Web development has advanced quickly in recent years, going from simple, text-heavy websites to complex, immersive web applications. However, “regular” content-driven websites are still in high demand despite all of this improvement. At some point, you might even need to make one yourself!
Content-heavy websites are easier to develop because they typically don’t deal with the “immersive part.” These days, choosing between two of the most widely used options is all that’s required: Content Management Systems (CMSs) or Static Site Generators (SSGs).
These days, static site generators, or SSGs, are very popular in the web development industry. Why? Static websites are popular among developers because of their many advantages, including simplicity, security, and quicker load times. However, when it comes to being dynamic, they do have certain shortcomings; here is where a CMS shines.
What are Static Site Generators?
Software programs known as static site generators (SSGs) simplify the process of creating web pages from static files. Usually, they extract text from many sources, integrate it into an HTML file, and then upload the finished product to a server.
With the help of these technologies, developers may work independently and concentrate on business logic and design rather than worrying about deployment, installing dependencies, or managing server hosting.
What Distinguishes a Dynamic Website from a Static One?
The server downloads one file per page when a web browser requests a page from a static site. Conversely, when a browser accesses a page from a dynamic website, the server must combine various components to create the webpage for every user.
While dynamic websites employ a combination of client-side and server-side rendering scripts, such as PHP and JavaScript, static websites rely on what is known as client-side code, which is mostly HTML and CSS.
Even though dynamic websites provide for many features, like personalization and interactivity, they are more expensive to develop and require more time to code than static websites.
Advantages of Static Site Generators
Among the many benefits of static site generators is their ability to load pages quickly. Not only is it a technical achievement, but rendering online pages quickly increases audience appeal, retention, and conversion. Even though engineers adore these tools, non-technical end users like marketers could find it difficult to navigate new workflows and murky procedures.
Static site generators offer templates, quick deployments automatically, and convenient asset management, freeing up developers to concentrate on producing more content that their audiences would like. Static sites are laboriously created and maintained by developers, but marketing teams are the ones that use them on a regular basis to produce and update content. Regrettably, static site generators frustrate marketers due to a number of aspects that make them fantastic for developers.
Disadvantages of Static Site Generators
Developer workflows are usually different from those used by marketers. It shouldn’t be necessary for marketers to learn Markdown in order to produce blog posts or update website copy. Instead, they should not want to.
To be honest, it is unreasonable to expect marketers to become experts in intricate systems in order to perform basic tasks like resizing images or embedding graphs. Instead of making things more difficult, marketers should have tools that make content creation and distribution easier.
The majority of a developer’s first week on a project is typically spent configuring a development environment and launching their local and staging tooling. Once the development team determines that a static site generator is the best option, they also promise to provide a build server so that changes may be previewed or to configure and maintain local development environments for every member of the marketing team.
These are a few instances of websites that probably work well with static site generators:
- Sites with a lot of material that doesn’t need to be updated frequently are excellent candidates for SSGs. Personal blog entries, documentation pages, landing pages, portfolio websites, and brochure web pages are a few examples.
- Websites that require rapid loading times and a large amount of information might consider using an SSG. For instance, a website that provides weather forecasts can rapidly retrieve meteorological data from an API and provide it.
When Not to Use Generators for Static Websites
A headless content management system (CMS) is a preferable choice to minimize complexity, even though numerous third-party applications and plugins can enhance the functionality of a static website. Here are several situations in which it is not appropriate to employ an SSG:
- when you need to customize something sophisticated for your clients based on their geolocation, time of day, etc.
- when it is necessary to often update information.
- when advanced editing and teamwork are priorities for your marketing team.
- whenever a database connection is required.
- when creating complicated websites such as user-registered sites and online stores.
- when the need arises for dynamic experiences and real-time data.
What is a CMS?
Utilizing a content management system, or CMS for short, is the second method for building a website with lots of material. CMS software, as its name suggests, is a tool for managing the content on your website. The front end, which is a website, and the back end, which consists of a database and control panel, are tightly interwoven into one neat little package.
