Drupal vs. WordPress: Which Is Right for 2021?

If you’re trying to decide on the best content management system for your website, you may be torn between two solid options: Drupal and WordPress. While either program can help put an organization’s brand into the world, each provides distinct advantages depending on a business’s objectives and resources.

Discover the differences to help decide which is right for your business in 2021.

What Are WordPress and Drupal?

WordPress and Drupal are both free, open-source content management systems (CMS) organizations and individuals use to create websites. Both use PHP for scripting and offer an interface that even nontechnical people can use to publish posts or design pages.

For search engine optimization (SEO), they’re also comparable — through plugins, WordPress sites can achieve many of the same capabilities Drupal has built in. Here are a few pros and cons of each popular CMS.

Drupal’s Advantages over WordPress

Drupal’s security, accessibility and flexibility for complex, multifunctional sites are a few reasons why more than 150 countries use Drupal for their governmental agencies. Drupal reviews from users mention a steep learning curve starting out, but highlight its flexibility and customization as pros for organizations that need complex websites for global audiences.

Drupal’s More Dynamic & Extensive

If you expect your site to need extensive customization, Drupal is a great choice. While WordPress provides a quick start and easy-to-use templates for websites, Drupal can be more flexible when sites need to expand. Businesses can add functionality at any time with 16,000+ Drupal modules, enabling their site (or multiple sites) to include multiple content types, complex forms, chat forums, ecommerce and much more.

Drupal Offers Better Support for Multilingual Sites

Drupal brings multilingual capabilities right “out of the box,” so your site can communicate with global customers in 100+ languages. Drupal can also assume a user’s preferred language, so your brand can deliver localized content. The multilingual capabilities also make Drupal good for SEO efforts around the world. Trying to reach the same multilingual and SEO capabilities with WordPress means integrating and juggling multiple plugins.

The WordPress Advantage over Drupal

WordPress fans speak of its ease of use for quickly building a website as well as its mobile user experience and lower development costs, which may explain why nearly 40% of all websites are WordPress.

WordPress Is Easier to Use

Due to its origins as a platform for bloggers to easily publish their work, WordPress has remained user friendly for both admins and readers over the years. While Drupal requires a bit more technical know-how, especially for the more customizable features, someone with no experience can build a beautiful, functioning website with WordPress in a few hours. However, the site will look like others that used the available templates.

WordPress Has an Extensive List of Plugins

To make that templated site look and feel more unique to your brand — not to mention add features for your users — WordPress has thousands of free plugins admins can integrate. Implementing all of those plugins, however, can require the admin to have more expertise than they might have needed to start a simple site. In addition, plugins need to be updated regularly for both functionality and potential security issues.

So, Is a WordPress or Drupal Website Best for Your Business?

Are you reaching customers in multiple countries or want to be able to add more customization in the future? Drupal may be your best bet. If you want to start quickly so your small business can hit the ground running, WordPress could be the choice for you.

If you’re ready to build or revamp your business website for 2021, Ameex Technologies can help. Our Drupal web development experts have 13+ years of experience providing clear solutions to complex problems. Get in touch with us today.