Grav vs Payload CMS
A side-by-side comparison of two self-hosted content management systems options
— licensing, setup difficulty, resource needs, and what each one
replaces.
Not the right match-up?
Compare Grav with
choose an app… Hugo Astro Gatsby Ghost Jekyll Hexo Halo Docsify WordPress Wagtail Eleventy Zola Tina CMS Pelican Typecho October CMS django CMS Keystone Gridsome Orchard Core Metalsmith Publii Middleman Plasmic Pagekit Umbraco Joomla Statamic Mezzanine ApostropheCMS Drupal Lektor Pico Pimcore Craft CMS Microweber Anchor CMS Squidex Keystatic Piranha CMS PublicCMS Publify Kirby Winter CMS Bludit MODX Revolution Sulu TYPO3 Fork CMS Vvveb ProcessWire Backdrop CMS OJS Cowyo Automad ClassicPress Concrete CMS Superdesk Cockpit Next WonderCMS Silverstripe CMS Typemill Wiki-Go Bolt Omeka WikiDocs Omeka S ImpressPages Datenstrom Yellow Expressa Contao GetSimple CMS Monstra CouchCMS Indexhibit REDAXO Subrion CMS Phile Razuna Pytition Formwork Localess Noosfero WBCE CMS PHPBoost Sphido 299Ko CMS Made Simple Pepettes Scovie Lionwiki FastAPI Gemserv DotClear 2 Faircamp my_capsule Neos Petites Annonces PureBlog SPIP ZwiiCMS
Compare Payload CMS with
choose an app… Strapi Ghost Directus Docsify WordPress Wagtail Tina CMS October CMS django CMS Keystone Orchard Core Plasmic Pagekit Umbraco Joomla Statamic Mezzanine ApostropheCMS Drupal Pico Pimcore Craft CMS Microweber Anchor CMS Squidex Keystatic Piranha CMS PublicCMS Publify Kirby Winter CMS Bludit MODX Revolution Sulu TYPO3 Fork CMS Vvveb ProcessWire Backdrop CMS OJS Cowyo Automad ClassicPress Concrete CMS Superdesk Cockpit Next WonderCMS Silverstripe CMS Typemill Wiki-Go Bolt Omeka WikiDocs Omeka S ImpressPages Datenstrom Yellow Expressa Contao GetSimple CMS Monstra CouchCMS Indexhibit REDAXO Subrion CMS Phile Razuna Pytition Formwork Localess Noosfero WBCE CMS PHPBoost Sphido 299Ko CMS Made Simple Pepettes Scovie Lionwiki FastAPI Gemserv DotClear 2 Faircamp my_capsule Neos Petites Annonces PureBlog SPIP ZwiiCMS
Feature Grav Payload CMS Category Content Management Systems Content Management Systems License MIT MIT Language PHP TypeScript Setup difficulty Easy Medium Min. RAM 256 MB 512 MB Deployment docker, bare-metal, source docker, bare-metal, source GitHub stars ★ 15,620 ★ 44,043 First released 2014 2021 Replaces WordPress, Squarespace Contentful, Sanity
Why pick each one
Choose Grav if… Trivial to back up and migrate Quick to set up Grav details Choose Payload CMS if… Excellent TypeScript developer experience No vendor lock-in Payload CMS details
Frequently asked questions Is Grav or Payload CMS better? Neither is universally better. Payload CMS has the larger community, while Grav is simpler to set up (easy difficulty). Choose based on the comparison table above and your own setup.
Are Grav and Payload CMS free and open-source? Yes. Grav is licensed under MIT and Payload CMS under MIT. Both can be self-hosted at no software cost.
Can I run Grav and Payload CMS with Docker? Grav: yes. Payload CMS: yes.