The e-commerce revolution has caused an explosion in the number of online market platforms. Laravel and WordPress are two of the most popular systems for building online stores, marketplaces, and e-commerce-related web products. If you’re stuck choosing what system to use for your e-commerce platform, this article is for you. We’ll evaluate the differences between Laravel and WordPress and answer any other questions you might have.
What are the Differences Between Laravel and WordPress?
Before we delve into the Laravel vs WordPress debate, it would help to understand both tools. That way, it becomes easier to compare both tools and evaluate their differences.
WordPress is an open-source Content Management System (CMS) released by the WordPress Foundation in 2003. WordPress was written in PHP and incorporates elements of MySQL.
WordPress is notable for its use of themes (templates) and plugins, which help users unlock new functionalities. Data shows WordPress is hugely popular, with more than 35% of Internet sites using it.
On the other hand, Laravel is an open-source PHP web framework launched in 2011 by Taylor Otwell. Based on the Model View Controller (MVC) architecture, Laravel was designed to handle tackling tougher web projects.
Unlike WordPress, Laravel is that it utilises a feature-package architecture to aid functionality. These features help with authentication, localisation, database management, routing, and inversion of control.
Is Laravel Better Than WordPress?
When it arrived, WordPress was seen as the best solution for e-commerce entities. With WordPress tools like WooCommerce, setting up an online store or marketplace became ridiculously easy.
However, many developers building e-commerce sites started noting several niggling issues with the WordPress architecture. A large number of these issues would be solved by the new Laravel, leading to its popularity among e-commerce website developers.
However, the question of whether Laravel is better than WordPress is difficult to answer. This is because both web solutions have their pros and cons. Using various talking points, we will compare Laravel to WordPress to see which is better:
Ease of use
WordPress makes it easier to set up an e-commerce store and not even Laravel can beat WordPress in this area. With WordPress, you don’t need to have extensive coding knowledge to set up a site.
It is a ready-made framework complete with thousands of plugins and tools you can use to create an online marketplace. WordPress even offers WooCommerce, a customisable platform for e-commerce solutions.
However, Laravel requires extensive coding knowledge before you can successfully set up an e-commerce platform. It is also more difficult to make changes to a Laravel-based web platform, particularly if you don’t code extensively.
Search engine performance
Laravel offers fewer opportunities for SEO optimisation compared to WordPress. Laravel lacks any advanced tool for increasing search engine performance.
In contrast, WordPress has plug-ins like Yoast SEO to conduct SEO optimisation. WordPress sites tend to have better search engine performance on average.
Site safety
In terms of security, Laravel is better than WordPress. Laravel has several built-in security features that make your site impervious to hackers. These features include:
- Password encryption
- Route protection
- Robust authentication mechanics
WordPress, however, has publicised issues with security. That you have to download numerous plug-ins often increases the vulnerability of your site. Some plug-ins have been used by third-party entities to breach sites that have them installed. This is the major reason several brands prefer Laravel to WordPress; no one wants a security breach on their e-commerce website.
Website scalability
When you start your e-commerce site, you may need little functionality. However, as your customer base increases, you’ll need to scale the site further.
Laravel makes it easier to build the architecture for your site from scratch and also modify it as it grows. WordPress sites offer little customisation, making scalability a problem.
So, Laravel is better for building large e-commerce sites with thousands of products and customers. Small webshops and online stores are better off with WordPress.
Cost
No matter how you look at it, Laravel is more costly to use compared to WordPress. Laravel resources are more expensive, meaning you’ll spend more on setting up your online marketplace. This cost of course pales in comparison to the benefits; especially flexibility and security that Laravel offers.
WordPress, on the other hand, offers numerous free-to-use resources from themes to plug-ins. For a small business with a tight budget, using WordPress may be the more cost-effective option.
Setup time
Because you have to build them from scratch, Laravel websites take longer to set up. Nevertheless, you can cut the time it takes to set up your Laravel-based site by hiring a skilled developer.
Thanks to its ready-made themes and plug-ins, WordPress makes it easy to create an e-commerce site. Yes, you might need to spend time on customisation but, overall, setting up your site will be a faster process with WordPress.
