# Payload Reviews 2026. Verified Reviews, Pros & Cons | Capterra

> Is Payload the right Headless CMS solution for you? Explore 48 verified user reviews from people in industries like yours to make a confident choice.

Source: https://www.capterra.com/p/218666/Payload-CMS/reviews

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Payload

4.9 (48)

[View alternatives](https://www.capterra.com/p/218666/Payload-CMS/alternatives/)

Provider data verified by our Software Research team, and reviews moderated by our Reviews Verification team. [Learn more](https://www.capterra.com/our-story/)

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Last updated March 13th, 2026

# Reviews of Payload

Ease of use

4.8

Customer Service

4.8

## Pros and Cons in Reviews

LM

Lou M

Software DeveloperComputer Software, 11 - 50 employeesUsed the software for: 1-2 years.

“The documentation was clear and effective, there were many examples that could be found on their own GitHub, and they have a very active discord community that are always willing to help when you run into problems.“

February 27, 2025

CP

Cameron P

CEOComputer Software, 2 - 10 employeesUsed the software for: 6-12 months.

“There are not as may enterprise-grade features built-in and there is a lack of third-party plugins compared to something like strapi or contentfulReview collected by and hosted on G2.com.“

May 24, 2023

LM

Lou M

Software DeveloperComputer Software, 11 - 50 employeesUsed the software for: 1-2 years.

“It's a very modern and sleek workflow, and can solve many of the required tasks out of the box.“

February 27, 2025

Seth S

Founder & PresidentFood Production, 11 - 50 employeesUsed the software for: Less than 6 months.

“Doesn't have enough traction in the community at the moment, and still missing some features that I'd love to see.“

January 6, 2022

JH

Jonas H

Head of TechnologyInformation Technology and Services, 51 - 200 employeesUsed the software for: Less than 6 months.

“The biggest strength is also one of its weaknesses: a toolset to build anything you want, on top of a solid foundation: strongly typed, endlessly extensible, great managed cloud hosting (although still in beta) and not to forget a vibrant community on discord.“

May 17, 2023

Shubham K

Full Stack Web DeveloperInformation Technology and Services, 11 - 50 employeesUsed the software for: 6-12 months.

“It strikes the perfect balance between low-code convenience and customization, allowing me to create and manage my web applications.“

May 27, 2023

## Showing most helpful reviews

Showing 1-25 of 48 Reviews

Sort by:

Most Helpful

Rating

Company Size

Reviewer's Role

Length of Use

Frequency of Use

Charlie H.  
Co-Founder  
Design  
Used the software for: 1-2 years

### "Seamless adoption by web agency"

August 14, 2024

5.0

There's always a nervousness when adopting a new platform but looking back there was nothing to be nervous about. It's been an easy & seamless process and gaining support as an agency partner has been great. We look forward to a bright future with Payload!

Pros

Show + Tell is a UK based Payload Agency... we've used payload as a web agency on multiple projects now as the feedback from IT & Marketing teams client side have been hugely positive. Client have found the content management process fare quick and more flexible to their needs meaning time saved in their day to day role. From development perspective the whole development team enjoy building on the platform and now dread if they have to develop on any of our legacy CMS systems we still support. It's been a big thumbs up from a programmers perspective.

Cons

The Enterprise is expensive from smaller companies however the product is great and well worth it for larger Enterprise level clients.

Switched from

[WordPress](https://www.capterra.com/p/131687/WordPress/)

Wordpress is 20 years old now and comes with a lot of bloat and performance issues. Payload solves these problems.

Review Source

MB

Mark B.  
CTO  
Information Technology and Services  
Used the software for: 2+ years

### "Payload - The best application framework on the market"

August 15, 2024

5.0

Been using Payload since summer 2022. The platform can be used as a CMS, or as an application framework. You can turn Payload into anything, either a rapid prototyping framework, or a content management hub

Pros

Developer experience, speed of development, and ease of extendability

Cons

Bundle size can be quite large for small scale projects

Alternatives considered

[Directus](https://www.capterra.com/p/156619/Directus/)

Reason for choosing Payload

The developer experience is unparalleled, and the ability to change everything in the platform is a major plus.

