What are the Cons of Wordpress?

That depends on the type of website you're trying to create. For example, if you're creating a blog then it would have very few cons and use it with almost no plugins. If you're trying to run an entire MMORPG off it, you're going to hit quite a few cons and might as well have the entire website custom coded.

The cons are that it's slow. Much slower than straight HTML from a good developer that knows how to write light weight code and optimize pages for speed. It also boxes you into a series of plugins and templates so it's not as versatile as hand written code.

With that being said I would recommend wordpress for just about any site you want to build because it's reliable, receives updates on a regular basis, and despite the fact it's not as versatile as HTML, there are still TONS of resources available for it.

You can get over the page speed issues by choosing a good, fast loading theme like Swift and hosting it on a host that knows wordpress and optimizes their server for it. The best hosting provider I've found for WordPress is zippykid.com.

1. Very difficult to learn to use well, compared with most of its competitors

2. Requires regular updating and (as can be seen from thread discussions here) the updates can cause significant compatibility and other problems

3. Plug-ins can be a real resource-hog but it seems you can't do a lot without them

4. There are obviously some common speed issues which can be circumvented only by "special knowledge/experience"

5. Unless you spend real money and/or are a masterful user, the end result tends to look "like WordPress" (i.e. it's not necessarily ideal for someone who "wants something a bit different")

6. As can be seen from many of the thread discussions here, wanting to change/customize things (which in other CMS's would be trivial and take only seconds) can turn out to be hugely complicated and requiring a deep understanding of something called "CSS" (whatever the hell that is) and a PhD in mechanical engineering

7. Obvious security issues and hacking problems, maybe partly just because it's so widely used that it's the one the hackers are brought up on, which again (you guessed it) can be circumvented only with some real inconvenience and by "special knowledge/experience"

Just my perspective, as someone who sees the many, considerable advantages of WordPress, would like to use it, has read the whole of both "WordPress for Dummies" and "Blogging for Dummies", has struggled with it on and off over the years, has never managed to use it successfully, and has now more-or-less given up with it - yet again.

it is difficult to use and customized.

Word press is my favourite. Other than the dozens of free plugins and hundreds inf not thousands of free themes. I use it 98% over static html sites.

The main issue with Wordpress is its security system.
There are many cases of sites being easily hacked into.

Depending on your needs, Wordpress should be
Able to meet most of our needs..

Not recommending Wordpress for content management site
Such as membership sites.

The biggest con without doubt... but you can 'save' your sites by using a service such www.codeguard.com or www.vaultpress.com

Yet other cons:
1) You're stuck with running php code even if all you want is a static website.

2) The MySql database can get absolutely trashy and bogged down with wp + plugins + themes + faulty uninstalls, etc.

3) You can (and mostly WILL) hit complete dead ends with blank white pages one random day! Go figure what went wrong by browsing thousands of threads on the wp forums!! (while big G throws your serp rankings back to page 10 for a 'blank site'!)

4) Many old plugins are security vulnerability gardens

But on the other hand... most of my sites ARE wp!
The pros outweigh all the cons by miles!

10 year old can make a proper site out of it.

Ok I want o create a local celebrity site with forum,chat,poll. i want my site with poll or something. Iv'e tried to use mybb forum because i can't afford to pay the license of vbulletin, but mybb don't have what i wanted and has a lack of features, i am not a techie person. So i think wordpress can do that. But the problem is wordpress is easily hackable or i thought. So if my sites gets hack its a big problem i don't know how to protect my site. In my understanding website builder will be there for you if your sites gets hacked, that what i understand.

Really depends what you're using it for. If you have no technical experience I would recommend Wordpress without a doubt. But if you want to make a customized social network or something ya it's not right for that. It's a blogging platform essentially but you can find themes and plugins to do next to ALMOST anything you want to do.

