Concrete CMS vs. Divi

Concrete5 is perfect for a website that needs to be regularly updated without accessing the code, whether that be because a developer created your site for you, or because you yourself are a developer who wants to keep the time spent on updates down.

In my experience, it's less useful for modern web apps such as PWAs that would benefit more from technologies such as React and Vue.

Incentivized

Divi has cornered the market on a simple, straightforward WordPress theme that gives some major integrations and functions! Now that I've worked within it for years, I have a much better understanding of how robust a system it is. It takes some practice to get accustomed to but once you "get" it, it is so fun to use. I've shown so many small business owners how to use Divi and I feel that it is much easier to learn than other themes with functions that are controlled by coding or shortcodes. I could play in Divi all day, and some days I do, depending on which projects I am working on at the time

Incentivized

• Concrete5 has a modular editing system, so you can edit the pages without having knowledge of coding. You just pick the module you want to insert or edit and click where you want it to go.
• You are able to edit modules in an HTML format if you would like to, so if you have the knowledge you can have even more control over your modules.
• You can also edit entire page themes by selecting them from the page layout menu. This allows you a greater versatility of the pages on your site.

Incentivized

• Front end builder easy to design
• Exportable and importable layouts and templates
• Integration with wordpress and many plugins
• Individual template builder to apply to certain post types
• Add on cloud to store and sync your own designs, code snippets
• Can create your own api licenses for different websites

Incentivized

• Concrete5.6 websites have no good path to migrate to 5.7, short of manual content migration. This is a big problem and affected the user community negatively.
• Some features that were available as paid add-ons in 5.6, such as discussion forums and e-commerce shopping cart, are missing from newer versions 5.7/5.8.
• Starting to develop add-ons and customizations for Concrete5 can be challenging as 5.7/5.8 documentation is not yet complete.

Incentivized

• Some advanced features need to be complemented with other paid plugins (e.g., attachments in contact forms)
• Certain Divi elements cannot be nested within other Divi elements (e.g., including an element within an accordion)
• Customizing the header is powerful, but making the most of it is more challenging than the rest of Divi's options

I have had nothing but good experiences with Concrete5. I have used it on several client websites and even several of my own sites. It is the leading CMS I will go to if I have a need to dynamically update content on a website by people who are typically untrained. They have solved every angst I had with the other solutions I have evaluated in the past and continue to be the simplest to implement and customize.

Although there is a slight learning curve (as with any software), it is very easy to use once you get a hold of it. It is easy to upload and manage files (and other digital assets), and the drag-n-drop interface on the front-end is easy for end-users to understand

Incentivized

Divi is overall a great tool to use - I think I would need to spend a little more time to dig into the tool to provide more long term feedback.

Incentivized

Since it's not tied to a central server (other than for authorizing updates and assigning licenses to specific sites), it's available pretty much 100% of the time.

Incentivized

The site works extremely well, the front end flies, searches and form submissions are very fast indeed. The reason its a 9 not a ten? the back end can be a little slow at times, and this is unfair, because for the backend to be so amazing, it has to do a huge amount of work!

Concrete5 is open-source and has an incredibly strong, polite, and supportive community. You can get an answer to nearly anything you want to do with Concrete5 by googling for it, searching the Concrete5 discussion forums or stack overflow, or posting your question to the forum. Members are very courteous and do not look down on those with less knowledge. And answers are always quick, informative, and supportive.

Incentivized

It's important that any CMS is implemented by a skilled developer. Content management is not a commodity. One of the keys I've found with Concrete5 is to create a homogenous content-entry method (e.g. focus on in-context editing OR focus on using the Composer feature). This seems to make it more likely that site editors will be able to easily come back to editing after a layoff without having to "remember" too much.

Incentivized

I didn't have to spend too much time learning Concrete CMS, whereas I had to spend a long time learning other CMSs. After struggling to develop a plugin for WordPress, developing an add-on for Concrete CMS was piece of cake thanks to many available APIs. Making custom themes and blocks was much easier than WordPress.

Divi is a far better-looking and easier-to-learn system than Elements. While Elements has flexible columns and more compatibility with third-party systems (Crockoblock), it has a far steeper learning curve. Divi had a better pricing model and was easier to use to work at speed. We also felt it was far more client-friendly for self-editing.

Incentivized

• Even though the Concrete5 community is growing, it's still not up to the level as some of the other WCMS communities.
• More detailed statistics with historical data could be provided by the system.
• Concrete5 hihgly depends on Jquery. It makes it hard to upgrade the javascript library since the control panel depends on it.

• It's hard to quantify, but it's allowed me to create the face of my website, which currently receives tens of thousands of visits each month. This is largely thanks to Divi.
• It has allowed me to quickly design my own sales and product pages, without having to rely on third-party platforms.
• Divi's lock-in has made it difficult for me to explore other visual builders that might also be interesting for my website.
• Es difícil de cuantificar, pero me ha permitido crear la cara visible de mi web, que en este momento recibe decenas de miles de visitas cada mes. En gran parte es gracias a Divi.
• Me ha permitido diseñar en poco tiempo mis propias páginas de venta y de producto, sin necesidad de depender de espacios de terceros.
• El lock-in de Divi me ha hecho difícil explorar otros constructores visuales que también podrían ser interesantes para mi web.

Incentivized