On June 20th, Magento has astonished the world of eCommerce with its release of Magento 2.2 Alpha. While many businesses were discussing or migrating from Magento 1 to Magento 2, Magento 2.2 brought tons of unique features and performance aspects for the Magento 2 providers. With Magento 2.2, the team has greatly improved the functionality of all three versions of Magento, including Open Source, Magento Commerce, and Magento Cloud edition.
With the amazing new features, which include optimized shipping, marketing automation tool, analytical insights, and streamlined store operations, Magento 2.2 brings a whole host of benefits. It brings something for everyone, starting from developers and B2B owners to the marketing people. Let’s find out what Magento 2.2 has covered (for different editions) as compared to its previous version Magento 2.
What Magento 2.2 Has Brought For Open Source Edition?
- Significant improvements in platform security and developer experience. With the recent release, Magento has tried to overcome the security concerns raised in Magento 1 or Magento 2 long back. To block any potential risk to the platform, Magento has taken necessary steps to avoid any vulnerability by removing unserializing calls, eliminating code execution attacks, and more. Further, they have worked on cross-site scripting attacks.
- Leverage from the upgraded technology stack. With this version, they are no more working with PHP 5.6 or Varnish 3. They have upgraded it to PHP 7.1, Varnish 5, and MySQL 5.7. Moreover, they have upgraded the libraries to a stable version.
- Introducing a new deployment process! Unlike Magento 2, Magento 2.2 has introduced a pipeline deployment process to reduce the production system downtimes with the help of quick build and deployment stages. It simplifies how one can manage configurations between different environments.
- Performance improvements. Users now do not need to face poor performance issues while indexers are running. The indexers can run in batches, which in the end improves overall memory and run time in the Magento. This could be a great performance relief for the Magento Development Company.
- Rectification of issues. If you ever faced issues in catalog, search, payment, and import/export, Magento 2.2 has good news for you! All such issues have been fixed with this release.
- Bundled extensions. Unlike Magento 2 extensions, Magento 2.2 brings 3rd party extension support for the first time in history. Magento Social extension can help you integrate your business Facebook account with your store.
What’s new in Magento 2.2 Commerce edition?
In addition to all the benefits offered in the Open Source edition, you can leverage from:
- In-Built B2B module. This will enable merchants to sell not only to the consumers but to the companies as well. No need to add the Magento Extensions, all you have to do is to visit the Magento Commerce store, create your account, and you are done! You can also refer B2B quick start guide for more information on this.
- Fraud protection. Signifyd is now associated with Magento to bring extensive support against the frauds. Unlike Magento 2, this will eliminate the need for opting for 3rd party extensions to prevent fraud.
- All the known and long-time pending issues related to Magento Commerce have been fixed in this release.
What about the Magento 2.2 Commerce Cloud edition?
- Web interface to access the staging and production environments. Forget using SSH or any other client to login into the server. With the web interface, you can add/manage the users, sync the code, manage the environment variables, view logs, and more.
- You can opt for 30 Days free trial! Now you can opt for different subscription options, which will help you try the cloud edition to check if it really fits your requirements or not. This is an amazing feature, which was not available previously.
- Starter Plans. You can now opt for the Magento Commerce starter plan by paying $2000 only, which is quite cheaper than earlier versions. This will help companies or enterprises to leverage cloud services at an affordable rate.
- Enhanced deployment process! With Magento 2.2, Magento has streamlined the deployment process, including Magento application environment variables, composer, and deployment methods.
Aside from these improvements, Magento has worked on providing some excellent changes for the online store owners. Starting from Sales Analytics and instant purchase checkout to the optimized shipping Magento team has worked all the aspects to cover the missing pieces from the previous versions. With different offerings and enhancements in Open Source, Commerce, and Commerce Cloud edition, Magento 2.2 is creating strides in the eCommerce world.
As compared with its previous versions, Magento 2.2 is faster, secure, and reliable. What’s your call on this? Do you think Magento 2.2 has brought something for Magento 2 providers? Share your views in the comments below!
