Congratulations Joomla on your 20th birthday
Time truly flies when you are in good company. This year, Joomla celebrates its 20th anniversary. For me, this is a very special milestone, as I have been part of the journey all the way back to the time before the system was even called Joomla.
I clearly remember the dramatic shift from Mambo to Joomla in 2005. There was an attempt to take over Mambo as an open-source project from the company Miro, which held certain intellectual rights to the CMS. This led all the developers in the project to establish the Open Source Matters organization and move the code into a new project named Joomla – a Swahili word for “togetherness.” In a very short time, Mambo disappeared into oblivion, while Joomla was carried forward by strong open-source forces and passionate people who – like myself – burn for creating a free and living CMS. That was the beginning of a 20-year partnership and hundreds of CMS solutions built in Joomla.
The Early Years – Joomla as a Pioneer
In its early years, Joomla stood out significantly. Compared to competitors like Drupal and Typo3, which were often heavy and complex, Joomla appeared far more user-friendly. WordPress did exist, but at the time it was still a very simple and little-known blogging tool – not a real competitor.
From 2005 until around 2016, I built websites exclusively in Joomla. With every new version, the system made significant improvements. It was my preferred tool, and I experienced firsthand how it opened possibilities that simply didn’t exist elsewhere at the same level – or, if they did, required much more work and higher costs.
The Rise of WordPress
– the New Kid in Town
After 2016, I gradually began building in WordPress as well. Not because I had lost faith in Joomla, but because demand changed, and WordPress increasingly offered advantages that were hard to overlook:
- Page builders for WordPress became significantly more mature and user-friendly.
- Clients found it easier to make adjustments themselves and continue developing their solutions.
- The ecosystem grew explosively with plugins that made it quick and easy to expand functionality according to client needs.
For many clients, WordPress therefore became the obvious choice, and naturally, I followed the trend – just like most others did. This is evident when looking at WordPress’ market share. However, WordPress has never been the best solution for everything. For larger sites, where Joomla had built-in functionality like multilingual support, user management, or plugins that solved customer needs better and cheaper, Joomla was still the clear winner.
Joomla 4 – A Turning Point
When Joomla 4 arrived, we began to look more towards Joomla again. Here, Joomla successfully modernized the entire platform:
- The speed was significantly improved compared to earlier versions, and when compared to similar WordPress solutions, Joomla 4 came out on top.
- The codebase and backend received a much-needed upgrade.
- Improved SEO features, smart site search (perfect for large websites), accessibility, and a much simpler installation and update process were all very welcome.
At the same time, the Joomla ecosystem now offered solid page builders that could rival those of WordPress. This meant that many of our clients were actually much better off with a CMS where core features such as SEO, multilingual support, user management, and custom fields were already included from the start.
Ved at optimere din landingsside ud fra disse kriterier kan du forbedre din annoncekvalitetsscore, hvilket kan føre til lavere omkostninger og bedre annoncepositionering, samt naturligvis forbedre brugeroplevelsen på dit site.
YooTheme Pro and Joomla
– a Match Made in Heaven
The next major shift came with the emergence of the first truly great page builders for Joomla – and especially when YooTheme Pro arrived, it became a real gamechanger. Suddenly, we could offer our clients the best of both worlds:
- A robust and modern CMS core.
- A flexible and intuitive page builder experience.
Today, Joomla is the system we most often recommend to our clients. Not just because of its speed and seamless maintenance, but also because it is a system that clients can quickly learn to use themselves. And most importantly: Joomla makes it easy to expand the solution as clients grow and develop new needs.
With over 20 major awards such as Best Free CMS and Best Open Source CMS, Joomla has repeatedly proven that it can not only keep up with the times but remain the strongest open-source CMS in the world.
20 Years with Joomla – and Still Strong
When Joomla turns 20 today, it is not only a celebration of a piece of software. For me, it marks a journey in open source, in communities, and in the passion for creating tools that provide freedom and opportunities.
I have been part of this story since the Mambo days, followed the development through both ups and downs – and today, I stand with a stronger Joomla than ever before.
Congratulations on 20 years, Joomla – and thank you for being a faithful companion through two decades.
