Do I need to upgrade?

[LVT LTD]

I currently have 5 sites on the following releases.
Is there any reason to upgrade them?

Zen Cart 1.3.8a
Patch: 1::
Database Patch Level: 1.3.8

Zen Cart 1.3.8a
Database Patch Level: 1.3.8

Zen Cart 1.3.8a
Database Patch Level: 1.3.8

Zen Cart 1.3.9b
Database Patch Level: 1.3.9b

Zen Cart 1.3.9c
Database Patch Level: 1.3.9c

????

thanks

[frank18]

1.3.9 has higher security levels - 1.3.8 is not PCI compliant (as I understand it).

The docs folder contained in the 1.3.9d package tells you the full story why an upgrade is beneficial.

Upgrading your 1.3.9b+c sites to the d version shouldn't take you longer than 10 minutes each. DB is the same for a, b,c and d.

[kuroi]

Every release, at minimum, tightens security and fixes bugs and well as adds some new features. So there's always a benefit, but what it's worth to you will be specific to your situation.

Every upgrade comes with a cost determined by the number of mods and amount of custom code that needs to be taken account of, the extent to which this overlaps with the changes to the core Zen Cart code, whether key add-ins are compatible with the new version, or new ones are available, or extra programming effort is needed, the attention to detail in the upgrade, and the skills and rate of the person undertaking it.

So the cost is specific to your situation too.

Is it worth upgrading? Well that depends on whether the benefits outweigh the costs, and since we can't know either, I'm afraid that only you can make that call.

One general piece of advice though. Over time the costs of not upgrading tend to rise faster than the cost of going ahead, until it become near to infeasible not to. So even if it's not now, there will be a point at which you will need to.