Content Management Systems (CMS) like WordPress are incredible applications that offer quite a bit of functionality for developing websites. That said, there are several pros and cons to using them. Some of the ones I’ve come across while using WordPress are described below.
Pros
- The biggest pro to using a CMS like WordPress is how easy it is to use. The user interface is clean and simple, allowing non-technical users to create a robust website easily and quickly.
- With over 60,000 plugins available on WordPress.org, WordPress can be tailored in almost any way possible with the simple installation of a plugin. This means technical and non-technical users can install and activate a plugin within minutes to ensure their website does what they need it to do without having to spend any time figuring out how to code it themselves.
- While a CMS like WordPress has a simple drag-and-drop user interface, it also offers more technical customization options, such as modifying the CSS of web pages with direct code input. This makes it ideal for someone with technical knowledge who wants to create a highly customized website quickly and easily.
Cons
- While WordPress has many themes to choose from both on WordPress.org and on premium sites in other places on the Internet, there aren’t many that offer extensive customizations for free. Many of the themes I’ve explored from WordPress.org offer only basic design options and features for free, while tempting you with other options that require a premium subscription.
- HTML editing in a CMS can be limited, which may be discouraging to the technical user or the student wanting to get more HTML practice.
- Regular updates are very important for security and functionality reasons. Not keeping your plugins and theme current can potentially open you up to security risks or render your website unusable.
Finally, for me, the single most difficult thing to do in WordPress is find the perfect theme that has all the features I want for free and that interacts well with all the plugins I choose to install and activate. I experimented with 3-4 themes while determining which would be the best fit for my site, and I had very limited customization options and some conflicts trying to use the plugins I wanted to use with most of them.
