Drupal vs Appy Pie: Comprehensive comparison guide for 2024

Final verdict

Drupal and Appy Pie both offer unique advantages, catering to different user needs and preferences.

• 
  Drupal (Overall Grade: 6.4/10)
  
  is a powerful open-source CMS known for its flexibility and extensibility. It is ideal for developers and users who need a highly customizable platform with a wide range of modules and themes. Drupal excels in providing robust security features, extensive learning resources, and advanced user management capabilities. However, it has a steeper learning curve and requires more technical knowledge, making it less accessible for beginners.
• 
  Appy Pie (Overall Grade: 7.2/10)
  
  stands out for its ease of use and quick deployment, making it perfect for individuals and businesses looking to establish an online presence with minimal effort. Its no-code, drag-and-drop interface is highly accessible, and it offers a variety of templates and AI capabilities to simplify website creation. Appy Pie also provides strong customer support and integrated hosting services, making it a practical choice for users seeking a straightforward and efficient website builder.

Best for ecommerce

Verdict

: Drupal and Appy Pie both offer robust ecommerce solutions, but they cater to different needs. Drupal is ideal for those who need extensive customization and flexibility, while Appy Pie is perfect for users seeking a quick and easy setup without coding.

• 
  Drupal
  
  : Known for its flexibility and extensibility, Drupal is a powerful open-source CMS that can be tailored to meet complex ecommerce needs. With the Drupal Commerce module, it offers comprehensive features such as product management, payment gateway integration, and customizable workflows. However, it has a steep learning curve and may require extensive customization. When comparing Drupal vs Appy Pie, Drupal is better suited for developers and businesses needing a highly customizable ecommerce platform.
• 
  Appy Pie
  
  : Appy Pie’s Website Builder is designed for ease of use, making it accessible for users of all skill levels. It provides essential ecommerce functionalities like product listings, inventory management, and multiple payment gateways through a simple drag-and-drop interface. This makes it an excellent choice for individuals and small businesses looking to establish an online presence quickly and efficiently. However, it may lack the advanced customization options available in Drupal.

Best for informational & business websites

Verdict

: When it comes to Drupal vs Appy Pie for informational and business websites, Drupal offers more flexibility and customization options, while Appy Pie excels in ease of use and quick deployment.

• 
  Drupal
  
  : Drupal is a powerful open-source CMS known for its flexibility and extensibility. It is ideal for users who need a highly customizable website with complex functionalities. With a wide range of modules and themes, Drupal can cater to various website needs, from personal blogs to corporate sites. However, it has a steeper learning curve, making it more suitable for users with some technical knowledge.
  
  Score: 7.5
  
• 
  Appy Pie
  
  : Appy Pie is a no-code development platform designed for ease of use and quick website creation. It is perfect for individuals and businesses looking to establish an online presence with minimal effort. The drag-and-drop interface and customizable templates make it accessible for users of all skill levels. While it may not offer the same level of customization as Drupal, its simplicity and efficiency make it a practical choice for creating professional-looking websites quickly.
  
  Score: 7.4
  

Detailed comparison

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Winner: Drupal.

If you’re looking for a platform that offers more creative control, a wide array of design features, and a vast array of templates and designs, Drupal is the preferred choice.

Drupal, as a highly flexible and powerful content management system, offers a vast array of templates and designs to cater to virtually any website need. With thousands of themes available, users can choose from minimalist designs, industry-specific layouts, and highly customizable multipurpose themes. These templates are designed to be responsive, ensuring that websites look great on any device. Moreover, the Drupal community continuously contributes new designs and templates, expanding the options for users to keep their websites modern and engaging.

Drupal Themes

Compared to Drupal, Appy Pie offers a wide array of website templates with over 10,000 options, catering to various needs and budgets. Categorized across industries, these templates are mobile-friendly and customizable, allowing users to edit colors, fonts, layouts, and add features. The platform’s pre-designed themes, layouts, and user-friendly drag-and-drop builder enhance visual appeal and customization ease, making it accessible for users without coding knowledge.

Appy Pie Themes

🏆 Winner: Appy Pie

. Scoring an impressive 8.3, Appy Pie is known for its simplicity and intuitive design, making it highly accessible for users without coding skills. On the other hand, Drupal, with a score of 5.4, offers a robust platform but with a steeper learning curve, especially for those not familiar with web development principles. If ease of use is a priority, Appy Pie is the clear winner in this category.

Learning Resources

🏆 Winner: Drupal

. While both platforms offer solid learning resources, Drupal goes a step further with its extensive official documentation, vibrant community forum, and a variety of online courses and tutorials, making it easier for users to learn and adapt.

Drupal and Appy Pie both offer ecommerce capabilities, but they cater to different needs and audiences. Drupal, with its Drupal Commerce module, provides a flexible ecommerce solution that can be seamlessly integrated into its content management system. It offers a wide array of features including product management, shopping cart, payment gateway integration, and customizable workflows. However, it has a steep learning curve and may require extensive customization to meet specific ecommerce needs.

