A content management system (CMS) is a computer application that allows publishing, editing, modifying, organizing, deleting, and maintaining content from a central interface. CMSs typically aim to avoid the need for hand coding, but may help it for specific elements or entire pages. In addition, CMS products also allow multiple administrators or editors to maintain online content. It is done without conflicting with each other at the same time.

Difference Between CMS And Straight HTML

Your choice of CMS mostly depends on the kind of website you want to create.  There are numerous types of websites: company, commercial, entertainment, news, blogs, forums, personal and educational, etc. If you have confusion to choose what, the first thing you should do is to sit down and list out what you need your website to do for you. Then compare your list to the features of the CMS and the 3rd party plug-ins available for it. But in some cases, you might not need a CMS at all. In that case it will be better off with just a static HTML site.

So Which Do I Choose?

There are hundreds of CMS that do pretty much anything you can think of and they range in price from free to thousands of dollars. But, based on statistics shown on currently WordPress Joomla and Drupal the most popular CMSs.  They have established themselves as the leaders for online content management systems. Most importantly, they are all open-source with means they are all FREE to use. Although, even if you feel you’re on the wrong content management system for your specific needs, it is possible to migrate from one to another.

Conclusion

To conclude, CMSs not just widely used by beginners, or small-medium sized websites. It is being used by well-known companies like Forbes, CNN, Sony, Harvard University. To my utter surprise even The White House is also using it for the main websites to reach millions of people. Indeed, depending on your needs choosing the right CMS can be very difficult or very easy.