Whats New With Magento 2

Magento 2 has made many major improvements to the older version. There are so many, I really can’t list all of them easily, but here are some of the major ones to note so far!

Improved UI of Admin Panel

The Admin panel is much easier to use and has a modern look and feel. It is much more organized now that it’s separated into major categories like orders, stores, products, reports, etc., with the ability to see all subcategories with one click on the main menu.

 

Site Speed Improvements

Magento 2 comes with many modern architecture improvements. With the proper server configuration and the ability to run PHP7, Varnish, and other site speed improvements, Magento 2 can run very fast.

Modern Javascript

The old version of Magento used Prototype Javascript, which is now a very antiquated framework. Magento 2 leverages Knockout JS and Jquery so that you can utilize more modern JS. This can also result in site speed improvements on the browser side.

Minimize Javascript

Magento 2 minimizes Javascript, which results in faster page load times.

Less CSS Preprocessor

Magento 2 uses the Less CSS preprocessor, an improvement from the previous version. This offers modern CSS capabilities so that you can create mixins, variables, and more robust CSS to improve Frontend development time and site speed.

Better Backend Architecture

The new Magento 2 architecture decouples the theme and modules from the rest of the application. In Magento 1, modules and theme files were spread out over the application, making it much more difficult to track down files, remove a module, or change a theme. Magento 2 has a much better architectural system so that you can more easily remove or add modules and improve your Magento 2 website.

Many New Enterprise Edition Features

Magento 2 is releasing many more new features for the enterprise edition and has already added new features like Elastic Search, content staging and preview, security enhancements and more.
One of the features I really like is the ability to view and drag and drop products into different orders in the category section. Magento has clearly massively enhanced the admin panel, especially for the enterprise edition.

Improved Ability to View and Manage Products and Orders

You can now much more easily view and manage products and orders by adding the columns you want specifically tailored to your needs. This is much better for different businesses and use cases.

Supports PHP7

PHP7 is a massive upgrade from older PHP versions and is a major improvement to Magento 2. PHP7 offers more functionality, better programming capabilities, and simply runs much faster, meaning your site will run much faster.

Faster Product Creation Process

It is now much easier to create products and it is also much more straightforward for newcomers to Magento. All of the necessary information for creation is right there at the top, rather than the old version which you would have to jump to different sections and know which fields had to be filled out, or you wouldn’t be able to save a new product.

Ability to use Varnish Out of Box

Varnish Cache is a popular – and powerful – open source HTTP engine that can greatly improve site speed. Magento 2 now comes with Varnish out of the box to greatly enhance site speed with less development effort.

Improved CMS Capabilities

The new CMS is much stronger and easier to use allowing for better content management capabilities. This makes it easier to create more pages without the need to add in another CMS solution like Drupal or WordPress into your architecture.

 

Improved Dashboard and Reporting

The new dashboard and reporting functionality is much better than the older version. It has more capabilities and is easier to use from a user experience standpoint. It is still not a top of the line solution so you will want Google Analytics and other analytics capabilities for enterprise reporting.

 

Improved Data Import / Export

The data import feature is much easier to use and an upgrade to the old version which was clunky and frustrating for newcomers. There is now more information with errors and the process of importing and exporting data is much smoother.

 

Improved Default Theme

The default theme is much stronger and can be customized to become a very competitive front-end offering compared to the older version. This is very helpful for companies on a tight budget that simply want to get something up and running of a competitive quality and at a reasonable budget.

 

Improved Checkout Templates

The checkout process is now a smooth, two-step process. This is a major improvement from the cumbersome multi-step Magento 1 checkout. This will make check out faster and easier for customers resulting in more sales!

 

Data Migration Tool

The data migration tools for exporting orders, customers, products, as well as importing such data into Magento, has improved significantly. There are now more specific options and you can customize the way the tool works more so than before such as how many errors you want it to record and much more.

 

Improved Security

Magento 2 has improved the overall architecture, especially around security. With frequent updates to the software, Magento 2 is much more secure than the older version which will eventually not even be supported for security patches. Magento 2 also improves password hashing so there is less risk for brute force attacks and other security such security attacks.

Rich Snippets / Better SEO Out of the Box

Magento 2 now comes with Rich snippets out of the box so that your SEO performance will be much better out of the box. Magento 1 required leveraging an extension for rich snippets making it a more time-consuming and developer oriented task.

Google API Integration

Magento 2 now comes with Google Analytics and Google Adwords integration out of the box for easy integration with no coding required.

Composer

Magento 2 now uses composer, a package manager to improve development operations and the ability to develop quickly on Magento. This helps modernize the Magento 2 architecture.

New Relic Integration

Magento 2 now comes with New Relic integrated out of the box so that anyone can utilize the leading site monitoring/web development analysis tool.

MultiShipping Options

Magento 2 now allows you to ship to multiple addresses out of the box. This is great for enterprise eCommerce sites who will need this functionality. Business to Business orders may also need to be routed to multiple addresses.