The Best Open Source WordPress AlternativesTop Blog Publishing & CMS Tools like WordPress

The best open source alternative to WordPress is Drupal. If that doesn't suit you, our users have ranked more than 100 alternatives to WordPress and loads of them is open source so hopefully you can find a suitable replacement. Other interesting open source alternatives to WordPress are Joomla, Ghost, Grav and Jekyll.

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WordPress alternatives are mainly CMS Tools, but if you're looking for Blog Publishing Tools or Website Builders you can filter on that. Other popular filters include Open Source, .NET Framework, Free, Website Builder, Linux, Self-Hosted + Open Source and Self-Hosted. You can also filter by region, for example EU-based alternatives if you prefer software developed in the European Union. These are just examples - use the filter bar below to find more specific alternatives to WordPress.
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Alternatives list

  1. Drupal icon

    Drupal

     494 likes

    Drupal is a free and open source CMS that has been created “by developers for developers”, and is therefore slightly more complicated to learn than a solution like Wix or WordPress. It's intended for an audience with technical skills, which is why it is perhaps less popular. This drawback can also be an advantage: thanks to the great flexibility of Drupal, it is possible to obtain much more advanced results thanks to more in-depth functionality. And like WordPress, it can also be extended with thousands of themes and modules.

    211 Drupal alternatives

    Cost / License

    Application type

    Platforms

    • Self-Hosted
    • PHP
    Drupal screenshot 1
     
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    8
  2. Joomla icon

    Joomla

     353 likes

    Joomla is another free and open source popular CMS. It's a powerful, versatile, and flexible platform with a large community of users and developers. It is known to be more accessible than Drupal, but more complex than WordPress. Like the other two, it can be extended with themes and extensions. Joomla still requires some technical skills and is primarily intended for developers.

    209 Joomla alternatives

    Cost / License

    Application types

    Platforms

    • Self-Hosted
    • PHP
    Home Dashboard
     
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    3
  4. Ghost icon

    Ghost

     259 likes

    Launched in 2013, Ghost is a modern blogging platform that you can self-host or pay for a hosted version (a bit like WordPress). But unlike the three CMS mentioned above, it's not based on PHP but on NodeJS, which can be a good thing for JavaScript developers. Ghost has a very sleek interface and offers useful tools like subscriptions, memberships, analytics, and integrations to easily grow your audience. You can also download beautiful themes from their marketplace to speed up the process of launching your website.

    280 Ghost alternatives

    Cost / License

    • Free Personal
    • Open Source (MIT)

    Application types

    Platforms

    • Online
    • Self-Hosted
    • Cloudron
    • Node.JS
    Ghost screenshot 1
     
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    1
  5. Grav icon

    Grav

     138 likes

    Grav is a powerful and easy to use open source CMS written in PHP and based on the Symfony web application framework. Compared to other content management systems, it is a fast, simple and flexible file-based platform. This means that Grav doesn't use a database like MySQL or MongoDB, but stores all the information in YAML files. This also means that the learning curve is pretty straightforward, there are less security risks, and the websites are usually pretty fast. There's also a marketplace with themes and plugins, but don't expect to see as many as for WordPress, Joomla or Drupal.

    191 Grav alternatives

    Cost / License

    • Free
    • Open Source

    Application type

    Platforms

    • Self-Hosted
    • Cloudron
    The dashboard
     
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    6
  6. Jekyll icon

    Jekyll

     127 likes

    Jekyll is a static site generator (SSG) created in 2008 by Tom Preston-Werner, the founder of GitHub. It's coded in Ruby and requires NodeJS. It's very different from WordPress on many points. For starters, it's a static site generator, which means it takes your text and generates static HTML pages for your site (with no database).

    Like Grav, it's pretty fast and simple to use, but it requires a bit more technical knowledge as you don't have access to an admin dashboard to manage your website. One advantage, though, is that you can use the free hosting provided by GitHub Pages with Jekyll.

    135 Jekyll alternatives

    Cost / License

    • Free
    • Open Source (MIT)

    Application types

    Platforms

    • Mac
    • Windows
    • Linux
    • Self-Hosted
    Jekyll screenshot 1
     
  7. Hugo icon

    Hugo

     93 likes

    Hugo is a general-purpose website framework for generating static web pages. Hugo flexibly works with many formats and is ideal for blogs, docs, portfolios and much more.

    109 Hugo alternatives

    Cost / License

    Application types

    Platforms

    • Mac
    • Windows
    • Linux
    • Self-Hosted
    Hugo screenshot 1
     
  9. ProcessWire icon

    ProcessWire

     165 likes

    ProcessWire is a free and open source content management framework (CMF) and content management system (CMS). The backend is clean and structured for easy handling. This tool gives you all the freedom you need to design your website. It is not as well known as the giant WordPress or its competitors Joomla and Drupal, but this lightweight software stands out from the competition with certain advantages (ease of use, security, stable API, page templates…).

    Cost / License

    • Free
    • Open Source

    Application types

    Platforms

    • Mac
    • Windows
    • Linux
    • Online
    • Self-Hosted
    • PHP
    ProcessWire screenshot 1
     
  10. Frappe Builder icon

    Frappe Builder

     14 likes

    Frappe Builder is an open-source low-code website builder built on the Frappe Framework, designed for simplicity, speed, and flexibility. Craft beautiful websites effortlessly with an intuitive visual builder.

    Cost / License

    Application type

    Platforms

    • Online
    • Self-Hosted
    • Linux
    • Docker
    Frappe Builder screenshot 1
     
  12. EmDash CMS icon

    EmDash CMS

     11 likes

    Full-stack TypeScript CMS built on Astro and Cloudflare featuring extensible architecture, sandboxed plugins in Worker isolates, WordPress migration, visual schema builder, role-based access, rich text editing, AI integration, media management, and open source deployment.

    53 EmDash CMS alternatives

    Cost / License

    • Free
    • Open Source (MIT)

    Application types

    Platforms

    • Self-Hosted
    • Typescript
    EmDash CMS screenshot 1
     
  13. Strapi icon

    Strapi

     39 likes

    Strapi enables developers to build projects faster by providing a customizable API out of the box and giving them the freedom to use their favorite tools. Content teams use Strapi to autonomously manage all types of content and distribute it from one CMS to any channel be it...

    85 Strapi alternatives

    Cost / License

    • Freemium
    • Open Source

    Application type

    Platforms

    • Self-Hosted
    Content types builder
     
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    1
  14. ClassicPress icon

    ClassicPress

     11 likes

    ClassicPress is a community-led open source content management system and a fork of WordPress that preserves the TinyMCE classic editor as the default option, which means there is no Gutenberg (block) editor.

    Cost / License

    • Free
    • Open Source

    Application types

    Platforms

    • Self-Hosted
    ClassicPress admin dashboard
     
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    2
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