Less to assemble, more to build on.
We say that Drupal is the most powerful open-source CMS, but with power came complexity. Drupal CMS breaks through that to make it easier to get started, and faster to deliver.
When I started using Drupal in 2010, it was popular among hobbyist web developers because it was extremely powerful, but didn't require an engineering degree. That changed over the years, as Drupal matured and adopted modern frameworks and patterns.
It’s now more powerful, scalable, reliable, secure and performant than ever. But as the foundation became stronger, it also became more complex to understand, and slower to get going. The average project budget gradually climbed and it was no longer commercially viable to build small sites with Drupal.
So in 2024, founder Dries Buytaert made a push to change that. He had the vision for Drupal CMS, a pre-packaged starting point designed to make it faster and easier to build sites. And he brought together a team to build it, which I have been lucky enough to lead.
Drupal CMS bundles all of the functionality that users expect from a CMS and ships it out of the box. This not only saves setup time (every time) but it consolidates the effort to maintain these features and eliminates the module roulette that new users were faced with.
Drupal CMS includes
Drupal Canvas is a visual page builder that provides true drag-and-drop editing on top of Drupal's unmatched structured content model.
For a long time, adopting Drupal meant getting its many benefits but compromising on the user experience, because the page building tools were clunky. With Canvas, that compromise is gone. Editors and front end developers get the experience that have come to expect from modern tools.
All Drupal CMS site templates come with a complete component library for Drupal Canvas.
For organisations
Bring your own branding
Custom component library: Enforce consistency with flexibility that you control
Built on Drupal's standard permissions model for governance
For frontend developers
Use what you already know: React + Tailwind
Bypasses Drupal’s theming complexity
Support for Drupal's native single-directory components or React code components
For editors
True visual page builder with live preview
Drag-and-drop layouts
Modern, intuitive user experience
Building pages is fun!
Site templates are pre-packaged starting points for websites based around a specific use case, providing not only a beautiful and customisable look and feel, but relevant functionality and recommended add-ons out of the box, on top of the foundational Drupal CMS experience.
Each template is a complete, working starting point. Not a design skin, but a fully configured site with real content models, editorial workflows, and Drupal’s full architecture underneath.
You can install, create your content, and launch! Or customise the site's theme to suit your brand.
All site templates include complete component libraries for Drupal Canvas, for limitless landing page capabilities.
Site templates we’ve created
The Drupal CMS team has developed five site templates so far. These three are my favourites.
Forma
Designed for a portfolio site, this template features a warm and modern earthy design with rich, neutral colours.
Haven
Designed for non-profit sites, Haven features a bright, warm design that can be adapted for many use cases.
Everbright
Also designed for a portfolio site, this template features a sharp and striking black-and-white design.
Install Drupal CMS
To start with a full local development environment, we recommend using DDEV for easy setup. You can install with the commands below if you have DDEV.
mkdir cms && cd cms
ddev config --project-type=drupal11 --docroot=web
ddev composer create-project drupal/cms
ddev launchYou will then be guided through the installer where you can select your site template.
For more information and help, checkout the Drupal CMS User Guide.