Backdrop CMS
Comprehensive CMS for small to medium sized businesses and non-profits.
Maintained, but at a slower pace than the leaders in its category.
Commit activity more than 38% of tracked projects; popularity more than 36%. How this is calculated.
Commits, last 11 months
| Stars | 1k |
|---|---|
| Latest release | 1.35.1 · 24 Sept 2026 |
| Repo updated | 25 Sept 2026 |
| Licence | GPL-2.0 |
| Built with | PHP |
Is Backdrop CMS actively maintained?
Over the last 11 months the project absorbed 148 commits, of which 36 arrived in the most recent quarter — roughly 12 commits a month.
The most recent tagged release, 1.35.1, shipped within the last month — a current, installable version exists today.
Backdrop CMS ranks #27 of 48 in Content Management Systems (CMS), placing it mid-table for maintenance activity.
What Backdrop CMS actually does
Backdrop CMS is a content management system designed to help small and medium-sized organisations build and manage their websites. Written in PHP, it provides tools for organizing and publishing digital content without requiring deep programming knowledge. It operates under the GPL-2.0 licence, making it open source and self-hostable.
Best fit: It is a suitable choice if you need a traditional PHP-based content management platform for a business or non-profit website.
Worth knowing: You may face a smaller community and fewer third-party modules compared to dominant alternatives like WordPress or Drupal.
Deployment notes
You will typically need a standard web server running PHP alongside a relational database such as MySQL or MariaDB, plus persistent storage for uploaded media.
Links
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