Joomla

Volunteer, community-governed open-source project; legal and financial support via Open Source Matters, Inc.

Joomla 1.0 released September 22, 2005, forked from Mambo.

Self-hosted PHP/MySQL CMS installed on a web server; no official managed-hosting arm.

GNU General Public License v2.

Based on Joomla's documented core strengths: native multilingual, granular ACL, workflow, custom fields.

Joomla software itself is free; there is no vendor pricing page since Joomla does not sell hosting or plans.

Joomla core software is free and open source; cost is hosting only.

Joomla itself is free; figure reflects market-typical entry-level shared hosting with a custom domain (e.g., Bluehost/SiteGround intro shared plans, ~$2-4/mo before renewal). Not a Joomla vendor price.

Market-typical mid-tier shared/managed hosting suitable for a small Joomla business site. Not a Joomla vendor price; Joomla has no tiers.

No single official figure: ecommerce cost depends on which third-party extension (VirtueMart is free; HikaShop Essential is a one-time ~€50 license) plus hosting. Cannot state a defensible single number without guessing.

Joomla software has no renewal pricing since it is free; only third-party hosting/extensions may have renewal price increases, which is a hosting-market fact, not a Joomla one.

Not applicable; Joomla software is free, not purchased, so there is no money-back window.

Admin-panel content editor (TinyMCE-based) with modules/positions and template overrides; not a freeform visual canvas, not pure code-first.

Core Joomla editing is form/field-based (TinyMCE article editor, modules assigned to template positions); no native drag-and-drop page building. Third-party page-builder extensions (e.g., SP Page Builder) add this.

No native front-end click-to-edit; editing happens in the back-end administrator panel.

Native content versioning (Content History) since Joomla 3.2; view, compare, and restore prior article versions.

No confirmed native autosave for the article editor; Joomla instead relies on explicit Save/Save & Close plus version history. Could not verify a true autosave-while-typing feature in official docs.

No official first-party Joomla mobile app for content editing. Admin panel is responsive/usable in a mobile browser; dedicated editing apps are third-party (e.g., JAM!).

Switching templates in Joomla generally requires re-assigning module positions and can break layout since content is not stored in a template-agnostic block format; not a guaranteed safe switch.

Editorial judgment: Joomla's ACL, workflow states, module/position system, and template structure require more up-front learning than hosted builders or WordPress' simpler post/page model.

No single official count found; Joomla Extensions Directory templates category spans many pages without a stated total, and core installs ship with only one default front-end template (Cassiopeia). Declining to guess a number.

Custom fonts can be added via template CSS/customization; not restricted by core software.

Cassiopeia and custom templates are built on Bootstrap 5 with full CSS/HTML control over responsive breakpoints via template overrides.

Full custom CSS via template overrides/customization, no plan restrictions since it's self-hosted software.

Full custom JavaScript support via templates and custom HTML modules; no plan gating.

No native visual animation/interaction builder in core; animation requires custom CSS/JS or third-party extensions.

Template-level style settings and Cassiopeia's customizer expose some global design tokens (colors, layout options), though not a full design-token system.

Editorial judgment: as self-hosted, open-source software with full template/CSS/JS access, design is not constrained by the vendor, though it requires more developer effort to achieve than page-builder platforms.

Joomla is self-hosted software; no official managed hosting is bundled or sold by the Joomla project.

Self-hosting is the only deployment model; requires PHP 8.1+ and MySQL 8.0.13+/MariaDB 10.4+/PostgreSQL 12+ on a compatible web server.

No CDN bundled with the software; CDN must be configured separately via hosting provider or a third-party service/extension.

Joomla core does not provide SSL; SSL depends entirely on the hosting provider (most modern hosts include free Let's Encrypt SSL, but this is a hosting-market fact, not a Joomla feature).

Joomla is a dynamic PHP/database-driven CMS; no native static site export in core (third-party extensions exist for static caching/export but this is not a core feature).

May 2026 CrUX data via HTTP Archive CWV Technology Report API: 58.8% of 147,826 origins with good CWV (desktop 59.0%, mobile 58.7%). Report technology name: 'Joomla'.

No native automatic image compression/format conversion (WebP/AVIF) in core; AVIF is supported for manual upload in the Media Manager since Joomla 5.0, but automatic optimization on upload requires a third-party extension.

Native lazy-loading plugin (Content - Lazy Loading Images) sets loading=lazy on images automatically since Joomla 4.

Native page/conservative caching options and cache plugin controls are exposed to the site owner in Global Configuration.

Every article/category/menu item has editable page title and meta description fields natively.

Article/category aliases (slugs) are editable per item.

Native Redirect component (com_redirect) plus System - Redirect plugin creates 301 redirects and logs 404s for mapping.

Joomla natively outputs canonical tags and allows per-page canonical URL control.

robots.txt ships in the site root and is fully editable, but only via direct file edit (FTP/hosting file manager), not from within the Joomla admin UI.

No native XML sitemap generator in core; requires a third-party extension (most commonly OSMap).

Since Joomla 5.0, core automatically generates JSON-LD schema.org markup (Article, BlogPosting, Book, Event, Organization, Person, Recipe, JobPosting) via a modular plugin architecture, no extension required for these types.

