Payload CMS vs Contentlayer

Compare Payload CMS and Contentlayer for your content needs. Find out what actual users are saying about each product and which one is best suited for you!

Payload CMS
Payload CMS
Payload is an open-source headless CMS and application framework that emphasizes flexibility, customization, and a developer-friendly environment. Provides powerful APIs, a clean UI, and robust support for various integrations.
Contentlayer
Contentlayer
Content made easy for developers. Contentlayer is a content SDK that validates and transforms your content into type-safe JSON data you can easily import into your application.

What Users Say

See what users who have used Payload CMS and Contentlayer have to say about their overall experience with the product.

Payload CMS's Key Strengths

Read what users love about Payload CMS.

Contentlayer's Key Strengths

Read what users love about Contentlayer.

Payload CMS's Key Issues

Read what issues users have with Payload CMS.

Contentlayer's Key Issues

Read what issues users have with Contentlayer.

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What Marketers & Content Creators Say

Hear from the users who uses Payload CMS and Contentlayer daily about their experience with the editors.

Payload CMS's Editorial Experience Highlights

What marketers love about Payload CMS's editor.

Contentlayer's Editorial Experience Highlights

What marketers love about Contentlayer's editor.

Payload CMS's Editorial Experience Issues

What marketers dislike about Payload CMS's editor.

Contentlayer's Editorial Experience Issues

What marketers dislike about Contentlayer's editor.

Mobile Editing

Find out how the platforms handle the mobile-first experience for the new generation of workforce on the move.

Payload CMS:
Mobile-First Experience

Payload CMS supports mobile-first experiences, allowing content creation on mobile devices seamlessly.

"It works seamlessly on desktop and mobile (still can't believe most headless CMS admin panels aren't responsive in 2022)."
Source
"Payload will give you backend superpowers... even non-technical users can independently make use of its Admin Panel to manage whatever they need to without having to know code."
Source
"Users in the Admin Panel have the ability to choose between light mode and dark mode for their editing experience."
Source
Contentlayer:
Not Suitable for Mobile

Contentlayer lacks explicit features for a mobile-first editing experience; primarily geared towards developer use.

"Contentlayer is a content SDK that validates and transforms your content into type-safe JSON data you can easily import into your application."
Source
"Contentlayer makes working with content easy for developers, focusing on static-site generator integration rather than mobile-first experiences."
Source
"ContentLayer has been a popular choice for developers looking to manage content as data, especially in Next.js applications."
Source

Automatic Content Linking

Find out if the platform supports automatic linking of related content to help user discover more content without additional manual effort from the marketer. This automatically create topical clusters of content and is essential for SEO.

Payload CMS:
No Automatic Content Linking

Payload CMS requires manual linking using the Relationship field; automated linking for SEO is not available.

"One of the most straightforward ways to manage related content in Payload CMS is through the Relationship field. This feature allows you to link different documents together."
Source
"By leveraging these relationship types, Payload CMS enables users to build complex content architectures that cater to a wide range of applications, from e-commerce sites to blogs with related posts."
Source
"The Rich Text field features a Link element which allows for users to automatically reference related documents within their rich text."
Source
Contentlayer:
AI-Powered Related Content

Contentlayer supports automatic links between related blog posts using a content collection feature.

"Contentlayer supports defining relations between content types, enabling automatic linking and related content generation."
Source
"Contentlayer allows for automatic generation of related posts based on defined relations in the content model."
Source
"Contentlayer provides a mechanism to create structured content and manage relationships including automatic internal linking."
Source

Automatic CTA Linking

Find out if the platform supports automatic display of Call-to-Actions using AI to help users take actions that are relevant to the content they are reading.

Payload CMS:
Manual CTA Linking

Supports custom components but lacks dedicated automatic CTA linking functionality.

"All Custom Components in Payload are React Server Components by default. This enables the use of the Local API directly on the front-end."
Source
"You can design and build your own Slate elements and leaves to extend the editor with your own functionality."
Source
"You can use Relationships to link to existing documents within the Rich Text field."
Source
Contentlayer:
No Automatic CTA Linking

Contentlayer does not support automatic CTA linking for personalized actions. HubSpot enables some level of dynamic behavior with CTAs, but not fully automated linking based on content analysis.

"The button CTA's link will be tied to the page ID and any changes in the page's URL will automatically update the button."
Source
"Calls to action (CTA) are another way to personalize the user experience by linking the functionality of marketing automation."
Source
"Using personalization tokens in CTAs is not built-in HubSpot functionality."
Source

Comments

Find out if the platform supports comments from your users to improve user engagement. This is often a great way to collect feedback and user emails.

Payload CMS:
Comments Supported

Payload CMS supports commenting via a dedicated plugin with features like comment approval and email alerts.

"A fully-customizable plugin for Payload CMS to create a collection for comments, reviews, or other user-submitted feedback."
Source
"Implement a comment functionality where everyone can comment without logging in."
Source
"The community discusses challenges and features of Payload, including the need for custom implementations."
Source
Contentlayer:
No Comments Supported

Contentlayer does not support built-in commenting features for users. Custom solutions may be created, but no native support exists.

"Updates will prioritize fixing pressing bugs and introducing new features."
Source
"Users to add comments, or applications supporting user-contributed content."
Source
"We're looking for more examples to better understand the use case before introducing this feature."
Source

Multi-tenancy

Find out if the platform supports managing multiple clients or projects within a single account. This is useful for agencies, multi-client or multi-project scenarios.

