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Oct
23
2007
Complete SEF URL Extension Comparison
Written by Steve Burge   
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SEF URL Extension ComparisonWe've long talked about how important it is to use a Search Engine Friendly URL component with Joomla. The best ones don't just create human-readable addresses but also help your site in many other areas of SEO.

Trouble is, the wealth of different components means that its easy to get confused. Which one should I use? Should I pay? Should I use a free component?

Hopefully, these two charts will provide a complete comparison guide for the main five SEF URL components.

  • Chart 1: What features does the component have?
  • Chart 2: What other extensions does the component work with?

Please note:

  • all five are being actively developed and there may be some mistakes / omissions. Please post any that you find in the comments below
  • Open SEF and Remosef are not included because they are not actively supported
  • More features does not always equal better. For some people, simpler may well be better
  • Performance can be an issue. Some components run more quickly than others, especially on large sites. However, because of the difficulty of providing a fair comparison, it is not included as a factor here.

SEF URL Component Comparison

 sh404SEF [-]ArtioSEF [-]SEFAdvance [-]JPromoter [-]SerrBizSEF [-]
Choice of extensions (.html / .php / .shtml)
Automapping
Joomfish Support
Redirect non-www to www
Metadata
H1 / H2 tags
Remove Sections / Categories
Works without .htaccess
Works with IIS
404 Error Page
Ability to use Title Alias for Shorter URLs
URL Caching
Index / NoIndex
No Core Hacks Needed
CostFree29.75 Euros. Free version is unusable because of text link ads40 Euros$25Free
Works with extra components?Yes, dozensYes, dozensYes, dozensYes, dozensYes, but currently only 4/5
Cost of plugins for extra components?FreeMostly free although five are sold (10 to 25 Euros)Free with purchaseFree with purchaseNeeds to be custom-coded

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SEF URL Components and Comptabile Extensions

 sh404SEF [-]ArtioSEF [-]SEF Advance [-]JPromoter [-]SerrBizSEF [-]
Community Builder
Deep Pockets
DocMan
Fireboard
HotProperty
iJoomla Magazine
Jomres
jReviews
MosTree
Remository
SMF Bridge
Sobi2
VirtueMart

 

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Comments  

 
#1 julien 2007-11-08 21:21
I think it's pretty obvious to see who the winner is.

I have tried all the free ones and used to use Open SEF, and SH404SEF is by far one of the best. It offers lots of option but yet simple to set. The options are very simple to understand.

Also the support in the forum of SH404SEF is excellent. The developer deserve huge donation for doing such a great job.

***** one more thing ******

there is one more thing not showing in the comparison table above is the number of queries done by the component is almost the same as without the component (see http://extensions.siliana.net/en/sh404SEF-and-url-rewriting/sh404SEF-Joomla-SEF-URL-without-URL-rewriting-or-.htaccess.html)

Which is a major asset when talking about speed. As we al know the more SQL queries the slower joomla! will be. Especially when you, most users and myself included are hosting our site on a shared server where don't have lots of RAM and CPU resources.

This components coupled with PageCache and QueryCache; and you have a nice cocktail to put your joomla site on speed with nice SEF URLs.

Unless you want to spend money, SH404SEF is "THE" component to use to get SEF URLs. But it does not stop you from giving a small donation

ps: i am not part of the dev. team, just a user who had a great experience with SH404SEF ;-)
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#2 Jacky Supit 2007-12-28 21:34
This article is so great.
thanks for your effort to create this comparison. I have spent weeks to find what is the best cms for me since I am going to create a forum and i need a good cms with a good seo performance.

thank you so much for this article.

and Yes Julien,
you're right, the SH404SEF craetor deserve to get some donations for his/her work.

thank you guys.

and thank you Puthzel (if you read this),
your recomendation on adsense-sby forum brought me here. thanks
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#3 Jacky Supit 2007-12-28 21:35
alledia,
what seo extention you use on this site?
thanks
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#4 Ulas ALKAN 2008-01-02 13:27
@jacky: i think alledi is using SEFAdvance for the sef urls ;-)
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#5 Steve Burge 2008-01-03 09:00
Hi Jacky

Trichnosis is right. We chose SEF Advanced back when it was the only real option. Fortunately for people launching a site today there a quite a few good choices.
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#6 AnRkey 2008-07-19 04:14
Thanks for this very informative look into SEF extensions. It was easy to compare them and make my choice. You saved me loads of time with this article.

R
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#7 daviddmf 2008-08-20 17:44
HI all and thanks for this very valuable section. I have spent countless hours configuring both sh404 and jpromoter and even employed a dev to assist me. The probelems are mostly to do with bugs caused by the sef components and also creating plugins to work with my custom comps. I am now upgrading my joomla 1.014 site to joomla 1.56 and am taking the time to choose my components very carefully this time. You can't go wrong with Community Builder and Fireboard but am still not so happy with Idigistore as there are teething problems. So may switch back to virtuemart.

Also I really need to decide whether to revert back to sh404 for my new joomla 1.5 site. Really not easy to decide. I have heard that sh404 slows things down a little and also it is hard to make plugins for custom comps. Whereas Jpromoter a bit easier to make the plugins, but virtually no documentation to explain how to use the SEF!

Well hope someone out there can enlighten me a bit more.

THanks for great comparisons.
David
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#8 Patchworks 2008-10-08 12:43
Well, it seem things have changed quite a bit since this article was originally written. I currently use sh404SEF and it seem there was a big bit of drama back in March 08. I'm not eactly sure what happened but it seem that development and support has dropped to a very slow pace. Yannick does the best he can but is simply overwhelmed and seemingly refuses to accept help from the community. And yes, I'm a donating member.

I personally find sh404SEF fine if you are doing basic SEO, but if you more on the leading edge of SEO and want control of your URL's, it lacks. Likewise, it does not handle the ItemID Duplicate URL issues for Custom URLs very well.

I was looking at Artio SEF and it seem to be a spin off of the sh404SEF. I don't know but maybe Artio SEF is the other half of the original team sh404SEF team? Does anyone know the story?

It seems everyone is has different requirements for a SEF SEO extension. My highest requirment is Complete Custom URL control since I don't rely on the extension creating my URL. I prefer to not risk a bug changing my URL in the future without my knowledge.

I would be curious what eveyone thinks is the best SEF extension these days?

g
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#9 Steve Burge 2008-10-08 15:08
Hi Patchworks

I've always had great communication with Yannick so you won't hear anything but good things from me about him or his project.

Artio and sh404SEF have the same codebase but different weaknesses. Artio for example loves to add -2, -3, -4 etc on the end of URLs.

I end up using sh404SEF for most sites, Artio if there's a really tricky menu setup (it handles large number of active menus well) and SEF Advance for very large sites that are better off without a database.

I've talked about this with core members and they're slowly improving the core Joomla URLs. Having an extra field (maybe using the alias?) for the URL might be the way to go.
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#10 adi 2009-05-02 07:15
Hi
i bought a while a go the sh404SEF and artio sef.
they do have some problems, specialy with Virtuemart.
beside you on your own, they guarantee mothing, enter to the Artio forums and see for urself.
i wish they were more helpfull and hunest.
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