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Open source content management systems (cms)

Content Management Systems offer a practical way to setup a website with many features, using third party plugins, themes and functionality that are easy to add and customize. This page ranks 48 open-source content management systems projects by a health score recomputed every night from repository data; nothing else affects the order. Pimcore leads at 94/100 with 369 commits in the last 90 days and 3.9k stars, followed by Ech0 (93) and Automad (92). 32 of the 48 score 70 or above, 9 publish a Docker image, and the median health is 81. MIT is the most common licence, carried by 19 of them. Between them they stand in for YouTube, Netflix, Squarespace, Crowdin and SharePoint and 4 more proprietary products.

updated Oct 2026 48 tools ★ 240k stars 9 with Docker median 81

Best for…

  • Most starred

    Strapi

    73,403 stars on GitHub, the largest community in the category.

  • Most active

    WordPress

    1,358 commits in the last 90 days, the fastest-moving codebase here.

  • Most permissive

    Automad

    MIT licence with health 92/100: the strongest option if you need to embed or fork commercially.

Ranked by health

Table view

How the content management system tools compare

Pimcore edges Ech0 94 to 93, and most of the difference is stars: 3.9k stars against 2.1k stars. Strapi has the largest following at 73k stars, yet ranks #9 of 48, held back mostly by Docker support (no Docker image).

The most recent release is Vvveb CMS 1.0.9.0, published yesterday. WordPress, Apostrophe, TYPO3 and 6 more publish no tagged releases, which costs up to 25 of the 100 points. HTMLy, CouchCMS and Noosfero score under 40, so check recent activity before adopting them. By stack, PHP (32), Nodejs (6) and Python (4) are the most common. Automad, REDAXO, Payload CMS and 18 more are permissively licensed; Pimcore, Ech0, Superdesk and 20 more are copyleft. october, CraftCMS and Kirby are source-available rather than open source, which limits commercial reuse. CMS Made Simple and SPIP are not hosted on a forge Repoly can read, so they have no measured score yet.

Content Management Systems (CMS): common questions

What is the best open source content management system tool?

By Repoly's GitHub health score, Pimcore at 94/100 (369 commits in 90 days, v2026.3.3.1 from 8 days ago). Ech0 is next at 93; Pimcore's lead comes mostly from stars. The score measures maintenance, not features, so shortlist the top few and try them.

Which content management system tools are the most actively developed?

WordPress (1,358 commits in 90 days), Pushword (1,175 commits in 90 days) and TYPO3 (871 commits in 90 days). Commit activity is 35 of the 100 health points, the largest single term.

Which content management system tools can I run in Docker?

9 of 48 publish a Docker image or Compose file, led by Pimcore, Ech0, Automad, Superdesk, Vvveb CMS and 4 more.

Which content management system tools have a permissive licence?

21 of 48: Automad (MIT), REDAXO (MIT), Payload CMS (MIT), Strapi (MIT), Localess (MIT) and 16 more. 23 are copyleft.

Which paid products can open source content management system tools replace?

YouTube (MediaCMS ranks highest here), Netflix (MediaCMS ranks highest here), Squarespace (Automad ranks highest here), Crowdin (Localess ranks highest here) and SharePoint (Alfresco Community Edition ranks highest here), plus 4 more listed on the comparison pages.

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