Upgrade your Magento: It is necessary!

Magento has been a very powerful and fast growing e-Commerce since it was launched in 2007 by Varien. Nowadays, Magento is chosen as a major digital commerce platform by over 200,000 online retailers because of its modular architecture, complete scalability and a wide range of options. However, like many other softwares, Magento always upgrade its present version to become more compatible with users. The question is ‘Should we upgrade Magento?’.

We all believe that the appearance of the latter is the innovation of the previous. Therefore in this article, we will show you 7 reasons why the answer is yes.

1. Security Updates

The first reason why we should definitely upgrade Magento version as soon as possible is the security issues. The world of online security is progressing at light speed day by day. Even famous brands such as Adobe, Sony, Amazon and Wal-Mart were all hacked in 2014. Magento has stepped up its default security in the newest version to protect users’ privacy.

What Magento did to patch security gaps:

• XSS vulnerability while creating configurable product variations was addressed.
• Information about different orders was not displayed.
• Changes to PayPal Express checkout.
• An .swf file was removed from the Magento distribution.
• File system was secured better.
• The security of action URLs was enhanced.
• Vulnerability during checkout was fixed
• The randomness function was also more secured

2. Responsive Theme Updates

The default Magento theme in the 1.9 version is mobile-responsive which is the best solution for salesman because the site that they invest in is compatible with any device of customers. This means that a shopping cart was design to work on any screen size. With responsive design, it is much more easy for merchants to boost conversion, for mobile-using customers to place an order or checkout anywhere. Moreover, this brings SEO advantages as well. If merchants focus a bit more on the content, this has big implications for SEO also in order to engage customers and reduce bounce rates.

3. Functionality Bug Fixes

Magento has continously added new functionality and bug fixes which will make your website run more smoothly and efficiently. So why don’t you take these advantages?

Specifically, with platform bugs, Magento 1.9 gave fixes on web store and shopping cart, Promotional Price Rule, Administrative Ordering, Invoicing, Credit Memo, Import, Payment Method and many other fixes.

4. Improved performance

Magento C.E 1.9 appeared with a new fresh responsive look at the first time being introduced. This latest update brings some excellent improvements which improves your store’s performance.

We can see in the lastest build, Magento has a complete new interface; for instance, old themes has been updated and replaced by fresh responsive web design.

5. Support of the latest PHP version

Each Magento CE and EE version supports the PHP versions, specially

• Magento CE 1.6.0.0–1.8.1.0 and Magento EE 1.11.0.0–1.13.1.0 support PHP 5.3 natively.
• Magento CE 1.9.0.x and EE 1.14.0.x support PHP 5.4 natively.
• Magento CE 1.9.1 and EE 1.14.1 support PHP 5.5 natively.

You know, PHP 5.4 and 5.5 have made breaking changes from earlier versions of PHP. Therefore, we recommend you use the most recent PHP version supported by your version of Magento. For example, you should use PHP 5.5 with CE 1.9.1 or EE 1.14.1. This means that your Magento website version 1.9.1 can run smoothly under PHP 5.5.

6. Tax calculation improvements

This improvement means that notwithstanding tax settings, the price is displayed include tax correctly with fixed price and dynamic price bundled products. For instance, default tax rate is different from the origin tax rate. This gives merchants access to accurate and consistent tax calculations and displays.

Resolved issues with calculating the credit memo amount when Fixed Product Tax (FPT) is discounted and the customer purchases more than one item.

7. Integration with Google Analytics

We believe that Google Analytics has become the standard for all websites since being released in April 2004. Magento promptly integrated with Google Analytics to bring customers convenience. If you’ve wanted to harness its power with Magento you’ve had to custom install the code directly into the pages. This process is now much simpler with the latest version of Magento.

To conclude, we want to say that upgrading to the latest version of Magento is a necessity. Magento is constantly adding new functionality and fixes, and these yearly updates are free and relatively easy to take advantage of. If you find it difficult to upgrade your Magento website, don’t worry because we are here to help you. Check out Magento data migration  (this tool has supported Magento to Magento 2 already) and let us make you migration process simpler.

Don’t hesitate to contact us if you have any question related.

Source: http://blog.litextension.com/7-reasons-why-should-upgrade-your-magento/