What is Drupal 7 End of Life?
Launched over a decade ago, Drupal 7 has been the platform of choice for tens of thousands of websites and we have worked with the platform since its launch.
All good things must come to an end and the Drupal Association and Drupal Security Team have said the Drupal 7 end of life is firmly set for January 2025 which leaves many companies considering their next move.
What Are Your Migration Options?
End of life means that there will no longer be community support for Drupal core version 7 and will not receive security fixes from the drupal security team or general support from the Drupal association. Drupal 7 modules will also no longer receive fixes from the Maintainers, the Drupal security team or the Drupal Association as a whole. This leads to security vulnerabilities, so what are your options?
Every company using Drupal 7 is different, your website is different and there is no one answer as to which option to select. In this article, we will look at the pros and cons of each option and delve into the process required to action the transition.
1. Upgrade From Drupal 7 to Drupal 10
The current recommendation for Drupal 7 users is to migrate to Drupal 10, the latest version.
When Drupal 8 was released, it added a complete redesign of the underlying architecture, included the Symphony framework and added a whole host of new and powerful features. This architecture has carried through and been continually refined through to the current version 10.
Drupal 10 provides a level of familiarity to Drupal 7 users which is not to be underestimated. The admin theme, functionality and menu system are very similar to Drupal so a Drupal 7 user can hit the ground running.
Drupal 10 Migration Pros:
- Familiarity with Drupal 7 administration offering a large degree of comfort.
- Powerful migration modules can assist developers with even the most difficult Drupal 7 to Drupal 10 migration requirements.
- You remain under the umbrella of the Drupal Association, the Drupal community and Drupal security team, benefiting from their best-in-class security and maintenance and recieve regular security advisories.
- Siruss provides highly optimised and cost-effective Drupal 10 hosting for super-fast and highly secure websites and is notified in advance of security advisories.
Drupal 10 Migration Cons:
- It is expensive - upgrading to Drupal 10 requires a brand-new website built in Drupal 10 and a migration plan designed and implemented by knowledgeable developers.
- The theme engine in Drupal 10 is different to Drupal 7 which means that your Drupal 7 theme will need to be rebuilt. Albeit this is an ideal time to look towards a re-design, it adds further cost to the migration because the theme will need to be rebuilt.
- If you have custom functionality, provided by custom Drupal 7 modules, these will all need upgrading to work with Drupal 10.
- Even though Drupal 8, 9 and 10 have been around for some time now, some functionality provided by contributed modules is not available and if you require that functionality, it will need custom development.
- Drupal 10 is a considerably more costly platform to maintain, and the monthly maintenance costs will increase accordingly.
2. Switch From Drupal 7 to a New CMS
To move a Drupal 7 website to a new CMS, we’ll use WordPress as our example, it requires a full rebuild in the new platform with a complete migration plan for the content and users.
If your Drupal 7 website is not overly complex, for example, a brochure website or blog, then moving to a new CMS can be a very cost-effective solution, especially in the long term.
New CMS Migration Pros:
- As mentioned previously, if your Drupal 7 website is not overly complex it can be a cost and time effective solution. If your website is more complex, it can still be migrated to WordPress. It will have a higher cost because of the increased complexity but it is still possible, it just needs to be carefully planned.
- Moving to WordPress will offer a more feature-rich and less restrictive content editing environment, providing the freedom of page builders, for example.
- A re-design could be considered. This could be based on one of the many excellent off-the-shelf WordPress themes, providing a significant cost saving against a bespoke theme.
- You can benefit from the more ‘plug and play’ nature of the WordPress CMS, making it super simple to add additional functionality with thousands of available plugins available.
- Ongoing monthly maintenance costs are greatly reduced compared to a Drupal 10 website, with smaller WordPress websites requiring no monthly maintenance plan at all.
- Siruss provides highly optimised and cost-effective WordPress Cloud hosting for super-fast and highly secure websites.
New CMS Migration Cons:
- For more complex Drupal 7 websites, the cost can be high and comparative to a Drupal 10 upgrade, or on occasion even higher.
- You lose the familiarity of the Drupal administration interface and will need to learn to use a new CMS.
3. Cross Grade From Drupal 7 to Backdrop
Backdrop is effectively Drupal 7 – modernised. It is non-profit and is a project of the Software Freedom Conservancy that helps promote, improve and defend open-source projects, such as Drupal 7.
In light of the huge changes that were coming in Drupal 8, the early contributors and Backdrop founders met the need to maintain this amazing software, improve on it and provide a cost-effective migration solution for the many thousands of Drupal 7 users.
Backdrop Migration Pros:
- Migration from Drupal 7 to Backdrop is by far the most cost-effective solution.
- Backdrop acts as though it were the next version of Drupal 7 so has a clear migration route for websites of all levels of complexity.
- Familiarity of the administration interface is retained, in part, with an improved experience requiring fewer clicks to achieve the same goal.
- Monthly maintenance costs are similar to your current Drupal 7 website, so there are no hidden surprises. In the case of a simple website, monthly maintenance can actually be reduced.
- Custom modules and bespoke functionality are more cost-effective and require less development than other options.
- Most popular Drupal 7 contributed modules have been migrated to Backdrop already. If they haven’t, they will be.
- Backdrop is faster, more secure and provides many new features, such as content scheduling and automatic comment closing etc…
- Siruss provides highly optimised and cost-effective Backdrop hosting for super-fast and highly secure websites.
Backdrop Migration Cons:
- There is still a migration cost involved, however, it is considerably lower than the other two options available.
- Some contributed modules in use on your Drupal 7 website may not have been ported to Backdrop and, if required, may need to be ported as part of the migration which will require additional development and cost.
Learn more about Backdrop Services here »
So, What Do You Do?
The first thing to do is get in touch with the friendly team at Siruss! Siruss is a Drupal Association Organization Member, and the team has many years of experience with the platform.
We will discuss the three options with you. We will review your current Drupal 7 website and advise on the best fit for your website. At Siruss, we understand that each website upgrade is an individual and unique project. Whether you have a complex community website with thousands of users or a simple brochure website, your website is super important to both you and us. We always strive to provide the most suitable, cost-effective solution available.
Don't Delay Migration
Don’t hesitate! The end-of-life clock is ticking, and agencies will have a lot of migrations to perform in the next 12 months. The earlier the migration task is approached the better it can be structured over a suitable time period.
Siruss has already upgraded or re-platformed many Drupal 7 websites and is in the process of migrating many more.
If you are ready to start your Drupal 7 migration, we’re here to help, get in touch today.
