Craft CMS vs. WordPress
Nowadays, it’s almost essential to build a website using a content management system (CMS) that allows you to create, edit, and manage pages and content independently. This is often one of the first requirements we hear from our clients when they come to us with the desire for a new website: they want to manage their website content themselves without relying on continuous developer support.
There are many CMS options on the market, with WordPress as the leading blog system. Today, however, we want to talk about Craft CMS and how it compares to WordPress.
At craft unit, we said goodbye to WordPress several years ago and adopted Craft CMS as our preferred content management system. Since 2016, we have developed more than 200 websites and online shops using Craft CMS and Craft Commerce, achieving outstanding results — making Craft CMS our top choice for website development.
And it’s not just us — major brands like Netflix, Ikea, Adidas, Microsoft, Apple, Reddit, Adobe, AT&T, McDonald’s, and Dell all use Craft CMS.
Content Management
When comparing the two systems, it’s best to start with what really makes Craft CMS shine: content management. Craft CMS is an open system that lets you create exactly the concept and content structure your website needs. Everything required for this is already built into Craft CMS — without the need for the typical WordPress plugins.
Furthermore, Craft CMS does not use pre-made templates, giving you full control over your website’s frontend and layout design. Without the limitations of plugins and rigid templates — from which there’s often no escape — you face no restrictions, and your website becomes truly unique and tailored to your specific needs.
For content management, Craft CMS offers an admin and editor interface with a modern, user-friendly design that provides exactly the options you need. We like to call it a LEGO-style system with unlimited possibilities.
Website Security
WordPress websites are known for being easy — and often — targets for hacking. This is mainly due to security vulnerabilities in plugins as well as layout and coding templates. In 2020, for example, 200,000 WordPress websites became vulnerable when a faulty and outdated plugin allowed hackers to reset the entire website database. Since Craft CMS does not use prebuilt themes or templates, the attack surface for hackers is significantly smaller than with WordPress.
Furthermore, Craft CMS comes with far more functionality built in, which means that plugins are rarely needed.
Outdated Plugins – An Open Door for Hackers
One of the main problems with WordPress is that you need to install many plugins to meet your website’s requirements and to add functionalities, integrations, backends, etc.
This is because WordPress was originally designed as a blogging platform. To turn WordPress into a full CMS, a large number of plugins from third-party developers around the world are required. Mostly, these are individual developers or small companies contributing to WordPress’s massive plugin ecosystem. In the end, your website becomes a collection of dozens of plugins that must be maintained and updated regularly to avoid security issues.
But what happens if a plugin from an external or unknown author is no longer maintained or becomes incompatible with the latest WordPress version? Your website then becomes vulnerable to external attacks and requires extensive redevelopment.
At craft unit, we’ve been asked multiple times to fix WordPress websites with more than 50 external plugins — half of which were outdated. A nearly impossible task!
Thanks to the minimal use of plugins in craft unit’s Craft CMS projects, this issue simply doesn’t exist for us. We only use plugins that are not essential for the operation of the website. This ensures that your site continues to function even if there’s an issue with a plugin or its developer.
Craft CMS was built from the ground up with a strong focus on security. It avoids common vulnerabilities such as SQL injections, cross-site scripting (XSS), and cross-site request forgery (CSRF) through the use of modern security practices and frameworks. For more information on common questions, refer to the Craft CMS Security FAQ.
Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
This is one of the main priorities for our clients. WordPress is well-known for its SEO capabilities, particularly thanks to plugins like Yoast SEO, which has been around for many years and has helped many websites improve their SEO. Craft CMS also offers SEO plugins such as SEOmatic, which provide similar functionality.
Okay, plugins... but what about performance?
Nowadays, SEO is not just about plugins. You need a website that is user-friendly, has a clear navigation structure, and delivers excellent performance. These are key factors search engines use when ranking your website. Google doesn’t like slow websites — and penalizes them accordingly. Performance is an area where WordPress often struggles, as the combination of templates and plugins tends to slow down loading times.
Once again, Craft CMS clearly outperforms WordPress. When it comes to website performance, the most important metric is the “Time to First Byte” (TTFB). Values above 200–300ms are already considered slow. All websites developed and hosted by craft unit achieve an average TTFB of under 80ms. This is achieved through performance-oriented coding and through web servers optimized specifically for Craft CMS .
Conclusion
If you’re working with a tight budget and limited time, WordPress can be a good choice. You can quickly launch a standard website without having to deal with much code. However, in the long run, you’ll face high maintenance costs and security risks due to plugins and themes/templates.
If you prefer a modern website that is 100% tailored to your needs, stands out from the crowd, is easy to use, delivers excellent performance and SEO, and lets you stop worrying about security — then Craft CMS is the right choice.