Choose your upgrade path
Drupal 11 → 12
Mostly module updates and deprecation cleanup. The most DIY-friendly path, if you're comfortable with Composer. Drupal 11 to 12 →
Drupal 10 → 12
Two steps of module and deprecation work, plus adopting the Composer workflow. Drupal 10 to 12 →
Drupal 9 → 12
A multi-step climb (9→10→11→12) — where DIY gets genuinely hard. Drupal 9 to 12 →
Drupal 7 → current
No in-place path — it's a rebuild and content migration. The honest take →
Not sure Drupal is still the right platform at all? That's a fair question — see reevaluating Drupal and considering WordPress, or our overview of how a Drupal migration works.
Why Drupal upgrades got harder: the Composer reality
Modern Drupal (8 and up) manages its code and modules with Composer, a command-line dependency manager. In Drupal 10 you could still sidestep it for simple tasks — you could install a module by uploading a ZIP file through the admin interface. Drupal 11 removed that option. Module installation and updates now go through Composer, on the command line.
For professional teams, that's a feature — reliable, versioned, repeatable. For site owners who've only ever used the admin UI, it's a real barrier. "Upgrade it yourself" now quietly assumes:
- command-line / SSH access (or a local dev environment like DDEV),
- comfort running Composer, and usually Drush,
- a host that actually supports Composer — many budget shared hosts don't.
The Drupal project knows this is a tension; efforts like the Project Browser module and the new Drupal CMS distribution aim to make it friendlier, but they're still maturing. The practical upshot: the further behind you are, the more of this you have to take on at once.
Not sure which path fits — or who should do the work?
Tell us what you're running as well as any additional tech stack details. From there we can figure out together if an upgrade makes the most sense — or if there's another option best suited for you and your organization.
Tell us what you need
Share your site and any additional tech stack details. We'll detect your Drupal version, flag any end-of-life risk, and figure out together whether a DIY upgrade, a managed upgrade, or another path is right for you and your organization. No obligation.
We'll email you back and may follow up if we spot significant issues worth fixing. No spam.