Updating from Joomla 1.5

[new_joomla4]

Have an old site Joomla 1.5 and got an email from host saying they will update to php 7.4 which my site is sure to not work.
It has been on my mind to update it lately but was waiting for Joomla 4 since it's so close to being ready.
Should I update to Joomla 3 in the meantime, or is there an easy way to make 1.5 work with php7.4?
Will it be a lot of work to update to Joomla 4 after it comes out?
All advise appreciated

[abernyte]

Rebuild in J3 and migrate to J4 at some future point when the dust has settled. It is possible to migrate from J1.5 to J2.5 and then J2.5 to J3, the tools are still available but it is not straightforward and things will break so unless your skill level is reasonably high, or there are some other sound and compelling reasons not to, just rebuild your site in J3 and get up to date.
Getting J1.5 and it's extensions to work with PHP7.4 or 8 is a fantasy. Don't waste your time.

[AlexVega]

Will it be a lot of work to update to Joomla 4 after it comes out?

What kind of site do you have?
How big is your site?
How many content?
What kind of content?
How many extensions?
What kind of extensions?
...

In general, yes... a lot of work. But you will find a huge amount of new features once you rebuild your site in the latest version available.

[AMurray]

For migration instructions refer to viewtopic.php?f=710&t=925100 and/or https://docs.joomla.org/Joomla_1.5_to_3 ... _Migration

J4 is stepping closer to being ready, with a release candidate, I believe, due in February.

[arnoldzzz]

Is there any easy way to upgrade from Joomla 1 to the latest? I hired someone to do it, but they totally botched the job.

[sozzled]

J4 is stepping closer to being ready, with a release candidate, I believe, due in February.

There is no indication from any reliable source that there is a J! 4 release candidate under construction at present or likely for release in the next six weeks or any time. What is the source of your information?

[AMurray]

It is mentioned in the link you posted on your comment about the beta 6 release (viewtopic.php?f=803&t=983998&hilit=beta).

I suppose this is as "official" as you can get: https://www.joomla.org/announcements/re ... lpha4.html in the first paragraph is mentioned "release candidate expected in February....."

We expect this to be the last beta of Joomla 4 and to have a Release Candidate available in February. We will also make a new portal available for translation teams to submit Joomla 4 language packs to coincide with the first Release Candidate.

The mere fact there is mention of "Release Candidate" suggest "something" is in the works but I will stand corrected if what I interpret in this release post is not correct.

[sozzled]

Not to be believed. In fact, it's unlikely that there will enough interest within the J! community-at-large in using J! 4 for production purposes until several months after J! 4.0.0 is released as a stable version; I will not be using it for production purposes or migrating from J! 3.x in the near future. What you read looks like more of the same advertising hype we've been seeing over the last five years.

We don't even know what will be the technical requirement changes involved with J! 4 (and they will be different to previous versions).

[abernyte]

Is there any easy way to upgrade from Joomla 1 to the latest? I hired someone to do it, but they totally botched the job.

No.
It is still possible but you have to be absolutely clear about what will survive the various migrations to the latest version. Not everything can. Given the number of changes required it is generally better to rebuild your site in J3 and migrate the content only which gives a higher chance of success.