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Drupal

Open source CMS with modular architecture, structured content support, and thousands of modules for extensibility. Offers custom themes, robust security, integration capabilities, starter distributions, active community support, and is free under the GPL license with no vendor lock-in.

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  • Self-Hosted
  • PHP  Drupal 10 requires PHP 8.1 or higher.
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Comment summary: Drupal is praised for its strong community and customization capabilities but criticized for complexity and maintenance issues. Users highlight Drupal's power and extensibility for large projects but note its steep learning curve and higher costs. Opinions are divided on how well Drupal updates to stay competitive compared to other CMS platforms like WordPress. While it offers many plugins, their quality can vary greatly.
Top Positive Comment
ab1
0

Many bad plugins but some good plugins also exist...

Top Negative Comment
DanMan
2

In both a good and a bad way. It's good because it's highly customizable. It's bad because it's a nightmare to maintain because of it.

Out of the box, it doesn't really do all that much, and the templating is complex, too. Again, because it's very flexible, which is good when you need it, but gets in the way if you don't.

So what I'm saying here is that you will have to invest quite some time to actually learn how to use this thing and about all the plug-ins you don't know you will need. If you don't have that time, or are not willing to take it, better stay clear of this. It's very easy to mess your installation up to a point where it all falls apart.

Replying to @DanMan

I agree that, more than 10 years ago, the Drupal version 7 or older were challenging to upgrade. This challenge is now resolved with Drupal 8 or more recent. As upgrading from Drupal 8 to 9 or more recent is much easier. Read more at https://www.drupal.org/about/9 or at https://archive.ph/zMWPh

-1

You need PHP and Composer.

ab1
0

Drupal has https://www.drupal.org/project/biblio for https://citationstyles.org.

I am not sure how good or bad this module...

gkruger
2

Drupal is pretty amazing. Powerful, reliable, secure and free (open source), as well as being backed by possibly the most impressive and helpful developer community with a security team and a huge library of functionality extensions (modules & themes). If you're isolated you will find there are many Slack rooms, forums and user groups all over the world and a lot of great manuals, plus a ton of vendors to hire. There is no site you can't build with Drupal. Drupal will also grow with you as your site expands and becomes more complex and it will help you make those changes as configuration that can be migrated from dev to live. I've messed with and been exposed to most of the top CMS out there and I like quite a few, but Drupal is still king when it comes to power and digital experiences. That said Drupal has become a tool for large websites and/or ambitious ones. Smaller sites should probably use Wordpress, Joomla or the like, possibly even Weebly, Wix, etc. Why? When I worked on Drupal 4 and 5 we were making websites in the $3K to $30K range. Freelancers abounded, as did site builders who were hobbyists and designers, plus the community was incredible. Now websites cost more like $150K through $400K or more if you're huge, freelancers are rare, hell small vendors are rare as it has become a tool for development by teams of 8 to dozens. Worse, community is greatly diminished. Drupal 8+ is not for small organizations without a healthy budget and staff/consultants providing ongoing support. I'd give it 5 stars for bigger sites and 3 stars for smaller ones. 4 on average.

chandrao
-1

very easy to make as pleased but not easy to maintain. for simple websites this works fine.

Louis Beckler
0

tried it, not pleased at all with the results, really needs to keep up with updates.

7 of 18 comments

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What is Drupal?

Drupal is content management software. It's used to make many of the websites and applications you use every day. Drupal has great standard features, like easy content authoring, reliable performance, and excellent security. But what sets it apart is its flexibility; modularity is one of its core principles. Its tools help you build the versatile, structured content that dynamic web experiences need.

It's also a great choice for creating integrated digital frameworks. You can extend it with any one, or many, of thousands of add-ons. Modules expand Drupal's functionality. Themes let you customize your content's presentation. Distributions are packaged Drupal bundles you can use as starter-kits. Mix and match these components to enhance Drupal's core abilities. Or, integrate Drupal with external services and other applications in your infrastructure. No other content management software is this powerful and scalable.

The Drupal project is open source software. Anyone can download, use, work on, and share it with others. It's built on principles like collaboration, globalism, and innovation. It's distributed under the terms of the GNU General Public License (GPL). There are no licensing fees, ever. Drupal will always be free.

Drupal information

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  • Licensing

    Open Source (GPL-2.0) and Free product.
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    One time purchase (perpetual license).
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    Average rating of 2.9 (11 ratings)
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Our users have written 18 comments and reviews about Drupal, and it has gotten 497 likes

Drupal was added to AlternativeTo by ronaldleite on and this page was last updated .