Why Migration of your Drupal Website to the Latest Drupal Versions is a Must-do?

A lot of people seem to be satisfied with what they are going on with at present.  Drupal 7 (or 6) websites have already and are still living up to its expectations by doing the job and working pretty smoothly. But is getting things done enough for you to stay ahead of the competition? I am sure you must have gone through the thinking of a) improving UI/UX, b) upgrading security, c) improving performance, and d) adding new functionalities for the target audience. If you have not thought about it yet, it is about time you do that. Read on to understand how an upgrade/migration to the latest version of Drupal helps you achieve a lot of what you want to do and stay ahead of your competition.

Drupal is strongly recognized for its scalability, robustness, adaptability and above all – security. It comes as no surprise that it has been preferred as a Content Management System for government corporations, financial establishments, and other industries where data safety and security are a top priority. 

So without frittering much time, let's shed some light upon why upgrading the Drupal website to the current latest drupal version is not just sound, but widely suggested.

Smart Moves

Drupal 9 is all set and is about to hit the ground running within two more months. At this point, is it clever to simply skip Drupal 8 and jump to Drupal 9 instead? The answer is NO, it isn’t. Because – Drupal 9 hits in June-July 2020 and Drupal 7 approaches the end of life in November 2021. This implies you have just 18 months to migrate your whole website to Drupal 9. Migrating has never been a one-click job. It has always been more than that and requires planning, technical architect, a development team, and a lot of testing. The most ideal thing to do in such scenarios would be to migrate to Drupal 8 now and keep abreast of the updates. It is important to note that to update from Drupal 8 latest minor version to Drupal 9 will not be difficult at all. The backend architecture remains the same.

Latest & Improved Features 

Are you failing to take advantage of new features that can raise your revenue? Drupal 8 now shows up stuffed with striking features that will improve your digital experiences. Features like WYSIWYG editor for valuable and rich content editing options, multilingual support, useful SEO modules, drag, and drop file uploads, built-in web-services, Twig template engine for robust and secure performance and a whole lot more(!!) are now all in core. That indicates you won’t constantly require contributed modules unless your specifications demand. Further, the list of contributed modules has grown by large numbers.

Responsive 

Responsiveness is not just a good-to-have feature now. It is a must. Drupal 8 has become responsive more than ever. This calls for you to understand that not only will your website factors like themes, blocks, images, and menus be mobile friendly to your viewers, but even your configuration setup should also be equally responsive. Site administrators can handle their websites efficiently when on the move with mobile-friendly toolbars and other peculiarities.

Top Performance

With technologies like BigPipe now in core, you don’t have to bother about your website’s performance. BigPipe module separates your web page into several segments and provides the segments that get prepared first (cached). Drupal 8 also has many smart caching modules like the Dynamic page cache and Internal page cache for secret users. Drupal websites are decoupled with front-end frameworks like Angular, React, and other JS frameworks that will help advance site performance and interactivity.

API-First Architecture

In this day and age, if you’re not future-proofed and, not giving enough attention to security and sustainability, you are going to face trouble. Your website and content demand to be made in a way so that it is accessible to various devices from various touchpoints. To do this correctly, your content requires to be handled as structured data; as data that any device/medium can interpret and understand. Drupal 8 reflects the API-first architecture where you can build an API before you create your website. This assures your content converts into services that can interact with different devices. Building your own web-service utilizing Drupal 8 modules and customizing it is now like a walk in the park.

Power of HTML 5

I am sure you are all informed of the strength of HTML 5. Drupal 8 arrives equipped with HTML 5, the most advanced and robust version of HTML. Intricate semantic factors such as email and data, audio and video, can be effortlessly embedded. It facilitates the website performance, is convenient and accessible at the same time, excellent for search engine optimization, and serves best no matter what the device is!

If you were pondering on how would you get your audience with exceptionally great digital encounters over all platforms, it is widely advisable and of course the best idea to keep your Drupal website updated to meet the latest technology needs. Migrating to Drupal 8 will definitely give you that edge over your competitors you've been itching for.  NOW is the time to make that happen.  It is packed with powerful modules ready while contributed modules from Drupal 7 have also been promoted in Drupal 8 now. We know, change isn't always easy but it imperative for growth, progress, and success. That being said, I hope this article and the inferences mentioned above were of immense help. Moreover, the goal of this article is to answer one of the key questions i.e. “why the migration of your website to the latest drupal version should be a pressing priority?”.