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  1. Stackups
  2. Application & Data
  3. Platform as a Service
  4. Cloud Content Management System
  5. Cloud CMS vs Contentful

Cloud CMS vs Contentful

OverviewDecisionsComparisonAlternatives

Overview

Contentful
Contentful
Stacks838
Followers955
Votes70
Cloud CMS
Cloud CMS
Stacks19
Followers39
Votes6

Cloud CMS vs Contentful: What are the differences?

Introduction:

When comparing Cloud CMS and Contentful, there are several key differences that differentiate the two platforms in the realm of content management systems. These differences can impact the decision-making process for businesses looking to implement a CMS solution that best fits their needs.

  1. Hosting Options: One key difference between Cloud CMS and Contentful is the hosting options provided. Cloud CMS offers both cloud-based hosting and on-premises hosting solutions, giving users the flexibility to choose based on their specific requirements. On the other hand, Contentful is solely a cloud-based CMS, which may limit choices for organizations that prefer on-premises hosting for their content management needs.

  2. Customization and Extensibility: Another significant difference is the level of customization and extensibility offered by each platform. Cloud CMS provides a more customizable and extensible solution, allowing users to tailor the platform to their unique requirements through custom plugins and integrations. In contrast, Contentful has a more structured approach with limited customization options, which may be suitable for organizations that prefer a simpler, out-of-the-box solution.

  3. Licensing Model: The licensing models of Cloud CMS and Contentful also differ. Cloud CMS operates on a per-user licensing model, where users pay based on the number of users accessing the platform. Contentful, on the other hand, offers a usage-based pricing model, charging based on the volume of content stored and accessed. This distinction in licensing models can impact the cost considerations for businesses evaluating the two platforms.

  4. Content Model Flexibility: Cloud CMS provides a flexible content model that allows users to create and manage various content types with ease. Users can define custom content types, fields, and relationships to accommodate diverse content structures. Contentful, while offering a structured content model, may not provide the same level of flexibility, making it more suitable for organizations with simpler content needs.

  5. Collaboration and Workflow: Collaboration and workflow management capabilities vary between Cloud CMS and Contentful. Cloud CMS offers robust collaboration features, such as content locking, version control, and workflow automation, to support team collaboration and content governance. Contentful, while also providing collaboration tools, may not offer the same depth of features, which could impact organizations with complex content approval processes.

  6. Integration Ecosystem: The integration ecosystem of Cloud CMS and Contentful differs in terms of available integrations with third-party tools and services. Cloud CMS has a broad range of integrations with popular applications and services, allowing users to seamlessly connect their CMS with other business tools. Contentful, while offering integrations with key platforms, may have a more curated set of integrations, potentially limiting the connectivity options for users.

In Summary, Cloud CMS and Contentful differ in hosting options, customization, licensing models, content model flexibility, collaboration features, and integration ecosystems, providing distinct choices for organizations seeking a content management system solution.

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Advice on Contentful, Cloud CMS

Kamil
Kamil

Product Manager at Wooclap

Jul 17, 2020

Needs adviceonGoogle DocsGoogle DocsGatsbyGatsby

Hi StackSharers, your help is dearly needed as we're making a move to which we will commit for the next few years.

Problem: As our Marketing team gets growing needs to publish content fast and autonomously, we're trying to add a CMS to our stack.

Specs:

  • This CMS should have fairly advanced marketing features: either natively built, and/or be open source, so we can either find third parties' plugins suiting our needs or build our own plugins homebrew.

  • "Advanced marketing features" like these: Non-devs should be able to handle content autonomously, Should have a non-dev friendly interface, should allow creating a library of reusable components/modules, should show the preview before publishing, should have a calendar with all publications, should show the history/tracking, should allow collaborating (Google Docs like), should display characters limit optimized for SEO.

Solution: We're considering an SSG + Headless CMS combination. We're fairly confident for the SSG (Gatsby), but we're still uncertain which CMS we should choose.

122k views122k
Comments
Webster
Webster

Founder at Demand Stack

Feb 10, 2023

Decided

I wanted to use an open-source CMS for this project so that ruled out a lot of options (Contentful, Sanity, Prismic etc...). The only other open-source option I found worth considering was Payload CMS. Since this was my first headless CMS project, I chose Strapi over Payload CMS. Payload CMS is very powerful and flexible but may be TOO flexible and abstracted for my first crack at this. Strapi also seems to have a lot of momentum which is important for open-source projects.