I build sites with Wordpress, Blogger, Weebly and straight html
I like Wordpress because of the flexibility it gives me.
An out of date plugin can cause problems and hackers seem to target Wordpress these days. I would advise to limit the plugins you use. Stick to the main recommended ones. I'm sure Wordpress will be replaced in a few years, but for now it serves me well.

Compared to coding the website yourself from scratch, Wordpress is the easier to use if you want to develop a professional looking website. It is very flexible and have so many features. You can even hide its "Wordpress" attribute. And moreover it is free.

Major con for those of us who own a big group of WP sites: updates.

// This was a one liner in memory of extinct dofollow sig links. May it rest in peace. Or in pieces...

Wordpress is a platform that does not require intensive courses. It is easy to work with and even those that are beginners in the domain can learn from it and with it. I agree that one of the problem that some people might have appears because of the many plug-ins that are installed recklessly.

if you add lots of plugins....

Cons of WordPress are Lesser When You Compare with the ease and long term value you create with wordpress.

However, If you are new to wordpress....Following things should be taken care:
1) You need to invest some time to learn some basic functions within Wordpress Dashboard.
2) You need to understand which plugins are useful at the same time are reliable.
3) You must update your plugins as well as themes within your wordpress periodically.
4) You must have a good security plugin.

In my opinion, If you have taken care some basic points as pointed above then you have a beautiful and stunning website with lots of functionality. A web property which is at par with the latest developments in the web world in the coming future years as well, All just clicking some buttons in your dashboard.

My humble request to you that you should not see only the cons of Wordpress, You should give some time to learn this amazingly simple yet powerful piece of software on earth which is being used by massive number of websites without any issue from several years.

Thanks,

Wordpress can do only up to a point a great website.. for different types of websites that can do different jobs, you`ll have to get specifil scripts or create your own html ones..

Im gonna go ahead and disagree here. I think its not a con of WP i think its very easy to crate a website in WP with no prior knowledge and its waay easier to make a site compared to coding one yourself in Dreamweaver for example. so thats definatly a plus

cons: - slow
- if youre not confident with the free templates you find, its gonna be a pain in the a** to change template styles

One of the cons with WordPress is the ease at which you can add plugins.

A once stable and secure site can quickly turn into a flaky unstable wreck if your selection of plugins begins to conflict with the latest WP update, exactly the issue I am having since installing 3.6

The issue of course is the interplay between WP core files, plugins and the database

My top tip is to avoid using the onsite plugin search facility and seek out professional plugin developers who will maintain their software and update as required when each WP update is released.

I should make it a personal project to teach Alexa to use and enjoy WordPress

The biggest con for wordpress is security. The sites can be hacked through sketchy plugins, themes, widgets etc.

The "Cons" are all of the above and none of them.
I look at it simply in what I think of as the "Microsoft" approach, you don't have to put something out there absolutely perfect, you can work on it and build it as both your clients, audience (use whatever word you need) and you grow.
You have not given us much to go on....what sort of site are you wanting to use it for.As forthethere's too much out there you have to make up your mind one day....you won't always get it right......But don't let that scare you.
Wordpress is a good platform for (in my personal experience)allwebsites, from "landing pages" through to full blown CMS sites.
As far as the"haking" goes it happens to us all. Get a good host who backs up daily, You do your backups and above all ALWAYS keep wordpress and any plugins up to date even if you have them turned off at the time.....Then go for your life

You better have time to waste figuring things out or pay someone who knows

The only con (security) has been mentioned.

security is not much of a problem
i find wordpress the best blogging platform
especially beacause it is newbie friendly

I am sorry, I can only say positives about WP and I think most of the counter-arguments are simply not true.

If you think WP is "difficult", you are invited to try out Drupal or similar, much luck with that

The most "difficult" part is still on the hosting side of things, that is having to learn basic things required like FTP upload, setting up a domain etc. as opposed to a self-hosted platform where this does not apply. But once this is learned (which is not hard), installing WP is literally done with a couple clicks.

