Ghost vs ProcessWire

Anyone can view code of Ghost since it's under a libre/open source license.

It only does a few things and it does them well. Unlike WordPress, with which you can build a universe, a blog or anything in between, Ghost is simple.

Markdown is a plain text formatting syntax designed so that it can be human-readable and easily converted to HTML. Markdown allows HTML code for complete flexibility.

Setting up a custom domain is effortless - fill the in the form and change DNS entries. Done.

You can download the source code and set it up yourself (just make sure your hosting provider supports node.js). Alternatively, you can use their Ghost(Pro) service to let them host it for you. Paid plans start at $10/mo.

Very easy setup with an official image from Docker. Just needs a custom config.json and you are pretty much good to go.

A built-in way to get and set up themes.

You can see markdown on one side of the pane and the result on the other, while writing.

Themes may be uploaded, as can logos and covers.

You can host your Ghost blog for free on Github Pages if you are OK with it being turned into a static site. You can use Buster to generate a static site from Ghost that can then be hosted on Github Pages.

There are lots of affordable hosting plans available for Ghost blogs.

You will always find one to respond politely in the forums. Sometimes even the creator Ryan Cramer himself.

ProcessWire is heavily based on custom fields. All objects (Pages) inside ProcessWire are based on extensible templates comprised of fields that can be easily defined. Many useful fields come prebuilt and they can be extended with modules.

Processwire is extremely easy to learn. Consider this:
echo $pages->get('title=Hello World')->title; // "Hello World"
echo $pages->get('title=Hello World')->parent->title; // "Home"
echo $pages->find('Template=Category')->count; // 126
echo $pages->find('Template=Category')->each('title'); // ['Audio', 'Video' …]

Selectors are so powerful but yet so easy.

Check out the cheatsheet.

The API is jQuery like;
// find some pages:
$pages->find('template=skyscraper, architect=john, sort=title')->limit(4);

// mutate
$pages->get('title=Hello You')->set('title', 'HelloWorld')->save();
$pages->get('title=Old')->trash(); // trash page

// check user…
$user->isLogedin();
echo $user->name; // guest
$session->login($name, $pass);
$session->logout();

// redirect
$session->redirect($url);

The way you fetch, access and manipulate objects (Pages) in ProcessWire is extremely powerful and easy. You can receive any page and its custom fields, filter, travers, add…

By default, ProcessWire comes with 0 assumption on how you handle the output. You have 100% freedom on how you want to develop the frontend. Want to plain output stuff, go ahead. Want to use any number of Templating Engine, do it. Just use as Headless-CMS, okay!

Either using the modules already available or writing your own module, using the jQuery-like API.

Source available on GitHub.