The latest update to the LocalGov CMS Directory sees continued growth in the use of Drupal in local government. Drupal is now used by 100 councils, which repesents almost a quarter of all councils in the UK and Ireland. Of this number 59 councils are using LocalGov Drupal, an open-source Drupal distribution.
The 6 most popular CMS in local goverment, that is CMS used by 10 or more councils, are Drupal, Jadu, Umbraco, GOSS iCM, Contensis CMS and WordPress. There are around 30 less popular CMS used by councils, but they have little or no traction in the sector.
There have been a limited number of changes of CMS since LocalGov CMS Directory was last updated in December 2024 as shown in the table below.
Content management system
Number of councils
Drupal
100 (+5 since December 2024)
Jadu
68 (-2 since December 2024)
Umbraco
58 (+1 since December 2024)
GOSS iCM
33 (-2 since December 2024)
Contensis
28 (+1 since December 2025)
How was the review of the LocalGov CMS Directory carried out?
The review was carried out through a combination of:
checking individual council websites by reviewing the code and references to a specific CMS
using WhatCMS, a service which allows users to check a CMS
using Google search AI to reveal changes.
CMS are now ranked in popularity by Council type
In December 2024 the government published its English Devolution White Paper, Power and Partnership: Foundations for Growth, in which it states that it wants remaining two-tier areas in England to be restructured into single-tier unitary authorities. It states that the government wants to restructure all two-tier areas so that they become unitary council areas. The government also wants to restructure “unitary councils where there is evidence of failure or where their size or boundaries may be hindering their ability to deliver sustainable and high-quality services for their residents”.
In light of this local government reorganisation I thought it would be helpful to start ranking the current popularity of CMS by Council type in order to help inform any future reoganised councils when choosing a suitable content management system. The local government reogansation will only affect England but I have included all council types in the UK and Ireland for completeness.
The results below reveal that Drupal is ranked first in no less than seven of the ten Council types. Jadu comes second overall in this respect and Umbraco third.
At this stage we have no idea what new councils will be created or what areas they will cover. It will be interesting to find out how this works out and what CMS the new councils choose to use to develop their websites.
English District – CMS Ranking
CMS
Number of councils
Rank
Jadu
33
1
Drupal
30
2
Umbraco
28
3
GOSS iCM
17
4
WordPress
11
5
English County Council – CMS Ranking
CMS
Number of councils
Rank
Drupal
6
1
Contensis
5
2
Umbraco
5
2
Jadu
2
4
Squiz
2
4
SiteCore
2
4
English Unitary – CMS Ranking
CMS
Number of councils
Rank
Drupal
29
1
Jadu
20
2
Umbraco
13
3
Contensis
8
4
GOSS iCM
7
5
English London Borough – CMS Ranking
CMS
Number of councils
Rank
Drupal
14
1
Jadu
6
2
SiteCore
3
3
Umbraco
3
3
Contensis
2
5
Liferay
2
5
Scottish Unitary – CMS Ranking
CMS
Number of councils
Rank
Drupal
8
1
Jadu
7
2
GOSS iCM
5
3
Umbraco
4
4
Contensis
2
5
Welsh Unitary – CMS Ranking
CMS
Number of councils
Rank
Contensis
8
1
Umbraco
5
2
Drupal
2
3
GOSS iCM
2
3
WordPress
2
3
Irish County – CMS Ranking
CMS
Number of councils
Rank
Drupal
9
1
pTools
7
2
WordPress
4
3
DNN
1
4
Kentico
1
4
Percussion
1
4
Irish Unitary – CMS Ranking
CMS
Number of councils
Rank
Drupal
1
1
T4
1
1
Irish City – CMS Ranking
CMS
Number of councils
Rank
Drupal
1
1
pTools
1
1
Northern Irish – CMS Ranking
CMS
Number of councils
Rank
Kentico
4
1
ExpressionEngine
2
2
WordPress
2
2
GOSS iCM
1
3
Liferay
1
3
LocalGov CMS Directory
Access the LocalGov CMS Directory using the button below. You can also find CMS usage maps by country on this page.
