Many people say that WordPress has many problems and flaws, but they all use WordPress to publish their “ideas”. It is normal that those who are dedicated to selling their experience and knowledge of web design and programming do not defend that an average user can make their own page, their own site, with WordPress. In order not to complicate it too much, the pros and cons of using WordPress for websites are going to be discussed below.
PROS VS CONS
Advantages
The fact of being open source is one of the great claims of this platform. Although many users do not care, since it is not their intention to take advantage of what this platform offers, they do benefit from this, since it allows them to have at their disposal a lot of themes and plugins from different authors.
Make no mistake, this is a great asset, but several of its competitors are also free, such as Joomla, Drupal, or ForkCMS, to name a few. This means that it is not an advantage to take into account.
Certainly, this is a point to take into account, not only is it easy to obtain a hosting service that delivers WordPress already installed or within the reach of a click, but it is also easy to install if one decides to carry out the process himself. Several of WordPress’s competitors, once installed, are straightforward to handle, but up to that point, the installation process requires more attention and knowledge (in many cases) than WordPress requires. On the other hand, what is known as initial configuration, that is, creating the necessary users and being ready to start, is also much easier in WordPress than in its competitors.
The installation of themes, that is, the customization of how visitors will see the website, is quite simple. Undoubtedly, the more options the theme offers to install, the more involved it needs on your part, but in many cases, change the appearance, change the theme is as simple as clicking the “install” button. Each website needs a different theme, not by imposition but, because who wants to present their business, surely will need a different presentation than who sells parts for repair of washing machines. The themes allow this differentiation to be made and, in many cases, they do not need any more intervention on your part than to supply the particular data of the business.
Disadvantages
Many of my administrator friends complain about the number of resources that this CMS consumes. The truth is that any computer application that makes use of PHP and the SQL engine, consumes resources, so its competitors do too. But beyond the fact that in some cases the memory usage cap has to be increased to 512Mb (which is outrageous), the truth is that under normal conditions, WordPress does not need more than 64Mb and, only in extreme cases in when a large number of plugins and a very active theme are installed, these extremes are reached.
- In many cases, the speed, or at least the perception of speed by the user, can be easily increased by installing cache services, either in the form of plugins or as independent applications on the server and, being extreme, even with CDN technologies on the cloud.
Statistics say that WordPress is the most attacked CMS, compared to its competitors. But the statistics are imprecise. If it is the most attacked, but it must be taken into account that WordPress today, means 43% of the installed CMS, so it is normal that it is attacked since it is easier for some of the installed WordPress to be lacking in security than find a hole in another CMS.
Since it is so easy to install plugins and see what happens, it is also easy to install things that we do not need, just to see how beautiful it does or what novelty it brings us. Plugin installation should be limited to specific functions that we need to cover. Trusted source plugins have many advantages, one of them being that they are also Open Source, so you can ask the community about their evaluation and rating.
Conclusion
After reviewing all the points of pros and cons. Although there are some drawbacks, the use of WordPress is highly recommended, one will save time and effort in the creation of your website. Almost any website can be created with WordPress, from a blog for personal use, to a news site of a global information chain, to name two cases. The number of themes available, the number of different task plugins, and the ease of using all of these in (almost) any combination make it suitable for all types of websites.
