20 Best Content Management Systems (CMS) Platforms in 2022!

Are you tired of constantly contacting a developer to maintain your website? There is nothing worse than the helpless feeling you get when you battle with technological issues. As a website is an element that establishes your digital presence, it is imperative to keep it at the forefront to achieve your business goals. 

Content Management Systems relieve you from the stress of managing and updating your website. 

It provides you with an interface to help you modify, edit, delete, and upload content directly to your website without the need for coding while simultaneously taking care of all the web infrastructure so you can concentrate on what matters the most – your customers! 

In this blog, we will be talking about the top 20 Content Management Systems that are taking the year by storm! 

1) WordPress 

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Pricing: Free

USP: Open-Source Content Management System

WordPress powers a whopping 43.3% of all websites on the internet!

WordPress started as a blogging platform and served as an early form of a website builder. It currently also happens to be one of the most popular Content Management Systems in the design and developer community. 

You can build any kind of website on WordPress, be it e-commerce stores or full-fledged forums for discussions. 

Due to its immense flexibility, while building websites without much technical knowledge, WordPress has a huge fan following. It hosts an array of free or paid themes and plugins.

However, you would need to be in charge of managing the security and management aspect. WordPress itself does not come with inbuilt security but gives the community an advantage to build upon the plugin system that it provides.

2) Drupal 

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Pricing: Free

USP: Security

Drupal is another popular name in the Content Management System world and kind of sits at the same level as WordPress in terms of functionality. 

Herein, you can build customized websites that are programmed to manage large amounts of data. It offers a library of plugins to enhance the overall user experience. 

You can also create bifurcations for geolocation, device type, history, etc to cater to your target audience in the best possible way. It is also one of the safest platforms in terms of security due to its stringent coding standards.

3) Joomla!

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Pricing: Free

USP: Complex websites made easy

Joomla! is another free open-source Content Management System for brands looking for great customizability and plugins. 

A lot of complex and futuristic websites are made on Joomla due to the high levels of customization, a plethora of features, and one-click installation. 

It was launched in 2005 and has been in the game for as long as WordPress. We would not recommend this to beginners as Joomla requires some level of experience for creation. You can also run an e-commerce business as they have the relevant extensions. 

Although Joomla has a lot of supporters, a lot of people have complained about compatibility issues if you have a lot of extensions running. 

4) HubSpot CMS Hub

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Pricing: Paid 

USP : CMS + CRM Experience

HubSpot CMS Hub is a great Content Management System for businesses and enterprises looking to communicate with their users. CRM integration allows market automation, sales, operations, etc. This is more of an all-in-one solution than a devoted Content Management System. The ease of use coupled with smart content features has triggered the astronomical popularity of the platform. It is also very safe to use due to the built-in security features. It is however extremely expensive and not affordable to everyone out there. 

5) Shopify

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Pricing: Paid 

USP: Best-suited for e-commerce

Shopify is an all-in-one hosted Content Management System with a relatively easier drag-and-drop functionality than other options in the market. The good thing about Shopify is that you would not need to install any software, buy hosting or manage the updates. 

Shopify gives aesthetic but standard template options for brands to easily mirror their branding. It sometimes hurts the brands in the long term as well. It is great for e-commerce as you can leverage Shopify’s integrated payment system as well. PayPal is one of Shopify’s default payment options. Although Shopify has undeniably great features, its upgradation and maintenance could burn a hole in your pocket!

6) Ghost

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Pricing: Free

USP: Best-suited for bloggers

Ghost is a Content Management System curated for blogging. This is a classic example of a headless Content Management System.

With Ghost, you can redirect content shown on a website to a mobile app. It offers a text formatting feature called Markdown through which you can add special characters to your words. 

Although it does not provide extensive features like other Content Management Systems in the market, Ghost offers great support without any additional plugins for SEO. 

7) Wix

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Pricing: Free

USP: User-friendly

Wix is a great Content Management System for beginners who want to create quick and neat websites through drag and drop. It offers plenty of responsive templates to choose from to ensure device compatibility. 

A big issue here is that once you pick a layout, you cannot choose another one. Wix would be an ideal option for you if you are just looking to exhibit your portfolio in the digital space. 

For complex websites, we would recommend you look into other Content Management System options available in the market.

8) Weebly

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Pricing: Free

USP: Cost-effective in the paid segment.

If you have heard of WordPress, chances are you may have heard of Weebly as well. It is a user-friendly Content Management System that helps you launch a great website within minutes using the drag and drop functionality. You can add and delete elements according to your preference. 

Although it is free to use but to upgrade your plans and templates, you need to opt-in for paid plans.

9) Crownpeak CMS

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Pricing: Free

USP: Flexibility

Crownpeak Content Management System is best known for its flexible approach for beginners who want to create websites. You can create a personalized website through drag-and-drop functionality. 

It enables brands to foster flexibility with regard to how it is integrated into their existing systems. It is easy to publish content and manage workflows in just a few clicks.

10) Apric

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Pricing: Free

USP: Design-Centric

Apric is a simple way to plan, design, and launch fast and beautiful experience-driven websites that change the way you represent your brand. This Content Management System helps you find a balance between conveying information and providing an experience, A clean canvas to create interactive and engaging websites without having to compromise your creativity against technical limitations. 

