Magento 1 End of Life: All You Need To Know

Magento recently made it official that all versions of Magento 1 will become End of Life(EOL) in June 2020.

This means that while it will still be accessible by users, it will no longer receive technical support officially from Magento.

A CMS without support is sure to develop vulnerabilities. This results in a compromised website – that cripples any eCommerce business.

It doesn’t just end here. Things might get even more problematic.

You won’t be able to operate on new versions of PHP, switch hosting platforms, forfeit your site, or even rank well on SEO!

Considering the popularity of the Magento eCommerce platform, it’s not difficult to imagine how Magento 1’s end of life could make merchants scrambling for new eCommerce solutions.

If you are one of the thousands of Magento 1 users and are wondering how this will impact your business and how you should proceed, this blog is for you.

Magento 1’s popularity:

Magento, with its powerful features and ease of use, became a hit among the eCommerce retailers. Today, this popular platform powers 12% of eCommerce sites across the globe, with around 2,50,000 active sites running Magento 1.

Users are left with no choice but to migrate to Magento’s recent version. But before we talk about what Magento 2 holds, let’s take a look at what exactly is Magento 1 – end of life (EOL).

What is Magento 1 – End of Life?

Magento announced that by June 2020, it will stop offering any support like software updates and security patches for its popular Magento commerce 1 and open source CMS platforms.

Hence, there are obvious reasons to migrate to Magento 2:

When support ends, Magento 1 sites will become more susceptible to security issues, thus putting the regular security of your consumers and your business at risk. This would also mean that no new features or functionality will be added in the future.

This also implies:

• No security patches update
• No new features
• No update of the technological stack

Therefore, the eCommerce platform wants to make sure that all its consumers have enough time to plan their next steps for upgrading to Magento 2.

Should you switch to Magento 2?

Highly improved and optimized, Magento 2 is popular for security as well. However, there are other major reasons as well for migrating to Magento 2. These include:

Add-on themes and extensions – There are many new add-ons, themes, and extensions available to boost ROI and optimize your eCommerce store.

Better Speed – Magento 2 is optimised to perform at better speed levels through Javascript minification and improved caching.

Why you shouldn’t stay onto Magento 1.x

While moving to Magento 2 is the best option, many users might consider staying put with Magento 1.x. However, this decision comes with some risks associated with it.

The users who decide to stick to Magento 1.x after EOL will be exposed to risk of hacks and cyberattacks. While web stores on these systems might still be working, in the end you’ll have to compromise on some factors, such as:

• Missing out on eCommerce innovations
• Legacy eCommerce software upkeep
• Lack of support and security patches
• Losing PCI compliance

Wrapping up:

With very little time left before the sunsetting of support for Magento 1.x, it is imperative that you take action quickly. If you plan and execute the re-platforming and transition process in time, this can be an exclusive opportunity for a positive digital transformation within your organization.

The transition will enable you to explore a more comprehensive set of features, security enhancements, and performance improvements enabled by Magento 2.

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