Difference Between Drupal 7 and Later Versions
Drupal has long been one of the most powerful open-source CMS platforms, and its evolution from Drupal 7 to later versions (Drupal 8, 9, and 10) has brought major architectural and functional changes. Understanding these differences is crucial for developers and organizations planning upgrades or migrations.
1. Core Architecture
Drupal 7: Built on a procedural PHP system with hooks and custom APIs.
Drupal 8+: Rebuilt on modern PHP standards using Symfony components, Object-Oriented Programming (OOP), and dependency injection.
2. Configuration Management
Drupal 7: Relied on the database for most configuration, making migrations across environments tricky.
Drupal 8+: Introduced YAML-based configuration management, enabling version control and smoother deployment workflows.
3. Templating System
Drupal 7: Used PHPTemplate, mixing PHP and HTML in templates.
Drupal 8+: Introduced Twig templating engine, which is more secure, clean, and designer-friendly.
4. Multilingual Capabilities
Drupal 7: Required contributed modules (like i18n) for multilingual support.
Drupal 8+: Multilingual support is built into the core, offering smoother translation workflows.
5. Mobile & Responsive Design
Drupal 7: Not mobile-first; responsive design depended on themes and contributed modules.
Drupal 8+: Mobile-first approach baked into the core with responsive images, layouts, and admin interface.
6. APIs & Web Services
Drupal 7: Limited web services, requiring extra modules for REST.
Drupal 8+: REST API is core, with support for GraphQL and JSON:API, making Drupal a strong headless CMS option.
7. Performance & Caching
Drupal 7: Basic caching system.
Drupal 8+: Advanced caching with Cache Tags, BigPipe, and improved performance for large-scale sites.
8. Upgrade Path
Drupal 7: Upgrade to later versions requires full migration due to architectural differences.
Drupal 8 → 9 → 10: Smooth upgrades, as these versions maintain backward compatibility with modernized code.
Following table gives readers a quick glance at the main differences :
| Feature | Drupal 7 | Drupal 8 / 9 / 10 |
|---|---|---|
| Core Architecture | Procedural PHP-based system | Object-Oriented with Symfony framework integration |
| Configuration Management | No built-in configuration management, manual export/import | Configuration Management system using YAML files |
| Templating Engine | PHPTemplate | Twig templating for cleaner, secure, and modern theming |
| API Support | Limited REST support | REST API in core, JSON:API and GraphQL support |
| Multilingual | Basic multilingual support via contrib modules | Advanced multilingual system in core |
| Mobile & Responsive | Not mobile-first, requires themes/modules | Mobile-first, responsive themes in core |
| Performance | Caching is basic and limited | Advanced caching (BigPipe, Dynamic Page Cache) |
| Support Status | End of Life (No official support) | Active support, modern releases (Drupal 10+) |
Drupal 7 laid a strong foundation, but later versions transformed Drupal into a modern, enterprise-ready CMS built on Symfony, offering better performance, scalability, multilingual support, and API-first capabilities.
