10 Best CMS for SEO in 2025 – headless, open‑source & builders

Search engine optimisation (SEO) – the craft of getting your content to rank highly in organic search results – puts your business in front of the right people, and more of them. One study of Google search behaviour found that 65 % of searchers clicked on one of the first 10 organic links during their session, while only 19 % clicked on a paid ad, and just 44 % went beyond the first page. If you’re investing in digital content, choosing a cms for seo is critical to giving your pages the best chance of ranking.

#Why is your CMS important for SEO?

While no system is a magic bullet for producing high‑quality content, a good cms for seo establishes the technical foundations that let creators focus on what they do best. The platform you choose can have a big impact on essentials such as:

• the way content is structured and how easily bots can crawl it

• website performance and page‑load speed

• how easy it is to create content and manage titles, descriptions and other metadata

Technical SEO happens both in the back‑end and on the site’s front‑end. Not all platforms handle front‑end delivery. This changes how much direct control a CMS has over performance and search‑friendly features. For example, a traditional CMS handles both content management and presentation from a single codebase. A headless CMS, by contrast, separates or “decouples” the back‑end from the front‑end, letting you deliver the same content to web pages, mobile apps, voice assistants and other channels via API. Hygraph, which is built on GraphQL, embodies this flexibility and allows teams to use the best front‑end technologies without sacrificing editorial ease of use.

To learn more about the technical aspects of SEO, explore our guide to SEO best practices with headless CMS.

#Essential CMS for SEO factors

Customisable SEO metadata elements

A cms for seo should make it easy to add and edit titles, meta descriptions, alt text and SEO‑friendly URLs. Straightforward sites benefit from standard templates, while businesses with multilingual pages or unique content types might need more granular control. Hygraph lets you define exactly how SEO data is structured, right down to image attributes, and makes it simple for editors to populate fields.

Availability of SEO tools

Whether through built‑in features, plugin libraries or integrations with your existing MarTech stack, a CMS should support analytics, writing assistance and automation. In Hygraph you can create your own models for SEO data, then integrate with best‑of‑breed services for keyword research, schema generation and performance insights.

Ready for mobile and other channels

Google uses mobile‑first indexing, meaning it predominantly crawls the mobile version of your site. At a minimum, a cms for seo should offer mobile‑responsive templates. A platform designed with omnichannel content in mind can structure information so it adapts across web, mobile, voice and AI chat. Here again, Hygraph’s headless architecture excels because it lets developers deliver content to any channel via APIs while maintaining one source of truth.

Support for high‑performing site delivery

Fast, responsive sites that handle traffic spikes are non‑negotiable. With a traditional CMS, performance improvements must be baked into the platform itself. A headless CMS like Hygraph needs well‑designed APIs that work smoothly with static site generators or modern frameworks. By decoupling content from presentation, teams can use lightning‑fast front‑ends and deploy on global CDNs while editors continue working in a familiar interface.

Best fit for content creation needs

Ultimately, the best cms for seo is the one that enables your team to create at the pace you need. For some, templates and drag‑and‑drop editing are perfect; others require flexibility to handle unique content types, complex workflows and granular roles and permissions. Hygraph offers a powerful modeling layer so you can design content exactly as your business needs, with fine‑tuned permissions and workflows to match.

#How to choose a CMS for SEO

When evaluating a cms for seo, start with your content complexity and growth plans. If you need multiple channels, multilingual support or advanced SEO control, a headless solution will give you longevity. If you’re running a small blog or shop, an out‑of‑the‑box page builder might suffice. Consider:

• Flexibility: Can you define your own metadata fields? Headless platforms like Hygraph offer unlimited flexibility, whereas builders rely on fixed templates.

• Scalability: Will the CMS handle future channels like mobile apps or voice?

• Ease of use: Can non‑technical users manage content without developer help?

• Integration: How well does the platform integrate with your existing tools for analytics, customer management and marketing automation?

Being clear about these factors will guide you toward the right platform and prevent costly replatforming later.

#10 best CMS for SEO in 2025

The CMS landscape is broad, covering simple blog sites and complex enterprise ecosystems. Below are ten popular options grouped by type.

Headless CMS: flexibility and scale

Headless systems built API‑first deliver all content via APIs instead of wrapping legacy code in an API layer. They support a composable approach to technology, allowing you to mix and match best‑fit tools and pivot your stack as needed. They’re ideal for teams that frequently experiment with content, scale across channels and need granular SEO control.

SEO pros of headless CMS: complete control over metadata; seamless integration with your MarTech stack; ability to work with leading front‑end frameworks for fast, mobile‑first sites.

SEO cons of headless CMS: there’s a learning curve – you must create your own content structures and SEO models, so some technical knowledge is required; advanced headless platforms often have higher enterprise pricing.

1. Hygraph CMS for multi‑source, multi‑channel content

Hygraph is a powerful GraphQL‑based CMS that helps companies unify content from all their data sources and deliver it to any channel. With advanced tools for both developers and content creators, it’s particularly valuable for teams using unique content types, working with large volumes of content, requiring granular workflows or managing multiple brands, markets and channels.

SEO advantage: Hygraph gives you total control over how you define and manage SEO data and provides advanced support for image optimisation. See our deep dive on technical SEO best practices and an example of how we handle SEO at Hygraph. Because Hygraph is truly headless and API‑first, it integrates cleanly with any front‑end, giving you the fastest possible site without sacrificing editorial ease.

Potential challenge: Designing your own composable content structures and SEO data models can be complex. If you just need a simple website with a handful of standard content types, an out‑of‑the‑box solution may be more cost‑effective.

Image source: How we handle SEO at Hygraph

2. Storyblok CMS for marketers who want a visual editor

Storyblok is a headless CMS tailored to marketing teams, providing a visual editing experience that feels familiar to those accustomed to traditional platforms.

