Advantages and disadvantages of a Wordpress website
Or: not all that glitters is gold!
When creating a new website, the question usually arises as to which software to use to create the homepage. Here I will introduce you to a few advantages of WordPress. However, this very popular web content management system also has some disadvantages. I compare the advantages and disadvantages of WordPress here.
WordPress advantages
- An “off-the-shelf” website can be created quite easily and quickly with WordPress.
There are hundreds of WordPress templates available at https://wordpress.org/themes/, for example. These templates can also be searched in the WordPress backend under Design and will tell you whether they are compatible with your WordPress version.
- You can write a post relatively easily.
WordPress is not actually a content management system, but blog software. Creating and filling pages and adding/editing images is quite simple.
- In contrast to TYPO3, WordPress can scale images without Imagemagick/GraphicsMagick.
However, (almost) all providers have at least one of these programs installed.
- No license costs
WordPress is free to use. Most of the plugins are also free of charge.
- Open source code:
This enables a high degree of flexibility and customizability.
- Large community:
A huge community of developers and users ensures continuous further development and extensive support.
- Countless themes:
Themes allow you to customize the look of your website.
- Large number of plugins:
plugins extend the functionality of WordPress with almost every conceivable function.
- Good basis for SEO:
WordPress is designed from the ground up to be easily found by search engines.
Wordpress disadvantages
- A WordPress system should always be kept up to date!
Time and again, I see attempted attacks on WordPress systems in the logs of my customers' TYPO3 sites. Various files are called up that give a bot an indication of an old WordPress system that is often fading away.
WordPress is now a very popular system with a market share of 64.8% (source: https://de.statista.com/). It is therefore particularly worthwhile scouring the bots here for outdated, insecure systems.
- There is a plugin for every function.
With WordPress, you need a plugin for almost every function that a standard website should have. Be it a contact form, a calendar or if you are not satisfied with the media library.
The next disadvantage comes to mind here:
- WordPress always sorts the media/images according to a scheme (year/month/...).
If at some point you have a lot of images, PDFs and possibly videos on a WordPress system, you can spend a long time searching for an old image in the media manager. If you want to create at least virtual directories for your images, e.g. to store them in a logical order, you will need an additional plugin.
- Many plugins and themes are available as free and pro versions
Most plugins and themes are free, but often only basic functions are activated. Only when you purchase a license - often only for one year - can you use all the functions.
And some of them like to point out the Pro version very insistently.
As you can see, there are a number of WordPress advantages, but also disadvantages. If you would like me to help you decide on the right web content management system, please send me an e-mail or give me a call.