A headless CMS to power native apps, from auth to uploads.

Payload is the perfect native app headless CMS. Instantly get all the tools you need to power your native app backend—including APIs, authentication, content management, media storage, and more.

Payload authentication used in Quikplow native app

Save time and budget

Backends and admin panels are hard, and you've built them many times before.

Almost any native app needs to have a powerful back-office to manage users, orders, media, and more. If you've ever built a native app like this, you know how tiring it gets to have to build a web-based admin UI in addition to the native app itself. With Payload, you can focus only on what matters—your app.

Let Payload automatically deliver you with a full API—including REST, GraphQL and Local Node APIs. You'll supercharge your app development and be able to focus on what matters.

Native app admin panel powered by payload

AUTO-GENERATED ADMIN PANEL

Don’t build an admin panel to manage your app from scratch.

Let Payload do it for you. Its UI was built to power any type of app—from simple to complex, and the best part is that it's fully extensible.

Implement your own business logic.

Payload's auto-generated CRUD APIs can be extended in any way that your app needs with Hooks. If you need more than CRUD, no worries—it's your Node server. Add whatever your app needs right alongside of Payload in Express or GraphQL.

See the power of Hooks
const Users = {
// ...
hooks: {
beforeChange: [
// Before the User is created or updated,
// sync it to Hubspot
syncCustomerToHubspot,
],
afterChange: [
// Send the new User a welcome email
// after it's successfully created
sendWelcomeEmail,
],
afterRead: [
// Dynamically append user's active subscriptions
// straight from Stripe
addStripeSubscriptions,
],
},
};

Payload is free and open-source.

You can host it yourself, or let us handle hosting for you on Payload Cloud.

Get started in one line

npx create-payload-app