Switched from

[Strapi](https://www.capterra.com/p/170599/Strapi/)[Contentful](https://www.capterra.com/p/134266/Contentful/)

Strapi was too slow, and Contentful had a frustrating developer experience.

Review Source

Sanna J.  
Lead Developer  
E-Learning  
Used the software for: 6-12 months

### "Highly customisable CMS with a great i18n model"

May 31, 2023

4.0

Pros

Payload's i18n model is incredible for large scale projects, and managing complexity. Additionally the admin panel is highly customisable and can be tailored to any kind of business.

Cons

There is no way to generate admin thumbnails for files other than images. Mangling of node.js environment and browser environment pose a bit of an issue, but manageable.

Alternatives considered

[Keystone](https://www.capterra.com/p/196892/Keystone/)[Sanity](https://www.capterra.com/p/199501/Sanity/)

Reason for choosing Payload

Ease of use and it's self hostable.

Switched from

[Strapi](https://www.capterra.com/p/170599/Strapi/)

Strapi's i18n model is not up to par for projects relying on data integrity (each translation has a unique id, despite the document in theory being the same).

Review Source

Sandro W.  
CEO  
Telecommunications  
Used the software for: 1-2 years

### "Our go to framework"

August 13, 2024

5.0

For us, Payload strikes the perfect balance between providing everything you need to not start from scratch while still being completely customisable for our requirements. We've built everything from websites, online shops to management platforms and our clients love it!

Pros

\- No limitations for extending functionality - Super fast experience for the end user, low resource requirements especially compared to Wordpress - Open source, easy to self-host

Cons

Some convenient functionalities are still missing, e.g. bulk upload, display where media elements are used across the system, locking documents for other users while being edited/live collaboration. I assume they will be available at some point in the future, currently you'd just have to implement them yourself

Switched from

[WordPress](https://www.capterra.com/p/131687/WordPress/)[Sanity](https://www.capterra.com/p/199501/Sanity/)[Contentful](https://www.capterra.com/p/134266/Contentful/)

Extendability, option to self-host & own your data (GDPR)

Review Source

Jacob W.  
Technical Lead  
Marketing and Advertising  
Used the software for: 6-12 months

### "No more WordPress"

May 18, 2023

4.0

Very quick adoption. A couple small snags here and there. Generally very pleased.

Pros

It provides the most useful aspects of WordPress out of the box and does away with many of the aspects that holds WordPress back.

Cons

While it has been around for a couple of years, it still has plenty of ways to improve. As a result, there is definitely more time necessary to investigate what is possible to do with it. However, the codebase is purposefully left as non-abstracted as possible which makes understanding it that much easier.

Alternatives considered

[Drupal](https://www.capterra.com/p/119594/Drupal/)[Webflow](https://www.capterra.com/p/136159/Webflow/)[Directus](https://www.capterra.com/p/156619/Directus/)[Adobe Experience Manager](https://www.capterra.com/p/142300/Adobe-Experience-Manager/)[Strapi](https://www.capterra.com/p/170599/Strapi/)

Reason for choosing Payload

Open source, not a paid SAAS that forces me to pin to a service dependency that limits us. Code-oriented definition of data structures. Replacements for Gravity Forms and ACF. A plugin that doesn't cost hundreds of dollars to store assets on a CDN.

Switched from

[WordPress](https://www.capterra.com/p/131687/WordPress/)

PHP is expensive when upgrades need to happen. Node.js has no such problem thanks to NVM. WordPress is difficult to work with in a modern way due to its old code practices. Payload CMS is very open and easy to extend and modify while covering for most normal use-cases.

Review Source

Shubham K.  
Full Stack Web Developer  
Information Technology and Services  
Used the software for: 6-12 months

### "Seamless Control and Effortless Customization"

May 27, 2023

5.0

Pros

I've been using PaylaodCMS for my website development, and I must say it's been an incredible experience. As an Express.js user, having full control over my application is essential, and Paylaod CMS delivers just that. It strikes the perfect balance between low-code convenience and customization, allowing me to create and manage my web applications.