Is Laravel Faster Than WordPress?
Site speed is an important consideration for any potential e-commerce site owner. Slow pages often turn off prospective customers, which is why it’s important to ensure that the e-commerce platform offers a fast and seamless experience.
Beyond conversions, page speed may impact SEO performance. Per Google standards, your site pages shouldn’t take more than 3 seconds to load.
Anything more, and your site’s abandonment rate increases, directly causing your site’s organic traffic to drop. In time, this will preclude your e-commerce site from showing up in Google’s top results.
The Laravel vs WordPress debate often touches on performance, with developers questioning which is faster. For the most part, Laravel is considered faster than WordPress for many reasons.
This is because Laravel doesn’t require the use of plug-ins or add-ons for increased functionality, since it already has in-built features. Plug-ins are notorious for slowing down pages, so not using them makes Laravel sites load faster.
Moreover, Laravel sites benefit from the clean and efficient code, which makes it possible to handle large databases and complex queries efficiently. WordPress doesn’t exactly have bad code, but it can hardly process queries as quickly as Laravel.
WordPress incorporates custom styles and themes that have many unused features, and slow down page processing. However, Laravel is known for its efficient structure, which promotes better loading time.
Still, you could get an experienced developer to help you optimize your WordPress e-commerce site. Only that this will cost you extra on add-on costs and it’s often not a one-time thing.
Can I Use Laravel With WordPress?
As said earlier, both Laravel and WordPress have their separate advantages. Some developers, hoping to enjoy the best of both worlds, often create platforms using a hybrid of Laravel and WordPress.
WordPress is noted for its ease of use while the Laravel backend has a higher learning curve. On the other hand, Laravel offers better speed and security.
Using Laravel with WordPress makes it easy for anyone to tweak site content on the backend even with little expertise. At the same time, front-end administration with Laravel guarantees better site safety and performance.
Since integrating Laravel with WordPress with WordPress has been a major preoccupation for developers, there are now many tools available to make the process easier. Here are some tools to use for WordPress-Laravel integration:
- WordPress Corcel
- WordPressToLaravel
- WP Eloquent
- Laravel-WP-API
- WordPlate
Note: There are dozens of tutorials online that teach how to use the aforementioned tools (and others) to integrate Laravel with WordPress.
Which Is Better: PHP or WordPress?
Like WordPress, PHP (HyperText PreProcessor) is used to build websites for e-commerce and other purposes. While PHP is a framework, WordPress is a Content Management System (CMS).
It’s hard to determine whether PHP or WordPress is the better option to build your site. So, we’ll make comparisons under several categories:
Budget
You’ll likely spend less building your site with WordPress compared to using PHP. But remember that you’ll have to pay for premium themes and plug-ins and even a WordPress expert if you don’t have a lot of experience. In the long run, an all-inclusive PHP solution like we offer at Daalder may be a cost-effective option for you.
SEO performance
WordPress offers a suite of plugins that help you handle SEO for your e-commerce site. Such features are not available with PHP, which can hamper SEO performance.
Website size
If you have a small to medium-sized e-commerce website and want to keep it that way, then WordPress might be more suitable for your needs. However, PHP is better for handling large e-commerce sites with thousands of products. So, PHP may be the better solution if you intend to grow your e-commerce site to a large scale.
User experience
WordPress offers many themes solely designed to enhance user experience. With PHP, your site’s user experience is highly dependent on the developer’s skill. In our estimation, WordPress offers more opportunities for a better user experience with its themes.
Skill level
A big selling point for WordPress is its ease of use — it’s easy to use for even novices. While PHP offers more customisation, it requires a higher skill level to use.
This could pose a problem if you lack coding expertise and don’t have the funds to spend on a website developer. If you’re a novice setting up his first e-commerce store, WordPress is a better option.
If you decide to go for PHP, you would be better off with an all-inclusive solution like the one we offer at Daalder. Our affordable e-commerce solution allows you to enjoy the benefits of PHP without having any technical skills.
