Upgrade to Drupal 9: Features and Reasons to Upgrade

It’s official - Drupal 7 will be drifting off by November of 2021. Drupal’s founder and evangelist, Dries Buytaert - has stated that support will be also be ending for Drupal 8 simultaneously. This makes it critical for hundreds and thousands of websites to migrate to later versions of Drupal to ensure a secure, scalable, and robust infrastructure.

Upgrading brings access to greater usability, compliance, faster search, and security updates. It also bestows a bundle of great features for site builders and administrators, an object-oriented backend, and a Twig-based templating system.

Consideration When Exploring Upgrade to Drupal 9

• BigPipe to improve page view performance and aids in faster page loading.
• Content workflow enables you to define various workflows.
• Multilingual capabilities are supported.
• Front-End freedom has been authorized.
• API-First approach for better integration capabilities.

Drupal 9 is the most innovative yet effortless version in Drupal’s history. Not only is it a high-quality choice for forming integrated digital frameworks, it is also a modest version of Drupal 8.9.0 with its third-party dependencies upgraded.



With this article, not only do we help you understand why it might be important for you to migrate to Drupal 9, but also what you can expect out of the migration process.

What Differentiates Drupal 9 from Drupal 8?

Think of Drupal 9 as a better, faster, and easier-to-use version of Drupal 8.

There are not many significant schema changes or new feature additions that might require a complicated upgrade. All Drupal modules including, Drupal 9, under-the-hood, uses object-oriented programming (OOP) and YAML. So, as long as all of the components of the project are using the updated code, the transition from Drupal 8.9 to Drupal 9 should not be complex.

Drupal 9 has core dependencies that must run, including:

• PHP 7.3 as a minimum version
• MySql 5.7
• Drush 10 (Drupal 9 won’t work on lower versions)
• Symfony 4

You will need to connect with your hosting provider to understand if they support these dependencies or not— the main managed-to-host platforms that already perform are Pantheon, Acquia. However, if you host your own websites on - AWS, Azure, Google Cloud, or on-premise, you may need to revisit them and update the environments.

Additionally, if you’re on hosting services like HostGator, Digital Ocean, Linode, Lightsail, or something similar, the updated version Drupal 9 will not support the advanced functionalities.

What’s new in Drupal 9?

The fundamental benefit of Drupal 9 over Drupal 8 is that the new version is supported with security fixes. Further, Drupal 9 offers an effortless upgrade from Drupal 8.



Check out some new capabilities that are added to Drupal 9

1. Backward Compatible Drupal 9 is reverse compatible, i.e., it is compatible with its predecessor version - Drupal 8. Where Drupal 9 will be able to use modules, configurations, and data created on Drupal 8, unlike the case with D7 and D8.

2. Faster and Better Performance The newest version Drupal 9 has taken it further to extend its pillar for responsive images, wherein displaying best-sized mobile images.

3. Cleaner Code Base Drupal 9 has removed the support for deprecated code in Drupal 8. This application guarantees that the code marked as deprecated is no longer be supported.

4. Newer Major Versions of Symfony and Twig Symfony 3 is replaced with Symfony 4 or 5 in Drupal 9. Also, the Drupal community launches an upgrade to Twig 2.0. These upgrades only result in advanced performance, improved developer experience, and intensified security.

5. Panelizer is Removed and Replaced The panelizer is replaced in Drupal 9 with the Layout Builder, the contributed module of the moment.

6. Headless CMS Drupal 8 and 9 have an API-first approach. Drupal 9 community is vigorously capitalizing on Headless CMS so that it can enhance user experience with the powerful front-end of the website that has a Javascript framework.

Reasons why you should consider upgrading to Drupal 9

• The Drupal security experts will soon cease providing support or security advisories, wavering the websites and its user’s cybersecurity.
• The prior versions Drupal 7 and Drupal 8 rescued on project pages will be flagged as insecure in 3rd party scans if making the integration with other third-party tools.
• Leading services providers like Acquia and Pantheon are shortly going to withdraw their support from Drupal 7.

The Drupal 9 migration process will be a massive relief for sites employing older Drupal versions. Unlike the old versions, for Drupal 9 upgrade, refactoring isn’t required. Deploying the Drupal 8 version helped compute the problems more efficiently to Drupal 9.

The latest version can fulfill the aspect of your high-stake website development projects vigorously. So, would you like to have a try? The key to achieving this smooth transition to Drupal 9.1.0 is to roll out your migration plan within deadlines and save yourself any hassle.



Altudo's is a trusted partner for Fortune 500 companies to help them migrate their digital sites to Drupal 9 for a better user experience. If you are also looking for a smooth upgrade/migration process for your business, We’re Here to Help You! Connect With Us at marketing@altudo.co.