Joomla - All information about the free CMS

As we have been developing websites and blogs with Joomla for our customers for many years and are therefore familiar with the website system, there should be no questions left unanswered at the end of the article.

So let the Joomla games begin.

What is Joomla?

Joomla is one of the world's most popular website systems or content management systems (CMS). According to Statista, there were around 3.95 million websites created with Joomla in March 2024.

This may not seem like a lot compared to the market leader WordPress, but it says nothing about the quality of Joomla.

Joomla is an open source project and fulfils all the criteria for a good, stable and secure website system. It just doesn't shout as loudly as its big brother, but keeps a low profile when it comes to marketing - Joomla's CMS aims to impress through quality.

The open source software Joomla has been available on the market since August 2005 and is constantly being further developed by hundreds of programmers around the world. All these developers do this voluntarily and free of charge. The community is well connected (the official Joomla forum had more than 3.2 million posts from over 730,000 registered members in April 2019 according to the Wikipedia entry), so you will find answers and support for every question. For example here ...to the Joomla.de support forum

But now back to Joomla.

What you might be most interested in: Is it easy for users to understand and use in the backend?

A resounding yes.

The website system is characterised by an extremely user-friendly administration area (backend).

Let's take a look at the backend first.

The Joomla backend - easy to use

The control centre

The Joomla control centre is very user-friendly. It contains an overview of all important functions and areas such as content, posts, categories, menus, media, user administration, etc., which the user can access directly, depending on their authorisation.

Contents / content overview

The content overview provides an overview of all existing content - i.e. posts, categories and media. You can open the respective areas and edit content with a click of the mouse. Using the filter function, content can be sorted by category, language, etc. or filtered by keyword.

Posts

You can manage your blog articles in this area. You can create a new post with a click in the top left-hand corner. You can also open and edit existing posts (update, add, change or remove content) with a click of the mouse.

Categories

This area shows you all the categories you have created. You can activate or deactivate them, add new ones or delete existing ones. Categories are important for a blog, for example, where posts are published on several sub-topics.

The media area

The media area is the area of the Joomla backend where you can find the media that you have either integrated into your posts or uploaded directly to the media directory. The media can also be images, videos, PDFs, etc. that you have linked to from elsewhere, for example from a guest article or social media.

Menus / Menu overview

In the menu overview, you can add, delete and expand menu items and link them to content (posts/pages). You can easily create a blog with Joomla by linking not just individual content, but several, for example in the form of a category link.

Components

All installed extensions are displayed in the Components area.

Users

If several people publish on your website or blog, you can create users, define authorisations and assign rights here.

So much for the user-friendly administration area.

Next, let's take a look at the costs you will incur if you use Joomla as your website system.

Joomla and security

The issue of security is a major challenge across all platforms - and Joomla is no exception. The numerous extensions in particular open up security gaps that need to be combated.

Joomla does this by setting up a special department within the development team. The name "Bug Squad" says it all: "Bug Squad" takes care of finding bugs and security gaps.

How much does Joomla cost?

The Joomla software itself is free of charge. As with its big CMS brother, you don't pay a cent for it. Any costs arise from extended functions or a customised design. I'll go into this in a moment.

In any case, you will have to pay for the hosting of your website, but this is not only the case for Joomla websites, but also for any other website.

Hosting (storage space) for your Joomla website will cost you anything from a few euros to 2-digit euro amounts per month, depending on the scope of your hosting package. We are happy to recommend the following hoster (hosting packages from €5 per month): all-inkl.com

Now let's move on to the extended functions and customised designs mentioned above, which could generate additional costs.

Where can additional costs arise with Joomla?

Joomla extensions - not all are free of charge

There are many software extensions for Joomla. These include plugins, modules, templates and languages. Software extensions add additional functions to the basic version, which is sufficient for simple websites. What these are depends entirely on your needs - there are virtually no limits to the possibilities. You can add a web shop to your Joomla website, integrate your email marketing tool or an extended contact form and much more.

Some of these extensions or plugins are free, some cost a little money. This can be in the form of subscription payments, which are due monthly or annually, or in the form of a one-off payment.

You can find all extensions for Joomla in the official Joomla directory ...to the Joomla directory

Joomla templates - for some you have to pay

The appearance of the Joomla website is controlled by so-called templates (design templates). Depending on the taste of the website operator, but also depending on the target group, different designs can be downloaded and installed from numerous providers. However, some of these Joomla templates are not free of charge.

We love and recommend the templates from Joomshaper (approx. 59 dollars) ...to Joomshaper

Themeforest also has a huge selection of different templates for Joomla ...to Themeforest

Where can I download Joomla in German?

Joomla is software that you can download free of charge from the Internet and install from any hoster. The most reliable source is the website of the provider of the open source software itself.

Download Joomla software (version 5.0.3)

Many hosters also offer the installation of Joomla directly in their backend.

You can download the German language pack or install the language in the backend by clicking on Languages in the System > Languages section.

In the window that opens, select the language and click on install.

Joomla resources and instructions to help you

Let's take a quick look at a question that we always have to answer for our customers.

Namely..

Which is better - Joomla or WordPress?

We have been developing WordPress websites and Joomla websites for years. Our own website, ithelps-digital.com, which you are currently visiting, is based on Joomla.

I won't go into detail about the advantages and disadvantages of both CMSs, we have written a detailed blog article about this. There you can find out everything about the advantages and disadvantages in the different areas and for different areas of application . ...on WordPress vs Joomla.

Therefore only a video and a short conclusion:

Our conclusion on the comparison WordPress vs Joomla:

If you run a business and have a website created for you, then it basically doesn't matter whether you have your site developed on the basis of WordPress or Joomla. Both systems are easy to learn to maintain and operate and both are available from us at the same price.

If you want to build your website yourself, you have to make a decision. You've already seen one decision-making aid - the aforementioned comparison of WordPress vs Joomla. If that's not enough for you, take a look at a few YouTube videos.

• ...WordPress tutorials

• ...Joomla tutorials

Then simply decide which system appeals to you more. Where do you have the better feeling?

If you are still unsure, leave us a comment here. If you need help with the realisation of your Joomla website, send us an email to This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

Summary: What have we discussed about Joomla?

You should now know everything you need to know about Joomla to make a decision for or against the open source CMS.

• You know what Joomla is and have learnt the definition of CMS (Content Management System) in a short digression?
• We have also discussed how user-friendly the Joomla backend is and the costs of the website system.
• You also know where you can download the Joomla software and the German language pack, are familiar with additional resources and instructions and have made a comparison with WordPress.

You are still unsure and would like to see some Joomla websites in action. No problem.

Here are some of our clients' websites. Click on the thumbnail to see the live site.

Need help with your Joomla website? Contact us at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. or call us on +43 1 353 2 353

We look forward to hearing from you.