Drupal vs. WordPress for a Blog
A D V E R T I S E M E N T
You can read many articles about Drupal vs. WordPress when you try to Google it. They've been there for quiet a long time, but this "blah blah blah" is far from over because there are more and more people to eagerly try both CMS and write their experience about it. I am neither a developer nor a blogger. I develop website, yes, but it doesn't mean I'm a developer. I have my own personal blog, yes, but it doesn't mean I am a blogger. I played basketball, yes, but it doesn't mean I am a basketball player. Blogging is my hobby and web development is my passion, this post will try to compare my personal experiences among these two CMS.
WordPress is an out-of-the-box blogging platform, it was built primarily for the purpose of blogging, it is for hardcore blogger per see. Install WordPress, tweak it a little, and there you go, a complete and powerful CMS to handle your every post. You can update, upgrade, backup, theme, and extend WordPress from admin side without going to the backend. Doing technical tasks in the admin interface made WordPress very popular to non-technical Joe. It is super easy to use, easy to install, easy to maintain, and easy to upgrade. It has built-in editor and media library that made the life of a developer a lot more easy. Plugins are vastly available and ready to install from WordPress.org, the best thing is, you can install a plugin from the admin interface without logging in to the backend.
WordPress however has its very frustrating downside. If you want more control in your blog, you can't do it in WordPress. What I mean is its scalability. In WordPress, doing something new will just get more complicated. To expand a WordPress blog will most of the time mean you are going to completely revamp your website.
Drupal is more than just a blogging tool, it is complete and powerful CMS that can be turned into any type of website you can imagine. Making a blog using Drupal is one of the easiest website to develop. You can turn it into a blog even without installing the core blog module. The default installation of Drupal can be turned into a blog, extend it a little with some modules, and you will have a very lightweight yet very powerful blogging platform to handle your blog.
One of the downside of Drupal is the steep initial learning curve. Many first timers fled away because they found it very frustrating to grasp how Drupal works. However, once overcome, this CMS become more seductive, it is very tempting to build yet another Drupal powered blog. If you get along with Drupal, you may ask to yourself why so many are using WordPress for their blog. You will do your own evaluation and you may end up writing another blogpost that says Drupal vs. WordPress.
In general, the strength of Drupal is the weakness of WordPress and the weakness of WordPress is the strength of Drupal (I am not sure why I say this, so don't take this statement seriously). Which one to go for your blog depends primarily on you. I will highly recommend WordPress if you don't want to be bothered with some technical stuffs, all you need is to blog. However, if you want to hold more control of your blog and willing to set aside blogging for a moment while do some learning, Drupal is right for you. The time you spend in learning this CMS is worthwhile in the future. Note also that blogging has its own issues like getting some traffic, search engine optimization, link building, profitable keywords, writing a quality content, and many more. Learning a CMS will take you away from the real purpose of blogging. When I told you to get up, and do some blog, your response would be to write an article for your blog, not to study how your blogging platform works. Which CMS to use, it's up to you, but first evaluate the comparisons I made in this post.
You may also like to read: Which CMS to use
You can read many articles about Drupal vs. WordPress when you try to Google it. They've been there for quiet a long time, but this "blah blah blah" is far from over because there are more and more people to eagerly try both CMS and write their experience about it. I am neither a developer nor a blogger. I develop website, yes, but it doesn't mean I'm a developer. I have my own personal blog, yes, but it doesn't mean I am a blogger. I played basketball, yes, but it doesn't mean I am a basketball player. Blogging is my hobby and web development is my passion, this post will try to compare my personal experiences among these two CMS.
WordPress is an out-of-the-box blogging platform, it was built primarily for the purpose of blogging, it is for hardcore blogger per see. Install WordPress, tweak it a little, and there you go, a complete and powerful CMS to handle your every post. You can update, upgrade, backup, theme, and extend WordPress from admin side without going to the backend. Doing technical tasks in the admin interface made WordPress very popular to non-technical Joe. It is super easy to use, easy to install, easy to maintain, and easy to upgrade. It has built-in editor and media library that made the life of a developer a lot more easy. Plugins are vastly available and ready to install from WordPress.org, the best thing is, you can install a plugin from the admin interface without logging in to the backend.
WordPress however has its very frustrating downside. If you want more control in your blog, you can't do it in WordPress. What I mean is its scalability. In WordPress, doing something new will just get more complicated. To expand a WordPress blog will most of the time mean you are going to completely revamp your website.
Drupal is more than just a blogging tool, it is complete and powerful CMS that can be turned into any type of website you can imagine. Making a blog using Drupal is one of the easiest website to develop. You can turn it into a blog even without installing the core blog module. The default installation of Drupal can be turned into a blog, extend it a little with some modules, and you will have a very lightweight yet very powerful blogging platform to handle your blog.
One of the downside of Drupal is the steep initial learning curve. Many first timers fled away because they found it very frustrating to grasp how Drupal works. However, once overcome, this CMS become more seductive, it is very tempting to build yet another Drupal powered blog. If you get along with Drupal, you may ask to yourself why so many are using WordPress for their blog. You will do your own evaluation and you may end up writing another blogpost that says Drupal vs. WordPress.
In general, the strength of Drupal is the weakness of WordPress and the weakness of WordPress is the strength of Drupal (I am not sure why I say this, so don't take this statement seriously). Which one to go for your blog depends primarily on you. I will highly recommend WordPress if you don't want to be bothered with some technical stuffs, all you need is to blog. However, if you want to hold more control of your blog and willing to set aside blogging for a moment while do some learning, Drupal is right for you. The time you spend in learning this CMS is worthwhile in the future. Note also that blogging has its own issues like getting some traffic, search engine optimization, link building, profitable keywords, writing a quality content, and many more. Learning a CMS will take you away from the real purpose of blogging. When I told you to get up, and do some blog, your response would be to write an article for your blog, not to study how your blogging platform works. Which CMS to use, it's up to you, but first evaluate the comparisons I made in this post.
You may also like to read: Which CMS to use
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Comments
Re: Drupal vs. WordPress for a Blog
Romel: Good post, I agree with your assessment of the two. I use Drupal and it is well worth the learning curve. There are lots of training sites, books and resources available for Drupal wannbes. The other CMS to consider is Joomla, although I prefer Drupal many believe that Joomla is better fit for certain situations. HERE is a comparison of the two. Thanks for the post.
Re: Drupal vs. WordPress for a Blog
Hi dave tribbett, thank you for dropping by and or sharing your thoughts. With regards to Joomla, I need to explore it a little more. I only have minimal experience with that CMS. My first impression about Joomla is the high volume of commercial extensions listed in their site. In Drupal, all modules are free of charge.
Re: Drupal vs. WordPress for a Blog
I think it really depends on what it is going to be used for....if it is a simple blog, i think it is ok to use wordpress. if you want social networking, more functionality, or more than just a blog or a brochure site, then drupal is probably the way to go.
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