Umbraco vs. Wordpress - Media Library Comparison

Deciding which CMS is best for you can take hours of research. Our hope is to shorten that time by providing a comparison of the features of Umbraco and Wordpress Media Library.

Transcript

Hi this is Jordan from ipso Creative, and in this video we will be comparing the media libraries of two popular content management systems, WordPress and Umbraco.

There are four categories we will be reviewing, how the media library is structured and organized, the search functionality, available file information, and editing capabilities. Let's dive in. 

Let's first talk about structure and organization. WordPress media only has one folder in which all media items live. It does not include the ability to create and organize additional folders. Media items display in chronological order from when they are uploaded. With most recent items at the top and older items at the bottom. There are two ways you can browse your media, in gallery view or in list view. WordPress does allow you to filter your items by media type, and date uploaded. You can also bulk select your media items to delete multiple items at once. 

Umbraco media is built differently, its structure is that of a file folder system. On the left is the main navigation of the entire media library. And on the right is the view of the item currently selected. You can create new folders and organize your media items however you'd like. There are also two ways to view your items within a folder, in list view or in gallery view. There is not the ability to filter your media but you can bulk select to move or delete your media items. And at any point you can easily upload new files within a folder. 

Now let's look at search functionality. WordPress has a search bar that searches all media items at once and pulls up any matching results. Umbraco has a search field within all folders but only searches items within that specific folder. However, there's also a global search which searches all items on your site and will pull up any matching results. This is not specific to media, however, but it can be helpful if you're not sure which folder a specific media item is located. 

Next let's review the available file information. WordPress provides the basic information, a file name, file type, date uploaded, file size, and dimensions. Below we have several text fields. We have an alt text field, and image title, caption, and description fields. As well as who upload the media item, and a link to view the item in its own tab. 

In Umbraco, we'll find a lot of similar fields: file title, file dimensions, file size, in bytes, and file type. And if we click on the info tab we can see the file link, the date created, and the last edited date, as well as the Umbraco media type. By default Umbraco doesn't have the text fields here that we saw in WordPress. Instead the alt text and caption fields are managed when adding the media to a content page. 

Our last category is the editing capabilities within media. WordPress allows you to edit directly within the CMS. You can crop, rotate, and flip the media item as well as adjust the image dimensions and aspect ratio. Umbraco doesn't have the same editing tools as wordpress but it's unique feature is the ability to replace a media item with an updated version without using the placement of the file on existing pages or places the file has already been linked to. Simply click "Remove file", upload the new version, and the media item will be automatically updated everywhere it is currently used. 

Well that ends our comparison of WordPress and Umbraco's media libraries. Hopefully it was helpful to see the differences between the two and identify which one may be best for your specific needs. Check out the description for links to other helpful CMS videos. And thanks for watching.