Joomla vs Magento for e-commerce website

Looking to setup an e-commerce website? There are numerous open-source options out in the market for you. In fact, there are TOO MANY options such that it is overwhelming. So let’s break down to a few best options for sanier consideration.
Generally, there are 2 main approaches you can take to create an e-commerce website: using an e-commerce system or extending a CMS with a shopping cart extension. We will select one platform from each of these 2 categories and then make our comparison from there.

Using an E-Commerce System

This means the system you are using is an e-commerce system out-of-the-box. Contenters in this category includes: Magento, Prestashop, osCommerce, and many other. By market share alone (see below chart), we can conclude Magento is the leading e-commerce system in this category. Hence, we will pick Magento as the e-commerce system of choice for our comparison.

Extending a CMS with a shopping cart extension

There are numerous Content Management System (CMS) but generally, the top 3 guys are: Wordpress, Joomla, Drupal. Even though Wordpress is way more popular than Joomla, Joomla with Virtuemart beats Wordpress with WP e-Commerce (See above chart). By the way, Virtuemart is the shopping cart extension to Joomla and WP e-Commerce is the shopping extension to Wordpress. Both CMS does not have shopping cart functions out-of-the-box and relies on extensions to become an e-commerce site. Hence, we will go with Joomla+Virtuemart as choice of comparison in this post.

Background of the platforms

Okay now we have picked two contenters from two different categories. The first comparison that we are going to consider is the background of the platform. The platform’s origin and philosophy determines its purpose and its future development path.

Joomla is a content managment system at heart and Magento is an e-commerce system. Hence, Joomla can be used to develop a range of websites from e-commerce to social to complex applications but Mangento is deployed mainly for e-commerce websites. This has an impact on the kind of e-commerce website you want.

If you are looking for a straightforward product-selling website, Magento will work very well for you. However, if you are considering adding events or community or custom functions to your website, then Joomla will be a better alternative. In fact, if your e-commerce website is not a simple shopping cart (eg. an e-bay bidding system), you should be better off developing on Joomla than on Magento.

Shopping Cart Features

While Joomla+Virtuemart features are sufficient for most shopping cart websites, if you need advanced pricing, product attribute management, shipping, reporting and payment methods, Magento is the system for you. Magento beats Joomla+Virtuemart in this respect. The number of features available in Magento is way over what Joomla+Virtuemart can offer. After all, Magento is an e-commerce system at heart.

Ease-of-Use

In Spiderman, “with great powers, comes great responsbilities”. In online systems, with great power, comes great complexity. Due to the extensive features/capabilities of Magento, learning to use it can be difficult. It is definitely not for the noobies (especially when you come to the content managing part!). Joomla+Virtuemart on the other hand is much easier to grasp and customize (even for the developer!).

Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

Both platforms have great support for search-engine optimization. Hence, on-site optimization is on par for both platforms. However, when we talk about off-site optimization where content is king, blogging capability (or content management capability) is extremely important. This is where Joomla excels. After all, it is a content management system. It is much easier and customizable to create blogs or create content on Joomla than on Magento.

Best of both worlds?

On a separate note, it is possible to get the best of both world with Joomla and Magento — bridging. Bridging means integrating both platforms so that they work seamlessly together. This can be done through J!Mint (Joomla! Magento integration tool) or MageBridge by Yireo (a bridge between the Joomla CMS and the Magento e-commerce platform). On the up side, you have the best of Magento in shopping cart and Joomla in content management. On the down side, you have to learn two different systems and a more difficult maintenance/development.

Conclusion

In conclusion, if you need very strong shopping cart features, go with Magento. To improve your SEO with Magento, you may want to consider integrating it with Wordpress for your blogging needs. If you need an all-in-one, easy-to-use, scalable and flexible system, go with Joomla+Virtuemart.

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Further readings:

Magento vs Joomla:
http://seashorepartners.com/blog/magento_vs_joomla.html

VirtueMart vs. Magento: A Comparison of ECommerce Frameworks:
http://www.cabiritech.com/ecommerce/virtuemart-magento-comparison/