Cons

I've encountered some challenges with Paylaod CMS's loading time during development. To enhance the development speed, I would love to see it replaced with a more modern solution like Vite.js.

Switched from

[Sanity](https://www.capterra.com/p/199501/Sanity/)

We were familiar with Sanity CMS, but it did not give us the granular control we needed for our custom applications.

Review Source

Alessio G.  
Founder  
Information Technology and Services  
Used the software for: 1-2 years

### "Best Headless CMS"

May 7, 2023

5.0

I've tried MANY headless CMS options, and Payload has been the best so far

Pros

I'm able to customize every single aspect of this CMS. Support is amazing

Cons

Limited support for alternative databases, although more will be added in the next releases.

Alternatives considered

[Directus](https://www.capterra.com/p/156619/Directus/)[prismic.io](https://www.capterra.com/p/153182/prismic-io/)[Strapi](https://www.capterra.com/p/170599/Strapi/)

Reason for choosing Payload

Payload is more customizable and easier to use. Both the User-Experience, as well as the Developer Experience, beat everything I've used so far.

Switched from

[Directus](https://www.capterra.com/p/156619/Directus/)[WordPress](https://www.capterra.com/p/131687/WordPress/)[prismic.io](https://www.capterra.com/p/153182/prismic-io/)[Sanity](https://www.capterra.com/p/199501/Sanity/)[Strapi](https://www.capterra.com/p/170599/Strapi/)

Other CMS's did not support everything I wanted to do. I felt very limited in what I could do.

Review Source

Christopher S.  
Sr. Full-Stack Software Developer  
Information Technology and Services  
Used the software for: Less than 6 months

### "The best option for developers"

September 6, 2023

5.0

It has been a pleasant experience to use Payload as my backend option. Only one place to configure my DB, API, and CMS in a simple way. It's awesome to have a backend so fast and easy.

Pros

Developer friendly. It's very useful and beneficial that we can customize and extend almost anything. We can define rules for each collection or field and create our own endpoints. The admin panel is easy to use and nice-looking.

Cons

I'm waiting for that Postgres adapter so we can have a relational database alternative. I believe Payload would be almost perfect if we could also customize the admin panel with Svelte components instead of React components.

Alternatives considered

[Firebase](https://www.capterra.com/p/160941/Firebase/)[Strapi](https://www.capterra.com/p/170599/Strapi/)

Reason for choosing Payload

I thought I could use Firebase as a CMS but I discovered that I was totally wrong. I also tried Strapi, because it's leading in GitHub stars, but I didn't like the admin panel, I found it complicated to use for non-tech users and I didn't find how to customize it to work and look the way I wanted.

Review Source

Seth S.  
Founder & President  
Food Production  
Used the software for: Less than 6 months

### "Hands down the best modern CMS"

January 6, 2022

4.0

Pros

Lightweight, robust, feature rich, extremely extensible. IMO the best modern CMS.

Cons

Doesn't have enough traction in the community at the moment, and still missing some features that I'd love to see.

Alternatives considered

[Statamic](https://www.capterra.com/p/183605/Statamic/)[Sanity](https://www.capterra.com/p/199501/Sanity/)[Strapi](https://www.capterra.com/p/170599/Strapi/)[Contentful](https://www.capterra.com/p/134266/Contentful/)

Reason for choosing Payload

We need a CMS that checks all the basic CMS feature boxes while at the same time providing a robust framework for extending functionality and building custom business logic alongside basic CMS functionality.

Switched from

[Strapi](https://www.capterra.com/p/170599/Strapi/)

Strapi is considerably lacking in some basic CMS functionality and surprisingly difficult to build custom functionality / business logic on top of.

Review Source

LM

Lou M.  
Software Developer  
Computer Software  
Used the software for: 1-2 years

### "Payload: The Next-Gen CMS You've Been Waiting For"

February 27, 2025

5.0

We needed a quick solution that would allow a content admin to control content for a multi-faceted marketing site. The flexibility to create new pages and re-use content across the site. It allowed us to develop a custom solution tailored very closely to the customers needs with ease.