The core Language Filter plugin has an 'Add alternate meta tags' option that automatically outputs hreflang alternate links for multilingual content; no extension required.

Open Graph and social meta tags can be set via template/meta fields; full control available though not always a single dedicated native UI field for every OG property without customization.

Per-menu-item / per-article robots meta (index/noindex, follow/nofollow) is a native field.

Alt text is editable natively in the Media Manager and image insert dialog.

Core com_content includes native article/blog functionality with category blog layouts.

Native custom fields (com_fields) attach structured custom data to articles, categories, contacts, and other core content objects; 16 field types, no extension required for basic custom content structuring.

Native nested categories and tags (com_tags) for cross-cutting taxonomy.

Native Start/Finish Publishing date fields on articles for scheduled publish and expiry.

Native Content History versioning with view/compare/restore, enabled by default since Joomla 3.2.

Native multi-user accounts with author assignment per article and granular ACL by user group.

Native RSS/Atom syndication via com_syndicate and the Syndication Feeds module, supporting RSS 0.91/1.0/2.0, Atom, and OPML.

Native Web Services / REST API (JSON:API-based) supports authenticated GET/POST/PATCH for core content objects like articles.

No ecommerce in core; requires a third-party component such as VirtueMart, HikaShop, or J2Store.

Not a Joomla core capability; depends on the third-party ecommerce extension chosen.

Not native to Joomla core; recurring billing is a feature of specific ecommerce/membership extensions (e.g., paid HikaShop tiers), not core software.

Not native to Joomla core; multi-currency depends on the chosen ecommerce extension.

No native or common point-of-sale capability found for Joomla core or its leading ecommerce extensions in official sources.

Not a core Joomla feature; depends entirely on the third-party ecommerce extension.

Direct database access (MySQL/PostgreSQL export) plus native Web Services API give full access to all content; self-hosted software has no vendor lock on export.

Templates are plain PHP/HTML/CSS files on the file system, fully portable to any compatible PHP/MySQL host.

Domain is registered independently of Joomla; fully portable since Joomla has no domain lock-in.

Self-hosted PHP/MySQL software; runs on any compliant host (Apache/Nginx/IIS), not tied to a single vendor's infrastructure.

Native Web Services REST API plus direct database access give full content access.

Editorial judgment: self-hosted, GPL-licensed, portable across any compliant host with full database/file access; structurally low lock-in versus hosted, proprietary platforms.

Figure varies by source and date; directory totals fluctuate as listings are added/removed.

Native RESTful Web Services API since Joomla 4.

No native webhook system in Joomla core; webhook functionality requires third-party extensions (e.g., Content Sharing - Webhooks, form-plugin webhook integrations).

Custom HTML modules and template overrides allow arbitrary code embeds with no plan gating (self-hosted software).

Native Joomla Console (CLI application, joomla.phar) for command-line administration tasks since Joomla 4.

No official native Zapier or Make integration; connections happen via third-party extensions using webhooks or the core REST API.

No native AI site-generation feature in Joomla core as of 5.x/6.x. Joomla introduced a provider-agnostic AI Framework (2025) that lets extensions integrate OpenAI/Anthropic/Ollama, but this is developer infrastructure, not an end-user site generator.

No native AI writing assistant in core; AI content generation is provided only by third-party extensions (e.g., AI Content Assistant, JoomAI) built atop the new AI Framework.

No native AI image generation/editing tools in core; requires third-party extensions.

No native AI-driven SEO assistance in core.

Native Access Control List (ACL) with customizable user groups, access levels, and per-component/category/article permission inheritance; one of Joomla's most granular core systems.

Joomla uses item checkout/locking (an article is checked out to one editor at a time) rather than real-time concurrent co-editing.

Native Workflow feature (since Joomla 4.0) supports custom publishing states, transitions, and notifications for content approval; no extension required.

No native staging environment in core; achieving staging/preview requires a third-party extension (e.g., StageIt) or a manually maintained separate install. Unpublished content status offers a limited form of pre-publish preview but not a full staging environment.

No native in-editor commenting/collaboration feature; front-end comment systems (for articles) require third-party extensions.

Native User Actions Log (com_actionlogs) records admin and content actions since Joomla 3.9.

No official 24/7 support channel; community forum and documentation are volunteer-staffed with no guaranteed response time. Paid third-party agencies may offer SLA-backed support independently of the Joomla project.

Editorial judgment: official documentation is extensive (docs.joomla.org, manual.joomla.org, new guide.joomla.org) but fragmented across old wiki pages, a newer restructured guide, and version-specific pages, which can be confusing to navigate; solid depth, mixed organization.

Market share has been in slow decline since a ~9% peak around 2012.

No native backup/restore in core; the de facto standard is the third-party (though widely bundled/recommended) Akeeba Backup extension.

Joomla can run a fully multilingual site natively; content languages, per-language menus, and the Language Filter plugin; with no third-party extension required. This is a genuine, well-documented core strength.

Native Multilingual Associations (com_associations) link translated versions of the same content item across languages for management and front-end language switching.

Per-language menus produce per-locale URLs natively, and the Language Filter plugin's 'Add alternate meta tags' option outputs hreflang automatically; both native, no extension required.

Both default templates (Cassiopeia front end, Atum admin) fully support RTL languages via an automatically-loaded template-rtl.min.css variant.