Once the basic site is up, you don't even need to know HTML, it's really only "play around and click" and is NOT more difficult as setting up, say, a site on blogspot or making a squidoo lens. (IN MY OPINION).

* Most of the security issues are not really related to WP itself, those are hosting issues. Hackers wont hack a site because it's "wordpress" but because the hoster has security holes and is not "hardened", has no firewall running, out-dated PHP versions etc.

So..the "problem" really is not WP but the necessity to know that the website host you use for the sites is secure. HOWEVER, this can be a non-issue if you use a good hosting company (probably even "managed" if you don't have experience). Oh..and by the way, if you use Cpanel you don't even need to bother with FTP uploads etc. but can install WO with one click right from Cpanel.

Tip: If you use a $5/month host...you can in all likelihood also not expect top-notch support or necessarily that their host is always up-to-date in terms of security.

* Spammy plugins with hidden code?

What a generalization. I don't know where you got your plugins from. I never had this problem. If a plugin would cause problems or has "spam code" or holes in it or whatsoever, rest assured you would read about it on the plugin repository. At some point you will likely have a variety of favorite plugins to use (less is always better) and then you will also know how they behave. (Really, those are normally a few essential plugins such as SEO plugins, social plugins etc..no one forces anyone to use untried "odd" plugins).

Security is not much of a problem
I think that wordpress is the best blogging platform
especially because it is newbie friendly

I think it's funny that people can manage to find cons in Wordpress when they haven't compared it to the alternatives. I was a former drupal/Joomla user as well as many other scripts. I converted over to Wordpress because it was so popular, so effective, fast, well-supported, huge extension database, and lots of free support online.

If you're going to be a newb and not be able to do anything by yourself....then yes, you will have to put up with the 3rd-party theme-designers plugins/extensions and incompatibility issues. But if you know how to code cleanly yourself, and figure things out on your own, Wordpress offers an incredible platform for ease-of-use and customization. There is nothing LIKE wordpress that is better than wordpress.

Whatever "cons" you may find in Wordpress, I would still recommend for you to use it because it's the best available...ESPECIALLY IF YOU ARE A NEWB and will be doing things on your own.

WordPress is great, but...

1) It can be slow loading. (For example, a client of mine has a simple WordPress site that takes roughly 50 seconds; my plain HTML site loads -- literally -- almost 10 times faster.)

2) The plug-ins can conflict with each other.

3) Hackers love WordPress (especially older versions with a default configuration and a too-simple password).

4) Frankly, for very simple sites, it can be overkill. (WordPress CAN get complex. For a site with just a few pages, plain HTML may better choice.)

5) They can be tricky to move from host to host. Plug-ins can help with this, but HTML sites can be moved just by dragging within an FTP program.

John

Ok, so nobody said Joomla as an alternative, so.. What are the alternatives? I honestly dont see writing pure html to be all that secure. I took a class, made a nice website with clean code a few years back and in all honesty there were ZERO security features.

Security and Plugins are main concerns which would I think should be the main dis advantages of the wordpress. Wordpress sites are hacked easily. The most plugins are very resource consuming, which lead them to make your server overload.

Wordpress is overkill if you just need to create simple websites. One day you may forget to update one of them (main installation or plugin) and then you are hacked.
For very high-traffic ones I also prefer pure html and an nginx or litespeed server.

Every other option you have may have cons, I am using WP since years and I haven't seen any thing that bother me, I like WP it is reliable and fast, support is also good.

The first few hundred sites my webguys made in dreamweaver when I told him to make one in wordpress he was pissed and refused to do it.

I think the biggest con is the security I have had a few hacked over the years, but it's less then 1%. The biggest plus is I can go put some copy and test ideas without writing up a request to my webguy only when I need graphics and layout etc.. So I love it, and yes it can get slow and some updates are a mess but it's all a give and take the way I see it.

I've noticed a few bugs here and there. Apart from that I don't have a problem with it.

