On 12th August 2025, the London AEM User Group held its very first session—and the energy was off the charts! Over 20 AEM pros tuned in for a lively, practical conversation on the question every team is weighing right now:
The chat was buzzing, the questions were sharp, and more than a few people admitted this decision feels like “choosing between two favourite children.”
Honestly, you had to be there—the mix of energy and ideas was contagious.
This wasn’t just another meetup; it felt like the foundation of a local AEM family, where curiosity and collaboration take center stage.
A recording of the 42-minute session is available for anyone who couldn’t attend live.
Speaker Highlights
Key Takeaways
The AEM Landscape in 2025
Adobe supports two flavours—AEM 6.5 LTS and AEMaaCS.
Teams should choose based on customization needs, release cadence, operational maturity, compliance, and readiness for continuous updates.
EDS adds a front-end-driven, performance-first option that can pair with AEM.
AEM 6.5 LTS (Released March 2025, SP22)
Supports Java 17/21.
Runs on-prem or AMS.
Great for orgs needing stability, deep customization, and self-managed upgrades.
Especially helpful where compliance or integrations make the cloud harder.
AEM as a Cloud Service
Evergreen, cloud-native with automated updates + scaling.
Comes with Fastly CDN and Cloud Manager CI/CD pipelines.
Ideal for teams prioritizing release velocity, lower infra overhead, and resilience.
Universal Editor
In-context, collaborative authoring across 6.5, AEMaaCS, and EDS.
Streamlines workflows no matter the delivery model.
Edge Delivery Services (EDS)
Headless-first, front-end-led with vanilla JS “blocks.”
Git-based workflows + document authoring.
Multiple CDNs + automated checks for top-tier Lighthouse / Core Web Vitals.
One attendee joked that moving from Classic to Cloud was like “handing over the keys to your house but keeping the spare in case Adobe loses theirs.”
Big “aha!” reactions when people saw how Universal Editor works across all AEM models—no matter where you are in the journey.
Lots of nods (and a few groans) when the group weighed cost predictability vs. usage-based models—clearly a hot topic.
The EDS performance examples (700 pages in 4 weeks!) had the chat lighting up with emojis.
These moments made the session feel less like a webinar and more like a community hangout.
Helpful Links and Resources
Presentation slide and recording of the video can be found – Here
If you missed the session, you can watch the recording here:
What’s Next
Cloud or Classic—what’s the single biggest factor steering the decision in your organization?
1. Deep customization + infra control?
2. Release frequency?
3. Compliance + DevOps maturity?
4. Cost predictability?
5. Or performance goals?
Drop your thoughts in the comments—we’d love to hear how your team is navigating the AEM future!
Thanks so much, @Saumya ,@Jineet_Vora & @Christian_Vogel_Adobe for sharing this detailed recap . The session sounds incredibly insightful, especially the practical breakdown of when to choose AEM 6.5 LTS versus AEMaaCS, and the demo of the Universal Editor across different setups is super useful. It’s great to see real-world examples like the 700-page migration and performance-focused EDS approach.
Quick questions:
Q1. From your experience, when teams are evaluating AEMaaCS adoption, which factor tends to be the deal‑breaker more often, operational maturity and DevOps readiness, or the ability to leverage the evergreen cloud features and automated updates? Curious to hear what’s driving decisions in other organizations.
Q2: For those thinking about their next AEM project, what’s the single biggest factor influencing your choice: stability, cloud features, release speed, or something else? Would love to hear thoughts.
@kautuk_sahni Thanks so much for the thoughtful feedback and great questions!
Q1: From what we’ve seen so far, the deal-breaker often depends on where a team is starting from:
For orgs with strong DevOps maturity and automation pipelines already in place, the evergreen updates and reduced infra overhead of AEMaaCS are a huge draw.
On the flip side, teams with complex customizations or limited operational readiness sometimes lean toward 6.5 LTS because the predictability and control outweigh the benefits of automated updates—at least for now.
Q2: For the next AEM project, it’s really a mix, but a few patterns stand out:
Stability + control for highly regulated industries.
Release speed + new features for teams under pressure to deliver quickly.
And increasingly, performance goals (Core Web Vitals, Lighthouse) are shaping the choice, especially where EDS comes into play.
Curious to hear what others in the community are seeing—what’s the biggest factor for your teams right now?
@Saumya @Jineet_Vora @Christian_Vogel_Adobe Can we also list down feature comparison between AEM 6.5 VS AEM 6.5 LTS vs AEM Cloud service? Like if a customer is not moving to AEM cloud what CMS features they are missing ex: CF export to Target, No integration with Genstudio or AJO etc..GEN AI features
Absolutely! Here's a clearer comparison that highlights what CMS features are present—or absent—depending on whether you're using AEM 6.5, AEM 6.5 LTS, or AEM as a Cloud Service (AEMaaCS). This should help everyone understand what they might be missing if they're not moving to the Cloud.
Feature / Capability | AEM 6.5 | AEM 6.5 LTS (SP22) | AEM Cloud Service |
Deployment Model | On-prem / AMS | On-prem / AMS | Fully managed Cloud (SaaS-like) |
Upgrades | Manual, disruptive | Manual, stable cadence | Evergreen, zero-downtime |
Infra Scaling | Customer-managed | Customer-managed | Auto-scaling infra |
CDN | External (e.g., Akamai, Cloudflare) | External | Built-in Fastly CDN |
Java Support | Java 11 | Java 17 / 21 | Managed by Adobe |
Universal Editor | Not available | Not available | Available |
GraphQL / Headless APIs | Limited | Limited | Full support + enhancements |
Edge Delivery Services (EDS) | Not available | Not available | Available |
Content Fragment → Adobe Target Export | Not available | Not available | Available |
Integration with Adobe GenStudio | Not available | Not available | Available |
Integration with Adobe Journey Optimizer (AJO) | Not available | Not available | Available |
Generative AI Features | Not available | Not available | Cloud-first rollout |
Legacy Features (Classic UI, Communities, etc.) | Available | Available | Some deprecated |
Best For | Deep customization, full control | Stability, compliance, predictable support | Innovation, integrations, future-proofing |
@Saumya & @Jineet_Vora - thank you both for taking the time to share your insights with the group! This was a really engaging session, and I look forward to more in the future.
Are you planning to host all meetings virtually, or will there be some in-person as well?
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