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Magento is definitely one of the most widespread and effective CMS systems designed specifically for online marketplaces. Even though it was not initially created with this purpose in mind, thousands of online retailers around the world have quickly adopted Magento as a platform of their choice to navigate the tenets of e-commerce and to expand digitally. But this article is not about the many benefits of Magento. On the contrary, it’s about the platform’s vital flaws and striking disadvantages.
Hi there, we already have slow e-commerce website (magento 2.1.x backend) as well as mobile apps (iOS/Android). We are looking at taking them to the next level both UI/UX experience as well as further functionality.
Our Client
Even the most commonly used software solutions do not guarantee absolute 100% success and, as the story goes, the case with Magento is a two-fold experience because many of its pros come at the price of noticeable cons. Read on to find out why Magento might not be the best solution for your business.
It’s Expensive
Magento is far from being a budget-friendly solution. The average entry price is $2000 per month without extensions that can cost you additional couple of thousands and the users often pay on a subscription basis rather than making a one-time purchase. You will most definitely need additional extensions since the platform is designed for you to depend on them. Moreover, consider that the average annual salary of a software engineer working with Magento is $80K (in US) and that you will definitely need him (and not just one) to maintain your project.
It’s Complicated (and slow, takes a lot of memory)
Those same extensions that cost you additional money are to blame for Magento’s single most important flaw – slow speed. Because of the extensions, updates, and plugins that are aimed to satisfy a variety of diverse users developers often report that the system lags behind custom solutions in terms of speed. It is also complicated and takes a lot of time to deal with optimizing your site’s performance and connecting it to a suitable hosting provider.
Errors and Glitches
Developers and QA engineers report that using Magento comes with a great deal of errors and bugs. That happens, again, because of the number of plugins and extensions. However, thanks to a big Magento community worldwide many bugs are fixed promptly, although new might appear. For some users this is inappropriate, given the amount of time it takes to develop a Magento project as well as its cost.
Lack of Support
Any one-size-fits-all software solution like Magento, Wix, WordPress or Joomla lack proper support. When facing downtime or encountering security issues, you need to act quickly in order to avoid losses. Reaching out to Magento support, you will need to go through many cycles of bureaucratic hell before your problem is solved. It takes time to just define you issue and it takes more time to get the answer you can understand and apply. For a quicker support you should either pay additionally, or browse through Magento forums, seeking help from Magento community.
Hosting (not included)
Hosting is another common problem for Magento users and developers. Hosting is not included in Magento package, so it is up to you to deal with the hosting of your website. This means additional expenses but it also is one of the reasons why a site that uses Magento can be too slow or have bugs.
Takes a Lot of Time to Maintain
Because Magento is a complicated platform, dealing with it requires a lot of patience and effort. All in all, it seems that the benefits of Magento are promoted more widely while its major flaws are generally not covered that good. You either need a professional developer who knows Magento well or it will take time for a programmer to get acquainted with Magento. And even a skilled Magento developer will need to constantly update his knowledge base to make sure that your website is optimized enough to deliver results that justify time, effort and money you put into it.
Magento SEO Issues Include
- Slow Page Speed / Load Speed
- Query String URLs
- Product Page Configuration
- Poor Magento Template Coding
- Indexing of Duplicate Content
- Indexing of Search Page
Custom Solution is Better
Custom CMS is going to be tailored specifically for you. Keep in mind that magento is not a good option for small-scale projects while some of its flaws can outweigh its benefits, especially if you’re right at the start of your project. It is highly advisable to go with the custom-made option, hiring a dedicated team of developers that will deliver a website that will work faster and be cheaper to maintain.
With a custom-made CMS your business is more likely to deliver thanks to original design, better performance, proper support, and less bugs in your code. When it comes to software engineering, the easier it works, the better. So, Magento, being a complex and time-consuming solution just won’t do you much good. There’s no doubt it was once a great CMS just the same as WordPress but the times have changed and so did what it takes to succeed in the world of e-commerce.
Wrapping Up
There’s no doubt that Magento was an effective platform in the past. In some cases it still is with many companies hooked up in Magento just too seriously to just give it up. Nevertheless, as it often happens with multi-functional “one-size-fits-all” solutions, the amount of extensions made updates made over the years decreased the overall functionality of this CMS to a point where it can no longer be called user-friendly. Perhaps, that is the reason why Magento changed a couple of owners in the last decade. New times requires new solutions and because Magento cannot be remade from scratch (due to the amount of code) it will better option for your business to go with a custom solution.