I feel that some of the cons of the Wordpress platform are: controls that are complicated and not user friendly, having to know encoding and embedding and text vss HTML - and that it's not cutting-edge technology. I've recently opted for a platform that doesn't require all that coding, that doesn't require a computer - and can be operated (image, videos, text) straight from your mobile device!

it's more easy to be hacked than the others (of course, there are tons of plugins for that but i am talking about wp only from scratch with no plugins).. you need to know html/css in order to make it the way you want the site to be

I think the major con for most sites I see are speed. The load time and resources can be overkill if all you need is a quick sales page or squeeze page. Some of my best sites are Wordpress free and fast as all heck. I like being different too. Just knowing I'm not following the herd is sometimes cool and refreshing. Not to mention, Wordpress wouldn't even exist if we all did the same thing, we'd still be running PhpNuke or something.

For me the biggest con is that not all themes operate the same. Usually premium themes have different structures on how to setup the homepage, logos, icons, etc. Some have all options located as a main sidebar menu option, others are hidden as a submenu item.

Also on occasion there will be instances where there are incompatibilities with plugins and themes. Today for example I found that when I run the OP plugin on my website, the theme will not show the slider.

Things like that can really suck time!

There are just too many factors that go into the success of a WordPress site -- from having a correct WordPress installation to using reliable themes and plugins; from ensuring your information architecture promotes ease of navigation to aligning and editing content; from ensuring your search engine optimization and Google verification is done correctly, to performing proper backups and updates.

Personally i think wordpress is a wonderful blogging platform. Though it isn't really newbie friendly with countless amounts of plugins needed to get started and also the lots tweaks needed to get a good looking blog.

WP 3.7 provides automatic security updates!


Andrew

wordpress is best software but dont use admin name in your username otherwise your website may hack. For heavy customization wordpress is not not good.

Every fruit in life comes only after cracking considerably tough things...WordPress is something like that....High recommendation is "Learn WordPress" You will get benefited in the longer-term...

Best Regards,
Vikash Kumar

It can be easily hacked.

Wordpress is not exactly the best when

it comes to online security.

Pro: Open Source
WordPress, and many of the themes and plugins for it, are freely available as Open Source code under the GPLv2 license. In short, this means you can freely modify and distribute the code without paying licensing fees (assuming you comply with other aspects of the license).

This one item here is fundamental to WordPress, and has a lot to do with every other pro and con on this list.

Pro: Huge Community
Out of all the Content Management Systems and Blogging platforms out there, WordPress would have the biggest community. At the time of writing, there are over 24,000 plugins and 1,700 themes available for free download on WordPress.org. But this is just the tip of the ice burg.

The massive community is even more useful if you are planning on doing custom development. There are 30,000 questions and 43,000 answers on WordPress Answers alone. You then have the extensive documentation on WordPress Codex, and thousands of other websites. If you have a question about WordPress, it's probably already been answered (this is one of those cases where this statement is actually true)

Pro: Easy to Install
WordPress is famous for it's easy installation process. This is one of those things they have got so incredibly right. No other self-hosted web app can compare.

After the core installation, you can also install plugins right from within the web GUI without needing to download anything or change config files. It's too simple, that it makes installation and development of any other platform seem incredibly difficult.

Pro: Lower Total Cost of Ownership
Any tech literate person can work in WordPress. Even those non tech literate can still find their way around the main tasks. This reduces the need for formal training and external support. Even upgrades are simple.

The ubiquity of WordPress also means there is a sizeable talent pool out there of experienced WordPress people. If you need someone to do development, maintenance, or support for you then you are in luck! You could hire someone to do all of this for you, from anywhere in the world (I'm one of those people).

Pro: Stable Plugin API Architecture
In the early days, the plugin API changed a little (as with anything rapidly growing). Now days it's settled down, and it's highly unlikely it will break with anything but the most major upgrade. This makes it easy to develop a plugin, by reducing the ongoing maintenance work needed to constantly update the API compatibility level.