Drupal is one of the most popular frameworks when it comes to web development. Today, more than a million websites on the Internet use Drupal. These are both small startups or online stores and the pages of world-famous large organizations.
The combination of practicality, efficiency, and security that this system can offer makes it an attractive option, which is why many organizations often look to a Drupal CMS development company to implement their ideas.
Drupal has several versions, the latest of which is Drupal 10. In addition, the developers then released 10.1, bringing several new features and improvements to the system.
When developing a website or web application, it is essential to ensure good performance as well as provide users with a positive digital experience. Drupal copes with these tasks perfectly well.
Let’s look at seven benefits Drupal can provide for web development.
1. Regular Updates
Drupal is an open-source system that is constantly upgraded and has a large community.
Developers release minor updates every six months, and new versions of Drupal are usually released every two years. This approach ensures continuous innovation and optimization of the system to ensure compatibility with the latest technologies.
Additionally, web developers can benefit from optimizing the Drupal core, which involves removing less-used components. Due to this, the system becomes faster and more efficient.
As a bonus, the Drupal community has 1.4 million members and is quite active. Thus, more than 50,000 modules and 3,000 themes are available to developers today. This is why Drupal is a great tool when it comes to customizing and extending the functionality of a website.
Benefits of Drupal include:
- Creation of workflows without writing code;
- Real-time content preview; and
- OpenAI, which is a set of modules for integrating artificial intelligence.
2. Security
Drupal is a reliable and secure system. This framework is used by many organizations, including government, banking, and corporate sectors, where the protection of sensitive data is a top priority. Trust in Drupal by reputable companies is a good indicator of credibility.
In addition, the Drupal security team regularly releases updates and patches to ensure the protection of the system.
In Drupal 10, developers and website owners can use the automatic updates module for Drupal core. This feature is available in just a few clicks.
As a bonus, Drupal provides the ability to update databases using a custom update API.
3. Advanced Content Creation
Drupal 10 has the CKEditor 5 tool, which is one of the most valuable innovations. The advantage of CKEditor 5 is that it is more extensible and works well with the latest JS frameworks.
For content creators, CKEditor 5 offers a number of useful features, including the ability to collaborate in real-time, allowing you to grant editing access to other users through the admin user interface.
Also, CKEditor 5 has an autoformat function. This allows users to apply formatting using the keyboard.
Another advantage of the tool is its multimedia integration, which gives content creators more context and simplifies their job.
4. High Performance
Drupal 10.1 is the fastest version of the system. The value of high website performance cannot be overstated, as the faster a site loads, the more traffic it has, which is an essential factor for conversion. And in this case, Drupal is superior to its competitors in many aspects, including Joomla and WordPress.
The benefits of Drupal when it comes to website performance include:
- Improved lazy loading and the ability to work with responsive images and content;
- Custom placeholder content due to the Big Pipe functionality, which provides reduced layout shifts and a smooth user experience;
- On-the-fly JS minification, which allows you to minimize code and markup; and
Drupal 10.1 capabilities provide faster website speeds, which contributes to a positive user experience and lower bandwidth usage.
5. Advanced Multilingual Support
Multilingual support is not a new function in Drupal, but this feature has become more advanced in the latest version. Often, multilingual support was the main reason why some companies chose Drupal. This is especially relatable for organizations that operate around the world.
In Drupal 10.1, the developers have added several new features, including:
- Easier management of translations and workflows;
- Ability to add and manage your own languages; and
- More accurate language detection.
The latter became possible due to a change in approach. Drupal 10.1 uses browser settings rather than user geography to determine preferred language.
6. Better Inclusivity
Improving website accessibility and supporting custom digital solutions for people with disabilities is one of the valuable benefits of Drupal. And in the latest version of the system, the developers have added some new features to expand the capabilities of Drupal 10.1
These include:
- Nightwatch. This is used for a Drupal accessibility test. With this feature, the development team can identify and fix problems in the core of the system.
- Default themes. Drupal has ready-made solutions in the form of available themes, such as Olivero and Claro, which comply with AA WCAG.
- Assistive devices. Drupal has support for assistive devices. This is made possible because the themes support HTML5 tags, which is necessary to improve the context for assistive devices.
7. Extended Functionality
Drupal 10.1 has several features that enhance the system’s capabilities for modern development methods. For example:
- New Olivero and Claro themes. Olivero is the default front-end theme that takes accessibility into account. Claro is an admin theme that is a complete design system for admin tasks.
- Responsive grids. This is the format for views using the latest CSS.
- SDC or Single Directory Components. This is a useful tool for front-end developers to group related files together.
What is Drupal development? What does headless architecture mean? Visit Elevated Third to discover more about Drupal’s capabilities and benefits you can enjoy!
