millions of users the power of creating their own websites.
Even a number of big and global brands have been turning to open source CMS for streamlining their processes of web content management.
Today, while the majority of CMS’s are still on-premises and open source in nature, there is a rising number of cloud hosted CMS platforms, yet WordPress and Joomla Hosting still lead the pack.
WordPress Pros
Open Source: What makes WordPress Hosting very popular among advanced developers as well as many beginners is the open source aspect. Basically, open source means you can easily download the CMS software source code and have it modified to meet your particular website needs. What this also implies is that you get the software free of charge.
Easy Setup: WordPress is so easy to setup, that you can do it in as little as 5 minutes. This was the platform developer’s main marketing message, but today that is generally a common feature with most platforms, so they have stopped using it for advertising.
Easy Customization: With WP, there are free themes in their hundreds upon hundreds – either through a 3rd-party provider or via the WP site itself, which are accessible to users. The facility makes it possible for even the newbies to customize their websites according to their business or personal needs. Beyond the themes, there are endless plugins to choose from, which can be used to enhance the content of your site.
Theme Changing: WP allows the changing of the appearance of the site using themes. It is available with several pre-installed default themes. Whenever you wish, it is possible to add new free themes from the official WordPress.org theme directory.
Endless Plugins: Perhaps the real WordPress strength lies in plugins. In WordPress official plugin directory, there are over 38,000 freely available WordPress plugins. It is also possible to purchase premium plugins through paid support offered by independent plugin developers.
Multi-Lingual: WP has done a great job of providing an excellent platform for building a truly multilingual site. It is available in over 53 languages, and new languages may be easily installed using a click from Admin Area.
Another great feature of WordPress is that it has a strong user’s community. You can easily access assistance on WP official support forums, Slack channels, handbooks, docs, codex, Stack Exchange, and nearly every Internet forum about web development and design.
WordPress Hosting Cons
Security – As it is the most widespread CMS platform globally, websites that are WordPress based often get targeted by hackers. The issue of security has remained a major concern whenever somebody uses the content management open source space, but more so on WordPress. The main weakness regarding WP open source code is that anybody can access it– even those without the best of motives.
Maintenance Cost – Although downloading WordPress and using is completely free, to maintain the site isn’t.
Customization Complexity – In case you are planning to customize your WP site beyond the convenient drag & drop tools that come with the template, you could encounter several challenges if you lack experience in web development.
Joomla Pros
Setup is Easy – Similar to WordPress, setting up and deploying Joomla can be done in a couple of minutes.
Powerful Extensions – This platform provides the users a broad with variety of plugins for help in site content enhancement.
Extensive User Permissions – Joomla allows the user up to 9 different types.
Multi-Lingual: The Joomla platform has out of the box capability for handling your multilingual website without having to install any extension.
Support: Similar to WP, it also has a helpful and large community with lots of documentation.
Joomla Cons
Advanced Customization Requirements – In case the Joomla world is new to you, you may encounter problems when it comes to advanced customization. You may need to get assistance in case you need more advanced features such as flash-based content or specialized buttons.
Support: Different from WP, getting affordable expert assistance is rather tough when it comes to Joomla. It may cost you more to hire an expert developer for Joomla troubleshooting, development, or assistance than it would for WordPress.
Security: In terms of security, Joomla is much like WordPress. However, for the maintenance and updates installation, the user has to do it.
It has been said that Joomla Hosting is not that SEO Friendly. However, what comes out clearly is that that Joomla is not SEO-unfriendly, although on the CMS platform, it doesn’t come so easy.
Bottom Line
Just 5 years ago, to review or write on Joomla Hosting vs. WordPress Hosting might have been a different story altogether. Both the platforms have grown and are now offering an experience that is much more similar than they did then. When you study the features of each of these systems, it becomes easy to see how alike the two are for the product end user.
The healthy competition between these two providers has been of great benefit to the users. As a result of it, WordPress and Joomla have both evolved to offer similar benefits, which at one time were missing from each of the two systems.
Neither of the two can be said to be really ahead of the other, an important aspect to appreciate as you select your CMS. Both remain open source, meaning they are highly adaptable and it depends on what your need to adapt or add. The third option: Use them alongside each other!