I've been happy with Strapi so far and it's been able to do what I needed. I may try Payload CMS on a future project now that I have some experience.

32.4k views32.4k
Comments
Maxim
Maxim

Web developer

Apr 14, 2020

Needs adviceonSanitySanity

Hi Community, Would like to ask for advice from people familiar with those tools. We are a small self-funded startup and initial cost for us is very important at that stage. That's why we are leaning towards Sanity. The CMS will be used to power our website and flutter cross-platform mobile applications.

108k views108k
Comments

Detailed Comparison

Contentful
Contentful
Cloud CMS
Cloud CMS

With Contentful, you can bring your content anywhere using our APIs, completely customize your content structure all while using your preferred programming languages and frameworks.

Easily Create, Upload and Edit;Use Simple Content Forms;Full Text Search and Query; Workspaces

Platform agnostic headless CMS; GraphQL and REST APIs; Fast delivery with global CDNs; Images API; Language and framework agnostic; Extensible web interface; CI/CD-ready; Flexible data; App Marketplace integrations; App Framework for building your own; Scheduled publishing, teams, tasks & comments; Localization with fallbacks
mobile content management; enterprise content management; document management; records management; users and groups management; real-time analytics; web and mobile forms; content workflow; publishing; push notifications;
Statistics
Stacks
838
Stacks
19
Followers
955
Followers
39
Votes
70
Votes
6
Pros & Cons
Pros
  • 30
    API-based cms
  • 17
    Much better than WordPress
  • 11
    Simple and customizable
  • 5
    Images API
  • 3
    Free for small projects
Cons
  • 5
    No spell check
  • 5
    No repeater Field
  • 4
    No free plan
  • 3
    Slow dashboard
  • 2
    Enterprise targeted
Pros
  • 4
    API-first, "headless" CMS
  • 2
    Available via SaaS or On-Prem
Integrations
Algolia
Algolia
imgix
imgix
Bitbucket
Bitbucket
Saleor
Saleor
Twilio
Twilio
Mailgun
Mailgun
Cloudinary
Cloudinary
GraphQL Playground
GraphQL Playground
commercetools
commercetools
Google Cloud Platform
Google Cloud Platform
No integrations available

What are some alternatives to Contentful, Cloud CMS?

Sanity

Sanity

Sanity is a headless, real-time CMS where the editor is an open source React-based construction kit and the backend is a graph-oriented cloud datastore with a globally distributed CDN.

Tipe

Tipe

All your Apps have text and your developers don't want to manage it. Create and manage your text or assets with powerful editing tools and access it from anywhere with a GraphQL or REST API.

prismic.io

prismic.io

Prismic is a Content Management System, a tool for editing online content, also known as a headless CMS, an API CMS, a content platform, a disruptive content-as-a-service digital experience.

Cockpit

Cockpit

An API-driven CMS without forcing you to make compromises in how you implement your site. The CMS for developers. Manage content like collections, regions, forms and galleries which you can reuse anywhere on your website.

GraphCMS

GraphCMS

GraphCMS is a GraphQL Based Headless Content Management System. It lets you build a hosted GraphQL backend for your applications and gives you all the tools you need to manage your content.

Scrivito

Scrivito

Scrivito is a cloud-based JavaScript CMS, built for digital agencies and medium to large-sized businesses. Scrivito is based on ReactJS and 100% serverless, so you'll never have to patch your CMS.

Osmek

Osmek

Build your site in any programming language, or framework, on any server. Distribute your content to one site, or fifty, in JSON or RSS, as custom templates, or XML. With your content tucked snuggly in the cloud, you're free to develop your way.

PushTable

PushTable

Flexible data structure, direct data table inputs and serverless support makes PushTable the perfect data management tool for front-end developers and development agencies. PushTable easily integrates with static site generators, and mobile SDK.

Nuxeo

Nuxeo

It is a platform for rich and structured content management. Its cloud-native, modular platform plugs easily into legacy infrastructure, scales with your team, and your progress.

CloudCannon

CloudCannon

CloudCannon is the fast, intuitive solution for your Jekyll needs. Build, update, and deliver content to your customers.

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