News CMS providers

Choosing a content management system (CMS) is one of the most important decisions for any news organization. To support news publishers in this process, the Google News Initiative, the International News Media Association (INMA), and Real Story Group (RSG) collaborated on a guide to the news industry's leading CMS providers so you can more easily determine which CMSs might be right for you.

Our team surveyed and interviewed a range of publishers to compile a list of CMS features, which served as the basis for our in-depth analysis.

To ensure objectivity, all reviews were conducted by independent third-party experts. This comprehensive evaluation involved multiple layers of assessment, including:

- A 70-question questionnaire

- A 90-minute demo

- Customer reference checks

- Fact-check with each CMS provider on the draft writeup

We hope you find this guide valuable. Please note: The majority of these evaluations with the exception of InterRed, Layout International, Livingdocs, Quintype, and Xalok were conducted in the first half of 2023. We provided a small summary of any major platform changes in 2024 in their review. If you are a CMS provider, we do not have formal plans yet to update this evaluation, but you can contact us at contactgni@google.com.

Find the right CMS provider for your business

Other News CMS vendors not included in this report:

Brightspot

CMS Medios

Coremedia

Creative Circle Media Solutions

Arc XP

Born out of The Washington Post, Arc XP offers a highly customisable and sophisticated set of tools for content and site management, as well as subscriptions, at the expense of comparatively high complexity and cost.

Atex

Long-time print-oriented vendor from Sweden today still focuses on those roots, even as it rolls out digital content management system (CMS) capabilities.

BLOX

BLOX CMS (formerly 'TownNews') is a feature-rich publishing and revenue platform from a rather old-fashioned vendor that trades a somewhat archaic platform for excellent customer support.

Drupal Foundation

Drupal is a long-standing, open-source content management system (CMS) player whose growing complexity over the years has come to preclude it from all but the higher echelons of news publishing.

Eidosmedia

Eidosmedia is a long-standing print content management system (CMS) vendor that has made impressive strides on the digital side, but still lags a bit in terms of architecture and technical debt.

Ghost

Ghost is a relatively simple, open-source content management system (CMS) from Singapore-based nonprofit Ghost Foundation, which also offers the 'Ghost Pro' fully managed service.

InterRed

InterRed is multi-channel CMS, offering print and digital publishing capabilities, with a focus on the German-speaking region.

Layout International

NewsPublish is originally a print-oriented CMS from Beirut, Lebanon, now headquartered in Dubai, with a traditional focus on the Middle East, supplemented more recently with a broader APAC expansion on the back of a more affordable alternative to established print content management solutions.

Livingdocs

Livingdocs is a newer CMS targeting the German-speaking world, with a comparatively modern interface featuring "Google Docs"-like collaboration, at the expense of front-end capabilities and print integration

Naviga Global

Naviga is the result of a series of investor-driven mash-ups of different publishing technology companies around the world and, as a result, it offers a wide range of potentially rich but confusing tool sets.

Newspack

Newspack is Automattic's 'right-sized' WordPress offering, packaged and priced for smaller news publishers, primarily in North America.

Quintype Bold CMS

Born out of the joint venture between The Quint & Bloomberg, Quintype is an India-based CMS solution with a modular architecture that focuses on flexibility, but requires technical expertise for full utilization.

Ring Publishing

Ringier Axel Springer Poland, a joint venture of Ringier and Axel Springer, offers an advanced platform that requires ample resources for customisation, targeted at European media firms with more complex needs.

Stibo DX

Stibo has centuries of experience with print and offers digital content capabilities in its modern Content Management System (CMS), though the vendor’s strategy and road map have been a bit unfocused.

Tresite

Tresite is a small, Mexico-based interactive agency focusing on media firms, bringing its own content management system (CMS) platform (SACS Pro) to their engagements in the Latin American region.

WhiteBeard News Suite

Lebanese company produces a very feature-complete, if somewhat clunky, content management system (CMS), offering a 'one-stop shop' for publishers primarily in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region.

WoodWing

Long-time InDesign tool maker and publishing platform has transitioned to digital but recent corporate sale and realignment may bode changes ahead.

WordPress Foundation

Numerous service providers around the world offer managed hosting and security services for WordPress as an alternative to Automattic.

WordPress VIP

WordPress VIP is Automattic's managed hosting service for large, enterprise customers in general, with some major news organisations licensing the platform.