On the other hand, Appy Pie provides ecommerce features for building and managing online stores within your app. It includes key functionalities such as product listings, inventory management, a secure shopping cart, diverse payment gateways, support for multiple currencies, promotions, order management, shipping options, tax calculation, and analytics. It is user-friendly with a no-coding-required, drag-and-drop interface, ensuring mobile compatibility across devices.

Drupal ecommerce features:

• Shopping Cart and Checkout Process
• Payment Gateway Integration
• Order Management and Invoicing
• Tax Calculation and VAT Support
• Shipping and Fulfillment
• Promotions and Discounts
• Reporting and Analytics
• Security and Compliance

Appy Pie ecommerce features:

• Product and Inventory Management
• Shopping Cart
• Multiple Currencies
• Promotions and Discounts
• Order Management
• Shipping Options
• Analytics
• Tax management

Ecommerce themes & templates

Drupal offers a wide array of eCommerce themes designed to cater to different types of online stores, from clean and simple designs to more sophisticated and feature-rich options. These themes are built with responsiveness in mind, ensuring that stores function seamlessly across various devices. In contrast, Appy Pie offers a small selection of ecommerce website templates. These templates are designed to help users create online stores quickly and efficiently, without the need for coding skills. Appy Pie’s ecommerce templates feature mobile-first designs, customizable product galleries, and various other features aimed at enhancing the online shopping experience.

Product page customization

Drupal offers extensive customization possibilities for product pages through its modular architecture, allowing for detailed content types, flexible displays with Views, and theme customizations. The Drupal Commerce module enriches e-commerce functionalities, enabling tailored product management, checkout flows, and payment systems. On the other hand, Appy Pie’s Website Builder provides users with extensive customization options for product pages, enabling the creation of unique online stores or product showcases without requiring advanced coding skills.

Payment processing

When it comes to payment processing, Drupal supports a wide range of payment gateways through third-party modules, including popular ones like PayPal, Stripe, and Authorize.Net. While Drupal itself does not charge any commissions or transaction fees, the individual payment gateways integrated with it do have their own fee structures. Appy Pie offers a user-friendly platform for integrating payment processing and POS capabilities into mobile apps and online stores, supporting multiple payment gateways like PayPal, Stripe, and Square for secure and versatile customer transactions. While it facilitates easy payment integrations, commission management may require third-party solutions or custom setups.

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Winner: Appy Pie

. Appy Pie, with a score of 7.7, offers a user-friendly, cloud-based platform that allows individuals, professionals, and small businesses to create mobile-friendly websites without needing to code. It offers a drag-and-drop interface, customizable templates, and various features like social media integration, ecommerce capabilities, and SEO tools. This makes it an ideal solution for quickly creating a wide range of websites, from landing pages to online stores, tailored to users’ specific needs and brand identities.

Drupal’s editor, scoring 7.5, offers a wide range of features tailored for content creation and management. It supports rich text editing, enabling users to format text, insert links, images, and media, as well as create tables and lists with ease. The editor is highly customizable, allowing administrators to configure toolbars and options according to the needs of their site. Furthermore, it integrates seamlessly with Drupal’s content management system, supporting features like automatic content saving, version control, and access control, making it a powerful tool for building and managing diverse web content.

Mobile editor/app

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Winner: Appy Pie

. Both Drupal and Appy Pie do not offer a dedicated mobile editor app. However, Appy Pie allows users to edit their websites using a mobile browser, which gives it an edge over Drupal. This feature can be particularly useful for users who need to make quick changes on the go.

Drupal, on the other hand, does not provide any mobile editing capabilities, which can limit its usability for users who prefer to manage their websites from a mobile device.

In summary, Appy Pie receives a higher rating due to its mobile browser editing capabilities, while Drupal lacks in this area and may be better suited for users who do not require mobile editing.

Overall Result

:

Appy Pie Wins

. Appy Pie scores 8.9 in product testing options, significantly higher than Drupal’s 7.1. While Drupal is an open-source CMS and is free to use, it does not offer a trial version or the possibility to test premium features. On the other hand, Appy Pie offers a 30-day free trial during which all premium features can be tested, providing a more comprehensive evaluation of its capabilities.

While Drupal is free, it requires separate purchases for domain, hosting, and website builder subscriptions. Appy Pie, on the other hand, offers paid plans with a variety of features, and even provides a discount for annual subscriptions.

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Winner: Appy Pie

Appy Pie offers a proprietary hosting service with a 99% uptime guarantee and relies on Amazon Web Services for its data centers. This makes it a more straightforward choice for users who prefer a one-stop solution for their website building and hosting needs. On the other hand, Drupal, being an open-source CMS, does not provide hosting services directly, leaving the choice of hosting type and provider to the user. This can be advantageous for users who want more control over their hosting environment, but it also means that the quality of hosting can vary greatly depending on the chosen provider.

🏆 Winner: Drupal

Both Drupal and Appy Pie offer tools and resources for website speed optimization, but Drupal’s open-source nature and extensive guides give it an edge.

