A content management system (CMS) is software, usually implemented as a Web application, for creating and managing HTML (HyperText Markup Language) content.

It is used to manage and control a large, dynamic collection of Web material (HTML documents and their associated images). A CMS facilitates content creation, content control, editing, and many essential Web maintenance functions.

Usually the software provides authoring (and other) tools designed to allow users with little or no knowledge of programming languages markup languages to create and manage content with relative ease of use.

Most systems use a database to store content, metadata and other items that might be needed by the system.

A presentation layer displays the content to regular Web-site visitors based on a set of templates.

Administration is typically done through browser-based interface.

Unlike Web-site builders like Microsoft FrontPage or Dreamweaver, a CMS allows non-technical users to make changes to an existing website with little or no training. A CMS typically requires an experienced coder to set up and add features, but is primarily a Web-site maintenance tool for non-technical administrators.