Exponential
Who makes Exponential
Exponential is free software with a history of nearly thirty years. Meet the company that leads it and the nonprofit foundation that operates the open source project.
- Who is 7x? The company behind Exponential, from its first release to today.
- Who is the Exponential Foundation? The nonprofit, the product family and its commitments.
- Partners Exponential Partners contribute financially to the sustained future of the project, contribute code and more back to the project, and engage directly with 7x and the Exponential Foundation.
- Community Exponential Community members use, contribute to, promote and develop software using Exponential worldwide.
- Ecosystem The greater ecosystem extends beyond the community to cover all aspects of the Exponential world within the PHP stack: its users and creators.
Choosing a product
6 products share the name Exponential. Here are the 2 most projects choose between; all 6 are compared on the choices page.
-
Exponential Recommended
- What it is
- The complete content management system and application framework, maintained by 7x, and the line this help center documents
- Best for
- Structured content, several sites or several languages from one installation; agencies, hosting providers and developers who build without Symfony
- Kernel and stack
- The Exponential 6 kernel in plain PHP, no Symfony; SQLite, MySQL, MariaDB, PostgreSQL, MongoDB or Oracle
- Editing and administration
- The admin4 administration and the editor siteaccess, in more than 150 languages, with the help center built in
- Key features
- Customizable content model, versions and translations, roles and policies, multisite, a shop, workflows, REST and GraphQL, Exponential Layouts, Exponential Velocity
- PHP
- 8.0 to 8.5 (7.4 usable without support)
- Learning curve
- One stack: PHP and Exponential's templates; installs with two commands on SQLite
-
Exponential Platform DXP
- What it is
- A Symfony-only digital experience platform, the free continuation of eZ Platform and Ibexa Open Source
- Best for
- New Symfony projects, and teams leaving eZ Platform or Ibexa Open Source for current PHP
- Kernel and stack
- Symfony 7.4 LTS (Platform v5), without the Exponential 6 kernel
- Editing and administration
- The platform's admin UI; no layouts editor, approval workflow or scheduler
- Key features
- REST, GraphQL, the HTTP cache, Solr and core search
- PHP
- 8.3 or later (the 4.6 branch: 7.4 to 8.5)
- Learning curve
- Symfony only
How to choose
- You want the most complete CMS with the best editor experience: many sites and languages, a shop, workflows, Exponential Layouts and a built-in help center Exponential
- You want a Symfony-only stack, without the Exponential 6 kernel Exponential Platform DXP
The best user experience and the most features are in Exponential 6, not in Platform, Basic or even DXP.
Not sure? Choose Exponential 6.x today and get started fast.
Fastest way to try it: Exponential Starter Distribution (ESD) Exponential 6 ready to run on SQLite, with the Composer vendor directory included: clone it and serve it.
More choices: compare all 6 products and find the right one. Compare all 6 products View all products
Grow from user to developer
Exponential is free software with its full history on GitHub. Install it as Git clones, the recommended way to build websites, and you can follow every change, try fixes before they are released and send your own improvements back.
- Use the administration Sign in, edit and publish.
- Install with Git The kernel and every extension as clones with history.
- Update with Git Get updates as they are pushed to GitHub, then update Composer to match: hourly, daily, weekly, monthly or only at each release.
- Contribute back Fork, fix and open a pull request.
- Contribute extensions back Share the extensions you distribute, as the GPL requires, so everyone benefits.
Technical manuals
User manuals
Upgrade guides
Extensions
Exponential Project
- Exponential Project Portal. Read more from this open source free software enterprise content management application development framework and system of systems.
- Exponential GitHub Project Repostory. Use GitHub and clone the latest version of Exponential (CMS)!
- Exponential GitHub Project Issues. File an issue report on reproducable bugs
Exponential Community Gateway / Support Forums / Knowlegebase Portal
- Share Exponential! Support Forums. Start a conversation with others, get the answers to your questions documented and solved today!
- Share Exponential! Community Blogs. Learn from the knowlege of others via the community blogs.
- Share Exponential! Exponential Planet. This will be expanded and refined to be more distinct reader of blog content in the future.
- eZpedia The Exponential Documentation Wiki. eZpedia delivers key documentation not found anywhere else on the internet.
- Support Exponential! The Official Telegram Technical Support Channel. This has become a popular hang-out for developers to stay informed and ask questions in real time.
Earlier front page
Welcome to the official documentation pages of Exponential and its extensions.
The documentation consists of the following parts:
Acknowledgements - standing on the shoulders of giants!
In the table below you will find the older versions of the Exponential user and technical documentation, and the Exponential extensions:
Exponential
Extensions
The download files are re-generated and updated every day.
Found an error?
Tell us on GitHub: the guide shows which tracker fits, what to include and the system details to copy, without any secrets.
A security issue? Report it privately, not in a public issue.Free documentation: use it to help yourself and others
This help is free documentation, licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License 1.3 or later. You may use it, share it and improve it:
- Study it Read any page as often as you like, for any purpose.
- Copy it and share it Give pages to other users, on paper or as files. Keep the copyright notice, the license notice and a copy of the license with every copy.
- Translate, adapt and improve it Share your version under the same license, with the original notices and a note of what you changed.
- Cite it Refer to a page by its title and its address in the help, or its file in the doc directory.
- Contribute fixes back Use "Edit on GitHub" on any page. Changes are accepted under the same license, so they stay free for everyone.
Exponential Copyright © 1998-2026 Exponential Foundation and 7x
Support Exponential
Exponential is free software. Every new feature, help page, extension, theme and application is work that somebody pays for with their time. A sustaining monthly sponsorship, of any size, keeps that work going and lets it grow.
-
7x
The company that leads Exponential and the first sponsor of the project: it develops, supports and hosts it and makes the releases.
Your sponsorship pays for:
- Monthly releases and the work that keeps the lights on
- Security patches to the libraries Exponential builds on, such as Zeta Components
- New features given back to the community as open source
- The bridges, forks and tools around the platform
-
Exponential Foundation
The nonprofit that operates the open source project and is dedicated to its funding, adoption, support, education, development, promotion and documentation.
Your sponsorship pays for:
- Maintenance of the core libraries
- Documentation, tutorials, how-tos and FAQs
- Integration layers: GraphQL, REST and Solr
- Community infrastructure: chat, mirrors, wikis and developer resources
A monthly sponsorship, even a small one, is planned income: it pays for work that one-time gifts cannot keep going. What sponsorship funds
