Drupal vs Joomla
Drupal
drupal.org
Joomla
joomla.orgSide by side
| Figure | Drupal | Joomla |
|---|---|---|
| Price from | Free | Free |
| Free plan | Yes | Yes |
| Free trial | Yes | — |
| Open source | — | — |
| Web | Yes | Yes |
| Windows | Yes | — |
| macOS | Yes | — |
| Linux | Yes | Yes |
| API | Yes | Yes |
| Self-hosted | Yes | Yes |
| Plans published | 1 | 1 |
| Spec score · Content Management Systems | 9.0 (#10) | 8.7 (#23) |
| Spec score · CMS Tools | 8.8 (#3) | 8.4 (#9) |
| Spec score · Website Development tools | 8.9 (#3) | 8.4 (#12) |
| Spec score · Website builders | 9.0 (#8) | 8.7 (#20) |
| Spec score · Nonprofit Website Builders | 8.9 (#4) | 8.4 (#13) |
| Spec score · Web Content Management Software | 8.8 (#3) | 8.5 (#7) |
| Spec score · Website Template Marketplaces | 8.8 (#4) | 8.4 (#9) |
| Custom content types | Yes | Yes |
| Custom user roles | Yes | Yes |
| Editorial workflows | Yes | Yes |
| Extensibility | Drupal can be extended with thousands of modules, themes and distributions. | The Joomla Extensions Directory offers thousands of extensions, most available free under the GPL license. |
| Free plan | Yes | Yes |
| Media library | Yes | Yes |
| Multilingual content | Yes | Yes |
| Platform type | hybrid | hybrid |
| SEO tools | Yes | Yes |
| Support | Drupal CMS support is available through its user guide, Drupal Slack’s #drupal-cms-support channel and the project issue queue. | Joomla! provides an official community forum, online documentation, an issue tracker, and an in-app contextual help system. |
Plans
In their own words
Drupal
Drupal is content management software for building websites and applications. Drupal CMS is a ready-to-use platform for marketing teams, content creators, and site builders, built on Drupal 11 core. Included tools cover media management, SEO, AI-driven website building, consent management, analytics, search, and automatic updates. Drupal supports structured content, multilingual publishing, editorial workflows, custom user roles, and APIs for serving web, mobile, and other channels from one source. Thousands of modules, themes, and distributions can extend it, and it can connect with external services and organizational applications. Drupal identifies accessibility, API-first architecture, security, performance, and scalability as core capabilities. The software is free open-source software with no licensing fees, but self-hosting and technical setup are required. Linux or a similar system is recommended for hosting; Windows is supported only for development, not production. Drupal CMS offers temporary browser-based trial sites. After setup, Drupal CMS itself is not updated, although installed modules and themes are updated like other Drupal sites.
Joomla
Joomla! is a free, open-source content management system for publishing website content. It supports multiple users with different permission levels to create, edit, archive, publish, and distribute material; an Access Control List manages users, groups, and permissions. Editorial workflows, custom content types, multilingual content, a media library, and SEO tools are included. Core publishing features include article management, scheduled publishing, versioning, metadata, keywords, and search-engine-friendly URLs. Joomla! is used for corporate and small business sites, intranets, publications, e-commerce, government and community websites, and personal homepages. Its MVC web application framework can also be used independently. The Extensions Directory offers thousands of extensions, most available free under the GPL, and the download site offers more than 70 accredited language packages. Joomla! lists built-in two-factor authentication. It provides community forums, online documentation, an issue tracker, and in-app contextual help. A fully functional free website is available through launch.joomla.org without requiring users to install the CMS themselves.