Three Reasons to Move from

Joomla to WordPress

To some this post is going to appear controversial, to others reconfirm their opinion. Joomla has had an incredible back story and like WordPress is a ‘fork’ of another CMS package.

There are no-doubt situations in which WordPress can appear to be weaker than other contact management systems.

Ecommerce being one that other packages as Joomla and especially Magento perhaps have stronger offerings ‘currently’.

Self-hosted WordPress is evolving from a blogging platform to a package that can cater to a wider audience, than its historical user base.

With improvements rolling out each year that are helping people cope with larger MySQL databases and handling that amount of data, WordPress’s functionality continues to grow and impress the world over.

However this article only covers three of the reasons to migrate from Joomla to WordPress.

We are not saying WordPress is right for everyone, but below are three strong reasons.

Migration / Upgrades

Joomla’s upgrade history over the last few years has been interesting to say the least.

The 1.0.x migration to 1.5.x was quite painful for many, resulting in hours of headaches for some users.

Then the 1.6.x migration headaches and hurdles for some was a migration too far.

Not in terms of the new features, which many welcomed, but the process wasn’t smooth for many and lack of backwards compatibility painful to accept.

Whereas over the last couple of years upgrading WordPress to many has been a smoother journey, even when issues such as different server specs present minor upgrade hurdles.

WordPress Plugins

I must admit WordPress’s presentation of available plugins on their website does appear cleaner than Joomla’s.

Then administration wise again the management is cleaner in WordPress’s administration dashboard.

It is true like Joomla’s issues with some older plugins, many older WordPress plugins are not compatible, but that isn’t surprising with any content management system

Perhaps it is Joomla’s complexity again that makes components and modules a daunting task.

Finding the right plugin, installing, configuring and working out how to integrate just feels more complex in Joomla.

Ease of Use

Here is the main reason to consider migration, WordPress is easier to use for people of all levels.

Which in a sense is a round-up of the previous two reasons.

The fact is Joomla is more powerful when it comes to handling pages, but in reality most people don’t need that level of functionality.

What WordPress provides ticks the boxes for most.

Dealing with front page articles, menu item placements and integration of new features for many just doesn’t feel worthwhile, when WordPress and its popular plugins is a viable alternative for the specific task at hand.

The Conclusion

Joomla’s complex rich functionality ultimately is its weakness. When you require such high level of features, Joomla can deliver, but it comes at a price as many novices might feel out of their depth using the package.

WordPress often can offer extended features via plugins, but it is a sense playing catch up, but what it does provide, it does incredibly well and makes using a breeze for novice, intermediate and advanced users.

With blogging such a crucial element to continued website growth, which in WordPress’s case works out of the box, it makes sense that if Joomla has frustrated and hindered you, plus now could be overkill for your requirements, then considering migrating to WordPress should be a real consideration.

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