Payload CMS:
Multi-tenancy Supported

Payload CMS offers multi-tenancy via a plugin that enables hierarchical tenant management, domain mapping, and isolation.

"This plugin sets up multi-tenancy for your application from within your Admin Panel. It adds a `tenant` field to all specified collections."
Source
"This plugin allows multiple tenants to access different resources in the same instance of Payload CMS."
Source
"Payload's Access Control facilitated a multi-tenant, "subsite"-based system."
Source
Contentlayer:
No Multi-tenancy

Contentlayer does not support multi-tenancy for managing multiple client accounts.

"Contentlayer is a content SDK that validates and transforms your content into type-safe JSON data you can easily import into your application."
Source

What Developers Say

Hear from developers who've integrated and built on Payload CMS and Contentlayer about their experiences.

Ease of Integrating Payload CMS:
Medium
Users find Payload CMS has a moderate integration complexity, with some issues noted in documentation and support.
Ease of Integrating Contentlayer:
Medium
Integration with Contentlayer is relatively straightforward for developers familiar with Next.js but presents challenges with version compatibility.

Payload CMS's DX Highlights

What developers love about building with Payload CMS.

Contentlayer's DX Highlights

What developers love about building with Contentlayer.

Payload CMS's DX Issues

What developers dislike about building with Payload CMS.

Contentlayer's DX Issues

What developers dislike about building with Contentlayer.

Content Modelling

Find out how developers model and manage their content with the platform with key highlights and limitations.

Payload CMS:
Customisable Content Types

Payload CMS supports content modeling with various field types including relationships, arrays, and blocks.

"Payload provides a wide variety of built-in Field Types, each with its own unique properties and behaviors."
Source
"Payload allows parent/child content modelling using a nested docs plugin for hierarchical content."
Source
"Each Collection can have its own unique Access Control, Hooks, Admin Options, and more."
Source
Contentlayer:
Customisable Content Types

Contentlayer supports flexible content modelling with custom content types and fields like title, date, and body.

"Flexible content modelling through its configuration file."
Source
"Flexible content modelling allows you to structure your content in a powerful way."
Source
"Contentlayer allows for flexible content modelling through its configuration file, supporting custom content types."
Source

Custom React Components

Find out if the platform supports custom React components to go beyond the basic HTML components for content.

Payload CMS:
Custom React Components Supported

Payload CMS supports custom React components through its admin panel, allowing rich interactive content.

"Payload provides a pattern for you to supply your own React components through your Payload Config."
Source
"You can build completely custom field types in Payload by swapping in your own React components for any field in your app."
Source
Contentlayer:
Custom React Components Supported

Contentlayer supports custom React components via MDX, allowing marketers to embed them in content.

"You can override built-in HTML elements and create your own custom React components using the components prop of the MDXContent component."
Source
"Use custom React components to render and style certain types of content; Embed React components directly into your content using MDX."
Source
"Using custom components with Next Contentlayer is similar to Next MDX. You can define a components object and pass it to your MDX content."
Source

Full Text Search

Find out if the platform supports full text search across multiple fields to help users find content quickly.

Payload CMS:
Full Text Search Supported

Payload CMS supports full text search through the @payloadcms/plugin-search, enabling advanced search across various fields.

"This plugin generates records of your documents that are extremely fast to search on."
Source
"I would like to create a fulltext search endpoint for one of my collections."
Source
"A plugin for Payload to generate records of your documents that are extremely fast to search on."
Source
Contentlayer:
Full Text Search Supported

Full text search allows searching across multiple fields in a blog using Contentlayer.

"Full text search enables searching through content data efficiently."
Source
"The way blog posts should be stored in the database should make them amenable for search (full-text, search by containing image/video ...)."
Source
"This update indicates support for continued features, including full text search capabilities."
Source

Starter Kits

Discover starter kits and templates to help you get started with the platform.

Payload CMS:
Available

Payload CMS offers several starter kits, including an Ecommerce and a SvelteKit template.

(Expand section to see a list of Payload CMS templates and starter kits.)

Contentlayer:
Available

Multiple starter kits and templates are available for Contentlayer.

(Expand section to see a list of Contentlayer templates and starter kits.)

Pricing & Plans

Compare the prices of Payload CMS and Contentlayer.

Payload CMS's Pricing
Free
$0 / lifetime
- Completely open source
- Self-hosted
Standard
$35 / month
- MongoDB Atlas serverless DB
- 3GB database storage
- 30GB S3 file storage
- 40GB bandwidth /mo
- 512MB RAM, 1 vCPU
- 50 million serverless RPUs /mo
- One custom domain
- On-demand backup
- Payload-branded email service
Pro
$199 / month
- Dedicated M10 Atlas cluster
- 30GB database storage
- 150GB file storage
- 100GB bandwidth /mo
- 1GB RAM, 1 vCPU, 2 instances
- High-availability compute
- Up to 3 custom domains
- Automatic backups
- White-labeled email service
Custom
$0 / custom
- Any size Atlas database
- Unlimited database storage
- Unlimited file storage
- Unlimited bandwidth
- RAM and CPU scaled to needs
- High-availability compute
- Unlimited custom domains
- White-labeled email service
- Single Sign-On (SSO)
- Enterprise plugins
- 99.9% uptime SLA
Contentlayer's Pricing

Compare with other technologies

Looking for a better alternative to Payload CMS & Contentlayer? Try Wisp.
Wisp is the best solution for blogging. Try it free today!