Pros

The documentation was clear and effective, there were many examples that could be found on their own GitHub, and they have a very active discord community that are always willing to help when you run into problems. Extremely fast turn around time from blank slate to production. The ease of use, one command and you're up and running. Having Typescript across the project helps to not shoot yourself in the foot. It's a very modern and sleek workflow, and can solve many of the required tasks out of the box. Their hosting solution was very easy to use and at an affordable/fair price.

Cons

Nothing at this time, they have a great roadmap of future implementations that solve all niche issues as well.

Review Source

JY

Jen Y.  
Director of Digital Experience  
Design  
Used the software for: 6-12 months

### "Efficient and User-Friendly CMS"

August 14, 2024

5.0

My overall experience with Payload has been very positive. The tool is user-friendly and provides a robust set of features that greatly facilitate content management. Its speed and precision are impressive, making it a reliable choice for our needs.

Pros

I appreciated the intuitive user interface and the comprehensive features that made it easy to manage content.

Cons

N/A. There's nothing that I don't like about Payload

Review Source

CP

Cameron P.  
CEO  
Computer Software  
Used the software for: 6-12 months

### "Finally a developer focused CMS""

May 24, 2023

5.0

Payload CMS helps us have a common structure between all of the sites that we manage and allows us to customize it for clients.

Pros

Payload has the perfect balance between user customizability and developer experience. The advantage of a CMS is it does a lot of things for you but most CMS do that by compromising the Dx by locking out certain features. Payload doesn't do this and allows you to change every aspect of the site while keeping your users happy.

Cons

I think the biggest disadvantage to PayloadCMS is its young age. There are not as may enterprise-grade features built-in and there is a lack of third-party plugins compared to something like strapi or contentfulReview collected by and hosted on G2.com.

Review Source

JE

Jan E.  
Product Owner  
Computer Software  
Used the software for: 6-12 months

### "Finally a good headless CMS"

May 24, 2023

5.0

Especially for customers who do not yet know exactly where they will end up, it is the perfect headless CMS due to its flexibility.

Pros

High focus on developer experience, minimalistic design, extremely easy customizable logic. Very dedicated and friendly support!

Cons

Sometimes it's kinda difficult to customize the design, but that's not really a big deal since it's used as a backoffice anyway.

Reason for choosing Payload

Directus puts emphasis on many features that we will not use and is already more complex overall. GraphQL works way better with Payload also.

Review Source

Jean W.  
Software developper  
Computer Software  
Used the software for: Less than 6 months

### "Amazing"

May 22, 2023

5.0

Pros

It's simple. You can easily learn and get something running in a matter of hours. The API's are perfectly designed and snappy, and the flexibility is crazy.We switched from Directus after 1 year of use in less than a week.

Cons

The cloud is a little unstable, but it's still in beta for the moment.

Review Source

VR

Verified Reviewer  
Frontend Developer  
Computer Software  
Used the software for: Less than 6 months

### "A perfect fit for the CMS I always looked for"

May 17, 2023

5.0

Pros

Extremly configurable with already familiar syntax and patterns. Easy to get started and helpful examples and templates.

Cons

Needs to be run on an express server and at the moment of writing it is limited to MongoDB which will be extended in the near future

Review Source

RH

Romain H.  
Front-end developer  
Design  
Used the software for: Less than 6 months

### "Smooth developer experience"

May 23, 2023

5.0

Pros

The ease of the typescript configuration

Cons

I haven't had a sticking point yet that caused me problems

Review Source

JH

Jay H.  
CEO  
Marketing and Advertising  
Used the software for: 6-12 months

### "Payload: An open source Headless CMS you'll love"

August 14, 2024

5.0

Pros

Payload offers the best developer and content manager experience of all the headless CMSs we've tried. It's open source, and the Payload team are very supportive and easy to reach.

Cons

Like all headless CMSs there's a learning curve compared to a traditional CMS like WordPress. It's dashboard UI can be a little underwhelming for users first trying the product.

Switched from

[WordPress](https://www.capterra.com/p/131687/WordPress/)[DatoCMS](https://www.capterra.com/p/10004474/DatoCMS/)[Contentful](https://www.capterra.com/p/134266/Contentful/)

Payload is open source, flexible and offers a great developer experience.

