Creating and managing a website requires powerful software that allows you to craft a product that appeals to the needs of your customers and target audience. For example, you can use content management system (CMS) software to develop, alter, and manage the content that’s placed on your website. The best CMS software solutions allow you to complete all these tasks without having technical knowledge. You can build an entire website without writing a single line of code.
A headless CMS is a type of content management system that gives you the ability to separate the backend from the presentation layer. Whenever you update content on the backend, it will be displayed on any channel. It also allows for a quicker editing experience when you’re looking to improve SEO or add new content to your website. Headless CMS software is becoming increasingly important for companies that want to stay ahead of the competition.
When you’re looking to choose a headless CMS for your project, you’ll have numerous options to select from. Since this platform will help you build and manage your website, it’s highly recommended that you take your time to find the CMS that’s right for you and your company. Two of the most popular headless CMS platforms are Sanity and Strapi. They offer ample flexibility and extensive features. The following guide compares Sanity vs Strapi to help you make the right decision.
Understanding Sanity CMS
Sanity is a customizable and powerful content platform that serves as a CMS. You can develop, manage, and distribute content to many digital channels via an API. The purpose of Sanity is to provide website owners and businesses with a platform that allows them to create a comprehensive content strategy and maintain it with a sophisticated editing experience. The tools that Sanity provides make it possible for teams to collaborate and produce dynamic content that will satisfy their main audiences. Some of the best features available with the Sanity CMS include the following:
- All materials are managed and stored through an API, which makes it easy for developers to obtain and send the content to any application or front-end. It’s a highly scalable feature.
- Because Sanity places a significant focus on maintaining a robust editing environment, developers can collaborate in real time. It’s possible for multiple people to work on the same content at once, during which they’ll be able to see real-time changes.
- Developers have complete control over the data models of their materials. They can customize connections, schemas, and fields to suit any project.
While many different types of websites can benefit from using the Sanity CMS, there are certain use cases where the platform excels, which include the following:
- Ecommerce platform management
- Collaborative content creation
- Developing digital marketing content
- Performing content management on most websites
- Providing support for multilingual websites
Understanding Strapi CMS
Strapi is another feature-rich CMS that’s self-hosted and open-source. It provides users with a customizable content management solution that allows for the development of API-driven apps. Website owners also benefit from its user-friendly interface. The main features and strengths of Strapi are:
- The interface is easy to use for the altering and creating of different types of content. Even non-technical users shouldn’t have any problems.
- Like Sanity, the Strapi CMS is API-based, which allows it to take a headless approach. The delivery and content management layers are properly isolated.
- Dynamic content modeling is possible with Strapi’s drag-and-drop interface.
If you’re wondering when to use Strapi, it excels in the following situations:
- API-focused projects
- Implementing headless CMS architecture in your project
- Integration of content management on IoT devices
- Instant content updates for Progressive Web Applications (PWAs)
Feature Comparison
Before you choose a CMS, compare the many features that Sanity and Strapi provide.
Content Modeling and Flexibility
When it comes to content modeling, Sanity allows users to create an unlimited number of content fields and types that can be customized. Developers can also make conditional fields and add attributes to content types. If you need to query data, Sanity provides the Graph-Relational Object Queries (GROQ) feature, which is a popular query language.
When using GROQ, developers are able to query data with considerable granularity. During this process, you can use projections, sorting, joins, and filters to develop queries that retrieve specific data sets. You’ll benefit from better UI efficiency with all the customization options at your disposal.
As for Strapi, it also provides users with comprehensive content modeling features. You can take advantage of custom and relational fields. This platform uses a GraphQL API to accommodate pagination, sorting, and filtering. The primary drawback to Strapi is that its query engine doesn’t come with the same level of versatility as Sanity’s GROQ.
User Interface and User Experience
As touched upon previously, Strapi offers exemplary user-friendliness and a fantastic UI/UX design. Even if you don’t have any technical know-how, you should be able to use this headless CMS without encountering any hurdles. Sanity isn’t as easy to use if you aren’t technically inclined. You may have problems handling certain content-related tasks.
Performance and Scalability
Sanity consists of scalable cloud infrastructure as well as a cached CDN that allows companies to meet consumer demands. If your company grows rapidly, Sanity should be able to scale without issue by leveraging quick APIs and GROQ. You can add considerable amounts of content without experiencing slowdown.
The performance benchmarks and scalability of Strapi depend on the specific deployment method you select. When you choose the self-hosted option, your infrastructure determines how well your website performs and scales. In this scenario, Node.js may be the solution you need to effectively scale your offerings. If you select Strapi Cloud, you don’t need to manage your infrastructure. You’ll benefit from a platform that can handle large-scale projects and significant traffic spikes with ease.
Community and Support
Sanity has a large and active developer community that can help users while they work on complex projects. You can tap into this community by asking for recommendations for plugins and other integrations to improve the performance or usability of your website. However, Sanity’s ecosystem is still growing, which means that it doesn’t provide the same level of documentation and resources as other CMS platforms.
As for Strapi, you’ll have access to a large user base that includes smaller organizations, content editors, and developers. They offer in-depth documentation and ample resources. The community has created a vast library of themes and plugins that can help you improve your website and content management efforts.
SEO and Marketing Capabilities
Each platform offers numerous SEO and marketing features that you can take advantage of.
SEO Features
Strapi provides an official SEO plugin that helps manage social tags, SEO tags, and content types. You can also use plugins to perform SEO analysis.
As for Sanity, their SEO features include the ability to create fields during your Sanity Studio workflow and compatibility with React, Next.js, and Sanity v3.
Marketing Integration
Sanity provides users with more than 200 plugins and tools that include marketing, website analysis, collaborative editing, artificial intelligence, and optimization options. The API system also integrates easily with custom plugins.
In comparison, Strapi offers an expansive library of marketing integrations and plugins that accommodate different needs. You can find plugins for deployment solutions, custom fields, and monitoring tools.
Security and Compliance
You’ll discover that Sanity focuses a lot on security and compliance. Administrators are able to define role-based access controls, which means that developers will only gain access to what they need to complete their tasks. Their infrastructure is CCPA and GDPR-compliant.
Strapi has an in-house security team that’s accessible through the cloud plan. Some of the security features you’ll have access to include review workflows, audit logs, automated backups, role-based access control, and encryption protocols.
Pricing and Licensing
The Sanity platform offers three distinct pricing plans. If you choose the free plan, you’ll be able to build smaller, individual projects with the features that it provides. In comparison, the Growth plan is designed to be used by smaller businesses that are looking to expand. It uses a pay-as-you-go model where the pricing increases with higher usage. You’ll find that the Enterprise plan is meant for larger companies that have more robust performance, compliance, and security needs. The pricing for the Enterprise plan is only available with a quote.
Strapi pricing depends on whether you choose the cloud or self-hosted option. The self-hosted community plan is meant to be used by smaller companies or individual developers. It’s also free. The self-hosted Enterprise plan is suitable for larger teams. If you’d rather use their cloud platform, consider the Pro plan, which costs around $99 per month. More exhaustive features are available for larger companies with the Team Cloud plan, which costs $499 per month.
Conclusion
Sanity and Strapi are two of the best headless CMS platforms. They both offer large plugin libraries, strong security features, and effective content modeling solutions. If you don’t have any experience with coding or other technical tools, consider Strapi. Sanity offers more customization options that experienced developers can take advantage of.
When you’re choosing between these two platforms, consider the size of your business, the pricing of each CMS, and the types of features you require to manage and produce the content your customers expect.
