If you’ve been checking us out, or know us already, you’d see that over the last 2 and a half years we have been super excited about working with a new (to us) CMS called Statamic, and also that for many years prior we specialised in Joomla websites - but what’s changed?
In August 2021 Joomla finally released the long-awaited version 4 - now when I say long-awaited I mean it. It was released 4 years after they announced it, and 7 years after it was first talked about.
It’s not us, it’s you
Now we know that good things take time, but to be honest, Joomla 4 was underwhelming for us (and our clients) - for the majority of websites it brought with it zero new features, and seems to have shifted focus to be more of a CMS for the EU market.
Where as other platforms on the web had evolved and grown, Joomla 4 stayed in its roots with a more complicated underlying framework (where simple custom developments become complex to achieve) and a "new" user interface that took a step back in usability and aesthetics. We felt that it was not the right platform for the needs of our clients.
Because of this we looked at alternatives - one that would bring new features, a platform that was a joy to design for and develop with and a better overall experience for us as developers and our clients as content managers - enter Statamic.
You can read more about Statamic in a previous post, but below we have put together a comparison of some key features outlining why we think it’s a better choice.
| Statamic | Joomla | |
|---|---|---|
|
Framework
|
Laravel
|
Joomla Framework
|
|
Authoring experience
Out of the box authoring experience
|
Flexible, user friendly, easy
|
Simple HTML block per page
|
|
Live preview editing
Edit pages with a live preview of changes
|
||
|
Content block builder
The ability to create unique page layouts
|
Requires 3rd party extension
|
|
|
Templating experience for developers
|
Easy, performant and managable
|
More complex, often requiring overrides, and inconsistent coding styles
|
|
Multi-site
Manage a main site and sub-sites (such as product-specific landing pages) from the one CMS
|
||
|
Multi-language
|
Using multi-site
|
|
|
Extendable with commercial add-ons
This includes both paid and free options
|
||
|
Native forms
Support for forms out of the box - like a contact or enquiry form
|
Requires 3rd party extension
|
|
|
Requires database
|
Not required, but can use one if your site is massive
|
|
|
Custom development experience
What is it like to build something cool for a specific site, or to create as an add-on for others
|
Easy
|
Difficult and overly complex
|
|
Custom user permissions
How easy is it to manage multiple user access levels throughout the site?
|
Easy
|
Difficult
|
|
Uses modern development stack
What's happening under the hood to make your developers really happy?
|
||
|
Frequency of updates
|
Fortnightly
|
Monthly
|
|
File management
|
Advanced and flexible
|
Basic
|
|
Image management
Including mobile friendly resizing and modern image formats
|
Includes responsive focus point cropping
|
|
|
Git version control
Deployment and management with full baked-in git love
|
Longevity and upgrades
Statamic is now following Laravel's versioning and update cycle, with a major release once a year (and will be a month or two after Laravel's). The first of these upgrades was Statamic 4 in 2023, and the upgrade process took only a few minutes - and that included updating to Laravel 10 too. Statamic's update schedule keeps deploying new features (and any bug fixes) throughout the year, and by following semantic versioning, gives us as developers a confidence to know and plan for updates, their compatibility and longevity.
Since the release of Joomla 4, they are now up to 4.3 with 4.0 and 4.1 already end of life – that seems quick, so were there issues?
As of July 2023 Joomla 5 Alpha has been release. Joomla are saying that from 4 to 5 will be an “upgrade” not a “migration” (as previous major versions have been), but I have seen chatter online that this might not be the case – we’ll just have to wait and see, but regardless our Joomla days are well and truly over.
The community
If we go from looking at the platform to the community again the differences are vast.
The Joomla community as a whole is good, but there are signs online that there are issues within the smaller community, and being mostly volunteer based the project doesn’t seem to (from the outside) get the focus and attention that it needs. Perhaps this is why Joomla 4 took so many years to eventuate.
Our own experience in being part of the Australian community was great – a good bunch of people, but when trying to contribute to the Joomla project we were met with rudeness and arrogance, and it left a bitter taste – to the point where we withdrew from the community and just continued doing what we do.
The Statamic community on the other hand is the polar opposite. The entire community from the core to the wider global community is friendly, welcoming and supportive.
No question is too small, answers and support are plentiful and we’ve even had several of our own contributions rolled into the core of Statamic.
We love and feel a part of the Statamic community so much we even made the trip to North Carolina back in May for Flatcamp, Statamic’s cool and unique anti-conference camp experience. The experience was amazing and so valuable.
While no one CMS is going to do everything that everyone wants, a CMS like Statamic gives us as developers much greater flexibility and control over providing a better and more user friendly content management and authoring experience, and more creative, dynamic and flexible page layouts for your site’s visitors.
Why not check out some of our Statamic projects, or drop us a line if you’d like to have a chat about how Statamic can work for your site.
Oh, and did you know that Mity is Australia’s only Certified Statamic Partner and we have developed several Statamic add-ons?
Michael Scruse
Michael brings his technical, web and sales expertise to every project, backed by over 30 years’ experience in the IT industry.
Michael is also a qualified chef, although cooking is now in a domestic kitchen. Michael is a bit of a history buff and is currently researching his own family history.