Review Source

Hrithik U.  
CEO  
Information Technology and Services  
Used the software for: Less than 6 months

### "Best Headless CMS"

August 14, 2024

5.0

Pros

The packed-in features, robust scalability and support from the Payload team outperform every other option!

Cons

I do not have anything to pinpoint as such, but there are absolutely more features to come in and once it does, Payload is going to be the top option for many.

Review Source

JE

Jennifer E.  
CEO  
Computer Software  
Used the software for: 1-2 years

### "The Headless CMS every Dev has been waiting for"

May 31, 2023

5.0

Overall it will be my go-to backend for any kind of software.

Pros

Payload CMS was a total gamechanger for my development experience. I have been researching a Headless CMS that is easy to customize and extend for over a year until I stumbled upon Payload. From the get go the documentation was very extensive, getting a hang on it was very easy and now the process of creating a CMS that is fit to the customers need is done in a fracture of the time. Easy WordPress replacement. Also the response times within the Community are very fast if you have questions and the founders are always there for a chat and take recommondations thoughtfully

Cons

While extension of the UI is possible, a layout builder with Drag and Drop features (eg. as a Plugin) would be great.

Alternatives considered

[Keystone](https://www.capterra.com/p/196892/Keystone/)[Strapi](https://www.capterra.com/p/170599/Strapi/)[Contentful](https://www.capterra.com/p/134266/Contentful/)

Reason for choosing Payload

Its easy to setup and features are easily integrated - nothing new to learn

Switched from

[WooCommerce](https://www.capterra.com/p/225601/WooCommerce/)[WordPress](https://www.capterra.com/p/131687/WordPress/)

Too much maintanance with 3rd Party Dependencies and Security Issues

Review Source

VR

Verified Reviewer  
IT Specialist  
Consumer Electronics  
Used the software for: 1-2 years

### "The CMS that everyone was waiting for!"

May 22, 2023

5.0

Overall, the cms is great and easy to use for website backends, but also as apis or internal tooling.

Pros

Payload is the most user friendly and developer oriented cms I’ve used so far. Its customisability and ease of use while keeping the express app fully accessible works great for us. Also the localisation is a lot better, since it works perfect in combination with generating routes necessary for NextJS dynamic routes.

Cons

Honestly, the only thing I’ve heard from our users is that the admin interface looks to basic. I rather see that as a good thing. It’s clean and easy to understand.

Alternatives considered

[prismic.io](https://www.capterra.com/p/153182/prismic-io/)[Strapi](https://www.capterra.com/p/170599/Strapi/)

Reason for choosing Payload

Prismic didn’t offer good functionally to generate localised paths needed for nextjs dynamic pages. Strapi made custom blocks and relations within far more difficult than necessary.

Switched from

[WordPress](https://www.capterra.com/p/131687/WordPress/)

We are currently rewriting our Wordpress site to run on NextJS and payload as a cms.

Review Source

FM

Filip M.  
Developer  
Computer Software  
Used the software for: Less than 6 months

### "Modern way to build website with headless CMS"

May 1, 2024

5.0

Pros

Payload has many great features and amazing and fast support. The advantage is that the project is open source and some people are creating amazing ideas. The Payload team is very reliable and tries to answer and accommodate everyone. Project is very active and always releases amazing new versions, which usually don't cause any problems with older versions.

Cons

I would have expected more examples in the documentation, some things are missing or incorrect. Payload also doesn't use concepts that some may be used to. If you're not a developer, sometimes it can be harder to understand or learn some features. But despite this, Payload CMS is a very powerful and flexible CMS.

Review Source

LV

Lou V.  
CEO  
Internet  
Used the software for: 6-12 months

### "Amazing experience with Payload CMS!"

May 17, 2023

5.0

Payload CMS makes a clear cut between the developer side and setup of the different fields and entries and the editor experience. It feels extremely nice to share the stack we work with between the frontend and the backend.