SEO advantage: Storyblok offers a native SEO app, with the ability to customise and extend metadata fields. Their documentation explains how it handles SEO.

Potential challenge: Because Storyblok prioritises the visual editing experience, its developer flexibility can be more limited than some other headless platforms.

Image source: Storyblok

3. Prismic CMS for a headless page‑builder

Prismic is a headless CMS focused on website use cases. It lets developers build fast sites using Next.js, Nuxt and SvelteKit and provides a slice‑based page builder for marketers.

SEO advantage: There’s flexibility in how metadata is structured and auto‑generated for different page types. Prismic’s SEO article details how they approach optimisation.

Potential challenge: It’s geared toward marketing websites. For businesses with eCommerce, complex integrations or custom app development, another solution may be more appropriate.

Image source: Prismic

Open‑source CMS: DIY with low entry cost

Open‑source CMS solutions are appealing because they’re free and fully customisable. Many businesses start here, but costs and complexity grow quickly as you extend them with plugins and custom code. While the code is technically completely open, the more you change, the harder it is to maintain. Adding or removing third‑party plugins can cause cascading errors, and modifications to core CMS functions must be redone on upgrades. Premium plugins and hosting also add to the price.

SEO pros of open‑source CMS: large selection of SEO plugins and extensions; developers can customise any part of the code; active communities for support.

SEO cons of open‑source CMS: extensive plugin use can slow down your site and increase security risk; heavy customisation makes it harder to upgrade and hinders experimentation with new channels.

4. WordPress CMS for WordPress loyalists

WordPress is the most widely used CMS. Many content creators and developers are comfortable with it. It has a large community, many templates and plugins, and is generally more user‑friendly than other open‑source options.

SEO advantage: The Yoast SEO plugin and others offer robust optimisation features. WordPress’s documentation on SEO explains their approach.

Potential challenge: WordPress relies on plugins, but there’s no universal code‑quality standard. As you extend functionality, you can face escalating maintenance costs, performance issues and security risks.

Image source: Yoast SEO plugin for WordPress

5. Drupal CMS for custom development

Drupal is a CMS built for developers and is often chosen for complex websites. It’s considered more secure than WordPress.

SEO advantage: Advanced developers can customise every aspect of technical SEO. Drupal’s SEO modules offer fine control over metadata.

Potential challenge: Drupal has a steep learning curve. Non‑technical users often need developer help to create content or update the site, leading to bottlenecks.

Image source: Drupal meta tags module

6. Joomla CMS for the open‑source middle ground

Joomla is more versatile than WordPress but more user‑friendly than Drupal.

SEO advantage: Joomla offers native features to manage metadata, search‑friendly URLs and indexing rules, plus a plugin library. This article explains its core SEO options.

Potential challenge: Taking the middle road means Joomla often isn’t the favourite for either developers or marketers. Its template and plugin library isn’t as extensive as WordPress, and it doesn’t allow the same level of customisation as Drupal.

Image source: Joomla

All‑in‑one page builders for simple sites and shops

These platforms offer core templates and SEO tools out of the box, letting non‑technical users get up and running quickly. They’re user‑friendly and suit individuals or small businesses with simple web needs. Their low entry cost is attractive, but they lack flexibility for advanced SEO or multichannel strategies. If you plan to expand, you may need to replatform later.

7. Shopify for standard eCommerce shops

Shopify is technically a commerce platform, but if you primarily create product and category pages, it might provide all the content management you need.

SEO advantage: Shopify’s features include automatic redirects for deleted or out‑of‑stock products and metadata structures that support rich snippets, pricing and customer ratings. Their SEO guide has more details.

Potential challenge: The platform isn’t designed for non‑product content. Businesses often integrate Shopify with another CMS once they want to increase editorial content.

Image source: Shopify

8. Content Hub CMS for teams invested in the HubSpot suite

Content Hub is a CMS from HubSpot designed to work alongside their CRM and marketing automation tools.

SEO advantage: HubSpot’s marketing suite includes robust analytics and SEO software that integrates with Content Hub to suggest keywords and optimise content. This page details the features.

Potential challenge: Content Hub is best used with other HubSpot products. If you don’t plan to adopt their CRM or marketing tools, it may not be the right stand‑alone CMS.

Image source: Hubspot

9. Webflow CMS for designer‑led marketing sites

Webflow is built with designers in mind. It provides a visual editor that lets users craft pages by adding HTML components and changing CSS elements, automatically generating code.

SEO advantage: Webflow’s native tools allow designers to manage metadata, indexing rules and redirects. Their SEO page explains the features.

Potential challenge: Webflow suits experienced designers who want polished marketing sites, but it has a steeper learning curve for beginners and limited support for large content volumes or eCommerce.

Image source: Webflow

10. Wix CMS for small sites that just need the basics

Wix is a drag‑and‑drop CMS with hundreds of pre‑built templates. It’s beginner‑friendly and suits personal sites and small businesses.

SEO advantage: Wix’s SEO assistant provides checklists for optimisation and automatically generates sitemaps, SEO‑friendly URLs and optimised images. Their guide outlines the features.

Potential challenge: There’s limited customisation and scalability, so companies intending to grow their digital presence often need to migrate to a more flexible platform.

Image source: Wix

#What other factors should companies consider when comparing CMS?

SEO is just one piece of the puzzle when selecting a CMS. With so many options, it can be hard to identify the best cms for seo for your use case, especially if you’re migrating from a traditional CMS like WordPress to headless. Consider the scale of your content, your team’s technical expertise, your integration requirements and your future growth plans.

For a deeper dive, check out our ultimate headless CMS selection checklist to identify which factors matter most to your business and determine whether a headless approach like Hygraph is the right fit.