Which publishing platforms are popular? Here is information on Blogger, Drupal, Expression Engine, Joomla, MovableType and WordPress in the following areas;
- The year the platform was founded
- A round number of plug-ins, modules, widgets, add-ons or extensions as an indicator of the size of the development efforts
- A round number as an indicator of the size of the user population
Please note that this information is probably not accurate for many good reasons. If you have more accurate data and a reference we will gladly update the information and credit you. The links below take you to the source for that number.
Open Source publishing platforms – Drupal, Joomla and WordPress
Not Open Source publishing platforms – Blogger, Expression Engine and MovableType
Blogging or Publishing Platforms
ordered by date founded
Blogger – started in 1999
Drupal – started in 2001
MovableType – started in 2001
WordPress – started in 2003
Expression Engine – started in 2004
Joomla – started in 2005
Quantify the Developer Community
ordered highest to lowest number of plugins, widgets, extensions, modules or add-ons
WordPress – 6,787 plugins
Blogger – More widgets than we’ve got prairie dogs
Joomla – 3,564 Extensions
Drupal 6 – 2,825 Modules
MovableType – 852 Plugins
Expression Engine – 144 Add-ons
Quantify the User Community
ordered highest number of users to lowest
WordPress 2.8.4 – 6,499,487 downloads (just this 2.x.x version)
Joomla – 10,000,000 total downloads since 2005
Drupal 6 – 200,000 active sites
Expression Engine – We assume these cowboys keep their data to themselves.
MovableType – We couldn’t figure out how many wagons are circled here. Any ideas?
Blogger – Not sure who is minding the cattle on this one.
Publishing Platform Data Conclusions
If you have more accurate numbers please share them.
Open Source Content Management Systems are strong contenders with consistent growth.
WordPress is the shiny new object at the moment. Lots of bloggers are moving to WordPress.
Drupal has shown consistent growth. Adoption will continue to increase.
MovableType might be losing ground due to competition
Expression Engine seems to have a reputation well beyond it’s numbers.
Joomla faces strong competition as a late comer.