Readers comparing content management tools need a clear way to distinguish publishing-focused products, framework-based systems, and projects with different levels of current activity. This September 2026 snapshot uses ToolVitals scores, health and shipping scores, openness and license labels, and GitHub stars as context.
The ranking covers open/source-visible tools and orders them by ToolVitals score, then uses health and shipping to break ties. GitHub stars provide context only and do not determine the ordering.
Rankings
| Rank | Tool | Openness | License | Health | Shipping | GitHub Stars | Score | Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Ghost | OSI-approved OSS | MIT | 98 | 98 | 55274 | 98 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 2 | EmDash CMS | OSI-approved OSS | MIT | 98 | 97 | 12287 | 98 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 3 | Wagtail | OSI-approved OSS | BSD-3-Clause | 97 | 97 | 20498 | 97 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 4 | Grav | OSI-approved OSS | MIT | 97 | 96 | 15665 | 97 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 5 | Alchemy CMS | OSI-approved OSS | BSD-3-Clause | 95 | 96 | 906 | 96 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 6 | Orchard Core | OSI-approved OSS | BSD-3-Clause | 96 | 94 | 8179 | 95 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 7 | Ech0 | OSI-approved OSS | AGPL-3.0 | 95 | 95 | 2053 | 95 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 8 | Halo | OSI-approved OSS | GPL-3.0 | 95 | 94 | 39717 | 95 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 9 | Ycode | OSI-approved OSS | MIT | 94 | 96 | 304 | 95 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 10 | Conrete CMS | OSI-approved OSS | MIT | 93 | 90 | 851 | 92 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 11 | E107 | OSI-approved OSS | GPL-3.0 | 90 | 95 | 331 | 92 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 12 | camaleon-cms | OSI-approved OSS | MIT | 90 | 95 | 1236 | 92 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 13 | Microfeed | OSI-approved OSS | AGPL-3.0 | 87 | 93 | 4076 | 89 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 14 | Enhavo | OSI-approved OSS | MIT | 90 | 86 | 92 | 88 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 15 | Umono | OSI-approved OSS | MIT | 70 | 70 | 22 | 70 | 🟢 Good |
| 16 | ExpressionEngine | OSI-approved OSS | Apache-2.0 | 68 | 45 | 505 | 59 | 🟡 Fair |
| 17 | Changelog | OSI-approved OSS | MIT | 63 | 44 | 2768 | 55 | 🟡 Fair |
| 18 | Lektor | OSI-approved OSS | BSD-3-Clause | 58 | 41 | 3947 | 51 | 🟡 Fair |
| 19 | lara-zeus Sky | OSI-approved OSS | MIT | 50 | 30 | 213 | 42 | 🟡 Fair |
| 20 | PrettyBlocks | OSI-approved OSS | AFL-3.0 | 46 | 31 | 94 | 40 | 🟡 Fair |
| 21 | Vvveb | OSI-approved OSS | AGPL-3.0 | 44 | 26 | 1187 | 37 | 🔴 Needs Attention |
| 22 | Microweber | OSI-approved OSS | MIT | 38 | 10 | 3437 | 27 | 🔴 Needs Attention |
| 23 | Markdown Ninja | OSI-approved OSS | AGPL-3.0 | 34 | 15 | 415 | 27 | 🔴 Needs Attention |
| 24 | BlogBowl | OSI-approved OSS | MIT | 34 | 13 | 159 | 26 | 🔴 Needs Attention |
| 25 | Pico CMS | OSI-approved OSS | MIT | 31 | 10 | 3905 | 22 | 🔴 Needs Attention |
| 26 | Squilla | OSI-approved OSS | GPL-3.0 | 27 | 0 | 1 | 16 | 🔴 Needs Attention |
| 27 | Markdown Site | OSI-approved OSS | MIT | 15 | 0 | 630 | 9 | 🔴 Needs Attention |
| 28 | Mecha CMS | OSI-approved OSS | GPL-3.0 | 15 | 0 | 189 | 9 | 🔴 Needs Attention |
| 29 | Platformus | OSI-approved OSS | Apache-2.0 | 3 | 0 | 484 | 2 | 🔴 Needs Attention |
| 30 | Rpub | OSI-approved OSS | MIT | 2 | 0 | 62 | 1 | 🔴 Needs Attention |
| 31 | Puck CMS | OSI-approved OSS | MIT | 0 | 0 | 170 | 0 | 🔴 Needs Attention |
| 32 | StartupEngine | OSI-approved OSS | MIT | 0 | 0 | 141 | 0 | 🔴 Needs Attention |
Top 3 Highlights
Ghost ranks first with a ToolVitals score of 98, health and shipping scores of 98, and a 🟢 Excellent status. Its supplied description centers on independent technology for modern publishing, memberships, subscriptions and newsletters. Ghost is labeled OSI-approved OSS and MIT; its 55,274 GitHub stars add context but do not determine the ranking.
EmDash CMS ranks second with a ToolVitals score of 98, health of 98, shipping of 97, and a 🟢 Excellent status. It is described as a full-stack TypeScript CMS based on Astro and as the spiritual successor to WordPress. Its labels are OSI-approved OSS and MIT, while its 12,287 GitHub stars are context only.
Wagtail ranks third with a ToolVitals score of 97, health and shipping scores of 97, and a 🟢 Excellent status. The supplied description identifies it as a Django content management system focused on flexibility and user experience. Wagtail is labeled OSI-approved OSS and BSD-3-Clause; its 20,498 GitHub stars provide context rather than ranking weight.
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