Pros

Payload is all we can want in terms of balance between developer experience and editor experience. The backend is extremely easily extendable, the administration panel UI is clean and easy to use. We love the tool and we truly believe this is the future of open-source CMSs.

Cons

At the moment the CMS is only limited to MongoDB databases but we know the team at Payload is hard working on a Postgres adapter that will ceil the deal for us. It might even not be the case anymore when you read this review.

Reason for choosing Payload

The technical stack and the way Payload is build suits our teams habits perfectly. It is extensible and hyper flexible. It bridges out backend and frontend setup nicely.

Switched from

[Craft](https://www.capterra.com/p/161664/Craft/)[prismic.io](https://www.capterra.com/p/153182/prismic-io/)[Strapi](https://www.capterra.com/p/170599/Strapi/)

After switching to a fully headless setup, we quickly ran into limitations with the well known options on the market. Payload has solved many of these caveats and it is really evolving in the right direction.

Review Source

AL

Audrius L.  
Head of Interactive  
Design  
Used the software for: 6-12 months

### "Unrivaled CMS experience both for website admins and for developers"

May 17, 2023

5.0

Absolutely everything, from the community, to the actual product.

Pros

The developer experience which enables anyone who knows javascript to customize both how the admin panel looks and how the backend works is just mind blowing. We've recently went on a journey to find the perfect CMS for our react/next based websites and I can with 100% confidence say that absolutely nothing compares to Payload.

Cons

When not using Payload Cloud, hosting Payload can sometimes be pretty confusing, having everything set up perfectly. But once you do it once or twice, it's a piece of cake. Other than that there are no negatives.

Reason for choosing Payload

Historically, working with headless CMS'es for react/next projects has been pretty hard. There were no CMS products that would have both excelent DX and be completely customizable for the end user (client admins). Payload does it all and with flying colors.

Switched from

[Sanity](https://www.capterra.com/p/199501/Sanity/)[Contentful](https://www.capterra.com/p/134266/Contentful/)

In almost every part of the comparable product features, payload delivers and over-delivers.

Review Source

VR

Verified Reviewer  
Frontend Developer  
Online Media  
Used the software for: Less than 6 months

### "Best Headless CMS"

May 17, 2023

5.0

I am using it in a federal organization and currently for a project where you can create templates via forms. It helped a lot because the setup was very quick and we could focus on the development and the Editors on the content.

Pros

The best thing about Payload is that it is very flexible- So you can use it for any kind of Project. Everything you need comes out of the box but you can also expand it as you like. You can create everything in code and you do not need any kind of GUI to create a Schema. Also everything is in Typescript so it makes the developement process really easy and fast. As a Big Compny you can easily White label it and customize it as you whish.

Cons

The only thing is that it is pretty new on the market so you will not find many ressources - but that is not really a prolem because the documentation is really good and their discord server and the community behind it is even better.

Alternatives considered

[Storyblok](https://www.capterra.com/p/213991/Storyblok/)[Strapi](https://www.capterra.com/p/170599/Strapi/)

Reason for choosing Payload

because it met all the requirements - selfhosted- All in code- mongoDB- easy expandable

Review Source

EJ

Eric J.  
Developer  
Information Technology and Services  
Used the software for: 6-12 months

### "Excellent CMS for developers who want easy customization"

May 23, 2023

5.0

Payload provides a very fast, lightweight CMS solution that I can self-host for free and customize as desired. It works well with modern web frameworks like NextJS as well, which makes it a good headless CMS option or people using that framework.

Pros

It is developer-friendly, being code-first and written entirely in TypeScript. It is easy to self-host and deploy. The documentation is excellent and allows developers to add customizations and develop their own plugins. Unlike many other CMS's, Payload is relatively unopinionated. And their developer team is very responsive to issues raised on their GitHub page.

Cons

There isn't much that I dislike about it. Because it is unopinionated, it is also a bit skeletal, so you do have to do a bit of work to get something you want up and running.

Reason for choosing Payload

It is free and open-source. Its documentation is excellent.

Switched from

[WordPress](https://www.capterra.com/p/131687/WordPress/)

Payload is less opinionated, faster, and easier to customize.

Review Source

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