InfluxDB 3 OSS is now GA. Transform, enrich, and act on time series data directly in the database. Automate critical tasks and eliminate the need to move data externally. Download now. Learn more β
Grav Alternatives
Similar projects and alternatives to Grav
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InfluxDB
InfluxDB β Built for High-Performance Time Series Workloads. InfluxDB 3 OSS is now GA. Transform, enrich, and act on time series data directly in the database. Automate critical tasks and eliminate the need to move data externally. Download now.
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Strapi
π Strapi is the leading open-source headless CMS. Itβs 100% JavaScript/TypeScript, fully customizable, and developer-first.
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eleventy πβ‘οΈ
A simpler site generator. Transforms a directory of templates (of varying types) into HTML.
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Directus
The flexible backend for all your projects π° Turn your DB into a headless CMS, admin panels, or apps with a custom UI, instant APIs, auth & more.
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Stream
Stream - Scalable APIs for Chat, Feeds, Moderation, & Video. Stream helps developers build engaging apps that scale to millions with performant and flexible Chat, Feeds, Moderation, and Video APIs and SDKs powered by a global edge network and enterprise-grade infrastructure.
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gutenberg
A fast static site generator in a single binary with everything built-in. https://www.getzola.org
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WriteFreely
A clean, Markdown-based publishing platform made for writers. Write together and build a community.
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Bolt
Bolt is a simple CMS written in PHP. It is based on Silex and Symfony components, uses Twig and either SQLite, MySQL or PostgreSQL. (by bolt)
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SaaSHub
SaaSHub - Software Alternatives and Reviews. SaaSHub helps you find the best software and product alternatives
Grav discussion
Grav reviews and mentions
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A new path forward for WordPress, and for the open web
Migrating to SSG is definitely one of the options!
I do wonder what other CMSes people do enjoy, though. My blog runs on Grav, a flat file CMS that still allows me to easily keep the content in Git, while also having some dynamic content and search (and optionally an admin UI): https://getgrav.org/
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Aether: A CMS That Gets Out of Your Way
> Aether sits in the sweet spot: simple enough for content creators, flexible enough for developers, fast enough for users.
A thing that most other developers miss is that non-technical people, like (and especially) content creator,s shy away from a terminal as if it were such a plague.
Some of them don't even have the mind concept of a directory tree, from a root drive to nested ones.
Therefore, if you have to `cd` to a directory and then `npm run build` it, yeah: the CMS is developer-oriented no matter what you claim. Once your Windows customer tries to run that command (assuming they know what `cmd.exe` is) they'll run into `'npm' is not recognized as an internal or external command, operable program or batch file.`. If it's a Linux person, they may find `node` and `npm` installed, but then it's closer to a developer than the pure content creator this is trying to target.
These products seriously need to compete with the 5-minute WordPress installation. I'm no WP fan, I really don't, but I give credit to its low-friction onboarding.
> Aether stores everything as Markdown files with YAML frontmatter.
Yeah, just like GravCMS[0]. Full disclosure: I'm a Grav user.
Except that Grav has a web admin interface: now, that is more approachable to a non-technical content creator than typing commands in a terminal.
I really don't want to make my comment feel like a rant, but it's very hard to ignore that some devs entirely miss the target public they intend to approach.
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[0]: https://getgrav.org/
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My blog doesn't need quality, it needs to look like it's from the 90s
Perhaps "polish" or "a sleek, modern UI" would have been slightly better wording on my part in regards to the look, but otherwise I'm quite happy that I settled on Grav and also the idea of versioning everything in Git, alongside a CI/CD pipeline, instead of one long lived instance on the server.
Grav is pretty cool: https://getgrav.org/
- Ask HN: Do you still self-host a blog? What's your publishing stack?
- WordPress Is in Trouble
- Matt Mullenweg Asks What Drama to Create in 2025, Community Reacts
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Building a Simple Grav CMS Theme with Twig, PHP, and CSS
But there is a content management system that makes it easier and simpler. And this is especially true for frontend developers. It's Grav CMS.
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Ask HN: Why hasn't Drupal benefited from WordPress's current issues?
Good point on the timing, but I really hope Wordpress users aren't migrating to Drupal en masse.
Drupal would be a very poor fit for most Wordpress-y sites (simple marketing pages, basic ecommerce, etc.). It's overkill and way too complicated and requires endless maintenance (see my rant in a sibling thread).
There are a lot of better, lighter options for people who liked the ease-of-use of Wordpress.
Wix/Squarespace are better choices for hosted/proprietary solutions, or in the FOSS/self-hosted world, there's https://ghost.org/, https://strapi.io/, https://getgrav.org/, or older PHP ones like TYPO3, Joomla, or CraftCMS.
There are also a lot of commercial headless CMSes (https://cms-comparison.io/#/card) that are good fits for devs who want to code a frontend (in a framework/language of their choice) for non-dev clients. (Disclaimer: I work for a headless CMS, but this is my own opinion). Wordpress can do headless too with the Advanced Custom Fields plugin, but that was previously bought by WPEngine and now caught in the crossfire between them and Matt :( https://www.advancedcustomfields.com/
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WordPress Alternatives
Not mentioned in OP: https://getgrav.org/
I used it for a project once and both me and the client were happy.
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K.I.S.S. - Why I moved my main site from Drupal to Grav CMS
It's Grav CMS.
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A note from our sponsor - InfluxDB
www.influxdata.com | 13 Jul 2025
Stats
getgrav/grav is an open source project licensed under MIT License which is an OSI approved license.
Grav is marked as "self-hosted". This means that it can be used as a standalone application on its own.
The primary programming language of Grav is PHP.
Review β β β β β 9/10