Drupal, an open-source CMS, offers numerous guides and tutorials on speed optimization, allowing users to optimize almost all aspects of their website. The load times and PageSpeed scores vary depending on optimization and website complexity. Core Web Vitals improvements depend on users.

Appy Pie, on the other hand, doesn’t directly implement specific speed optimization strategies for your website. However, they offer various tools and features that can help you optimize your website’s speed on your own. Both load times and Page speed scores vary widely, depending on the optimization and user’s location. Appy Pie does not disclose any information on their Core Web Vitals improvements.

🏆 Winner: Drupal.

With a score of 8.6, Drupal leads the way with its extensive range of over 51,000 modules, showcasing the extensive contributions from its community. These modules are designed to enhance and tailor Drupal applications to specific needs, emphasizing the platform’s flexibility and openness. Appy Pie, with a score of 6.4, provides a range of plugins and extensions for website enhancement, with the availability differing across plans.

While Drupal’s modules are predominantly freely available and open source, Appy Pie’s plugins range from 5 to 25 free plugins depending on the plan tier.

Drupal Applications

Appy Pie Applications

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Overall Winner: Drupal

. Drupal’s open-source nature and extensive module ecosystem provide a more flexible and customizable platform for marketing features. However, Appy Pie’s focus on ease-of-use and quick deployment make it a practical choice for those with minimal technical know-how.

🏆 Winner: Appy Pie

. In the Drupal vs Appy Pie comparison, Appy Pie takes the lead with a higher customer support score of 8.2. Appy Pie offers 24/7 support through live chat, email, and phone, ensuring users can get assistance at any time. The platform also provides extensive documentation and tutorials, making it easier for users to troubleshoot issues independently.

Drupal, with a customer support score of 6.7, offers a range of support options, including community forums and professional 24/7 support services through providers like Drupal Connect. While Drupal’s community support is robust, the professional support services are often provided by third-party vendors, which may not be as seamless as Appy Pie’s integrated support system. Despite this, Drupal’s extensive documentation and community resources are valuable for users seeking help.

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Winner: Drupal

. Drupal’s security measures are comprehensive and robust, offering a wide range of features to protect websites and user data. It includes built-in mechanisms for preventing common web vulnerabilities, supports advanced security features like two-factor authentication, and provides extensive access control capabilities. Drupal’s proactive security approach is bolstered by a dedicated security team that continuously works on identifying and fixing vulnerabilities.

Appy Pie also takes security seriously, offering secure private data storage and protection with advanced encryption and strict access controls. It ensures website security through SSL encryption, regular security audits, and secure hosting. However, Drupal’s more comprehensive security measures and higher security score give it the edge in this comparison.

🏆 Winner: Appy Pie

. Appy Pie, with a score of 7.2, offers a comprehensive suite of AI features, including an AI website builder, AI ecommerce features, AI content generation, and additional AI features. It uses AI to simplify website creation and enhance user experience.

Drupal, with a score of 7.5, integrates AI across various functionalities but does not have a built-in AI builder. Its AI features are more focused on enhancing user interactions and streamlining operations.

🏆 Winner: Drupal

. Drupal’s flexible permission and role system allows for an unlimited number of users to manage and edit a website, only constrained by server capacity and practical management considerations. Administrators can create various roles, such as “Editor” or “Administrator”, each with customized permissions. There’s no inherent limit in Drupal on the number of users with administrative or editing capabilities, enabling extensive collaboration and content management possibilities.

On the other hand, the Appy Pie website builder offers different user access levels based on the plan chosen. For the Free Plan, one user has full editing privileges. Paid plans include the Starter Plan (3 users), Hobby Plan (5 users), Professional Plan (10 users), and Enterprise Plan (unlimited users). Each plan designates an Admin with full access and additional Editors with varying editing rights. Additionally, paid plans allow for customization of roles, enabling tasks such as content editing or design adjustments.

Drupal User Roles and Access Levels:

Appy Pie does not provide detailed information about user roles and access levels.

Additional Features

User Feedback

Users appreciate Drupal for its ease of use, security, and flexibility as an open-source CMS, highlighting its ability to scale and support a variety of websites and applications with modern technology tools. The community and documentation are frequently mentioned positives, providing ample support and resources. However, criticisms include a relative lack of plugins and themes compared to competitors like WordPress, the learning curve for customization without coding, and some challenges with installation and updates. The platform is praised for its robust content management capabilities, enabling users to manage content and user access efficiently. Overall, feedback underscores Drupal’s strength in creating secure, customizable, and scalable web solutions, despite some desires for more intuitive UI and easier setup.

Appy Pie garners positive feedback for its user-friendly interface and excellent customer support, offering low-code solutions for app and website building without requiring coding experience. Users appreciate its ease of use, extensive features, and ability to create apps and websites quickly. While some express a desire for more customization options and templates, overall, Appy Pie serves as a valuable tool for businesses and individuals seeking to create apps and websites efficiently, solving the problem of complex coding requirements and providing a platform for easy communication and engagement with users.

FAQ