Apric is currently at the MVP stage and the first template is a "creator's landing page". The future plans of expansions entail releasing more templates to cater to a wider audience to build their websites. 

The builder offers ease-of-use at the forefront so you can effortlessly achieve the wow factor without having to compromise on the functionalities. 

11) Squarespace

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Pricing: Paid

USP: Best-suited for small businesses

Starting around the same time as WordPress, Squarespace is a widely popular Content Management System. It is however not open-source, meaning you can’t download and install the software on your server. It is more like an integration of a blogging platform, no code website builder, and a hosting service. The packages range in accordance with your needs and requirements.

12) BigCommerce

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Pricing: Paid

USP: E-commerce for Small Businesses 

BigCommerce aids businesses, especially small businesses to start an e-commerce store within a quick span of time. It has a list of in-built features and tools to help you build a fully functional website. Another great thing about BigCommerce is its security feature that can help small businesses with cybersecurity issues. 

Although BigCommerce is a paid Content Management System, you can go for the trial version to check if you want to use it before investing in the plan. It also offers an array of payment options like Apple Pay, PayPal, Credit/Debit Card, etc. 

13) Typo3 

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Pricing: Free

USP: Great for enterprise platforms

Typo3 is an open-source Content Management System with exciting features that can be customized. The ideal target audience for Typo3 would be experienced developers who want to build unique and futuristic applications with multiple functionalities. 

With beginner-friendly options of Content Management Systems in the market like Apric, we would certainly not recommend Typo3 to someone who has little to no technical knowledge as it may seem like a lot of work to build a website. For developers, it is great as it offers over 6,000 extensions and plugins along with a dedicated section for language management.

14) Magneto

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Pricing: Paid

USP: Best-suited for Extensions and Plugins

If you ask us what 3 words we relate with Magneto, it would be costly, costly, and costly. It is so expensive that the website does not direct you to any pricing plan. What is the pricing plan, you may be wondering? Well, Magneto charges a whopping USD 22,000/year which is the average budget of a small business. 

A lot of giants like Coca-Cola, Nike, and Ford use this Content Management System and we aren’t surprised. It is a solid open-source e-commerce platform by Adobe offering lots of third-party integrations and extensions. Magneto also enables brands to handle plenty of customers and products at a time. 

15) Webflow

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Pricing: Free 

USP: Intuitive Editor

Webflow is a no-code Content Management System catered toward designers looking to build custom websites. You can either build a website from scratch or choose a template. What makes Webflow stand out is the intuitive editor that gives a very neat and clean look, unlike the majority of Content Management Systems in the market that have a complex interface. 

It is easy to build responsive designs through Webflow and that is one of the reasons it is loved in the design community. Webflow editor supports and handles all the SEO as there is no need for a plug-in.

16) WooCommerce

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Pricing: Free

USP: Most popular e-commerce platform in the world

We know what you are thinking, WooCommerce is not a Content Management System platform! You are right. It is actually a plugin on WordPress but since it is the most popular e-commerce platform in the world, we wanted to include it in our list. 

The only issue here is that you would require WordPress on your website to install and run WooCommerce. You can choose from multitudes of themes and extensions while managing all your inventory simultaneously. It comes equipped with two default payment options – PayPal and Stripe but you can add more choices through extensions.

17 Strapi

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Pricing: Free

USP: Content-rich user experiences

Strapi is one of the leading open-source headless Content Management systems. It is 100% Javascript, fully customizable, and developer-first. It helps you build aesthetically pleasing and functional websites in minutes. 

Strapi also ensures great omnichannel user experiences. By offering developer-friendly tech stacks and tools, Strapi offers the freedom to manage content through an easy interface intuitively. 

18) Kentico

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Pricing: Free 

USP: Collaboration

Kentico is a Content Management System used for building functionality and feature-packed business websites, e-commerce stores, and intranets. It has great online marketing capabilities like web analytics, automation, lead generation, etc. 

It also fosters collaborations and provides internal intranet and team collaboration solutions. Not only is Kentico a competent Content Management System, but it has a built-in campaign management tool as well so you can monitor campaigns under one roof.

19) dotCMS

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Pricing: Free

USP: Hybrid Headless Content Management System

dotCMS enables you to leverage a flexible API-first infrastructure (no-code) so you can build, manage and deliver great customer experiences. They claim that they offer a lower total cost of ownership as compared to self-hosting or 3rd party managed hosting, thereby resulting in good returns on your investments. 

This Content Management System is ideal for marketers and developers. We recommend you reuse older content to create engaging designs in dotCMS

20) eXo Platform

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Pricing: Free for up to 5 users

USP: Employee Collaboration

eXo Platform is an internal Content Management System that works as a team collaboration software as well. This is mainly used by enterprises that want to boost employee engagement and monitor productivity. It offers custom templates, SEO support, a Text editor, Document Indexing, etc. 

Conclusion

Well, now that you know the top 20 Content Management Systems of 2022, which one would you like for you?

In addition to that, if you have any questions about Content Management Systems, feel free to drop in a query on Instagram @Apricweb. We would love to have your feedback!

Until then, Ciao! ☺