A CMS employs dynamic webpages as opposed to an SSG, which creates your HTML before serving it. So, it creates the website’s code immediately before forwarding it to the customer. This type of activity doesn’t need any kind of “build-step,” but depending on how many people visit, it can strain your web server.
Two of the most well-known CMSs are WordPress and Joomla. About 30% of all websites on the internet are reportedly powered by WordPress, to give you an idea of how commonplace this software is! Big names like TechCrunch, Microsoft News, Facebook Newsroom, Mozilla Blog, and others are among them.
Static site generators are highly regarded by developers in part because of the shortcomings of the systems they have replaced. The old content management systems were infamous for their poor user experiences for developers and content creators, as well as their sluggish performance and security vulnerabilities. Nonetheless, several of the CMS platforms available today have improved upon these errors and shortfalls by assimilating the greatest characteristics of static site generators and creating their own distinctive advantages.
A contemporary content management system (CMS) website allows developers the flexibility they need to create the features that users want while reducing deployment time. Marketing teams, meanwhile, can produce content using well-known, web-based, “what you see is what you get” technologies that easily connect with pre-existing software and data.
Static Site Generators vs CMS: Comparing the Differences
#1 Performance
When accessing a static website, the speed at which a device can download and render the material determines how quickly pages load. Since the user downloads content from both static and CMS sites at the same rate, server-side rendering—which causes a CMS to always perform slower than a static site by an amount equal to the time it takes to perform server-side rendering—is the primary performance factor that separates the two.
But there are ways to reduce or even completely do away with it. Caching and serving the assembled content produced by server-side rendering is possible with the help of a content distribution network (CDN) such as CloudFlare.
#2 Security
Compared to dynamic websites, static websites offer a lower attack surface since they lack server-side rendering and dynamic components. The largest security risk associated with employing an SSG is the possibility of an attacker breaking into the version control system you use to keep the website updated. Malicious assaults have a larger surface area on CMS-based websites.
Thus, securing a CMS-based website requires much more work. For instance, to defend a WordPress website from malicious assaults, install WordPress security plugins. To further defend yourself from malware attacks, you should regularly patch your primary content management system, in this case, WordPress.
#3 User-friendliness
If you know the fundamentals of programming languages, using static site generators is simple. SSGs are frequently used by seasoned web developers for precision, which is challenging to accomplish with a regular CMS. CMSs, on the other hand, are simple to use and don’t require a technical background to function.
With their WYSIWYG (What You See is What You Get) builders, anyone can begin creating a website in a matter of minutes. Thus, a content management system is a preferable option if you are new to web development. An SSG is your best option if you’re an experienced webmaster searching for opportunities in bespoke coding.
#4 Features
Despite supporting plugins, the majority of static site generators do not have the comprehensive plugin database that CMSs like WordPress or Drupal do. Even if markup languages can be used to provide bespoke functionality to an SSG, maintaining it will cost far more than maintaining a straightforward third-party plugin. In terms of features, content management systems really outdid themselves. Plugins can be added to CMS-based websites to increase their capabilities. There are many WordPress plugins available in the market for different functionalities like live chat, performance, analytics, author bios, comments, migration, and more.
#5 Reliability
Because static site generators have fewer moving elements than dynamic ones, they are more suited for creating dependable websites. As such, the likelihood of something going wrong is low. Furthermore, a skilled web developer can rapidly restore the website in the event that something goes wrong.
However, things might get pricey very quickly if you have to hire someone to restore an SSG site. This is the advantage of a CMS-based website. You do not need to be technically skilled to repair a CMS website, even though they are more vulnerable to code conflicts and errors. Therefore, SSGs are a preferable option if you are experienced with programming languages. For all others, CMS is a preferable option.
Closing Thoughts
Static site generators are becoming more and more popular every day, and since they cut down on the time and work required to create a website, it is hoped that this trend will continue.
It is less complicated and more affordable when combined with a dependable security system. CMS also boasts some excellent facilities at the same time. In the end, you will have to decide between these two based on your needs.
