directus

The flexible backend for all your projects 🐰 Turn your DB into a headless CMS, admin panels, or apps with a custom UI, instant APIs, auth & more.

⭐ 34,985 stars on GitHub · 🍴 4,732 forks · 📜 License: other · 💻 Language: TypeScript

What is directus?

If you already have a SQL database and want a polished backend without rewriting your data model, Directus is one of the strongest options available. Its differentiator is simple but powerful: it sits directly on top of your existing database and turns it into APIs, an admin UI, and a content/data management layer.

Main components

• Instant REST and GraphQL APIs generated from your SQL schema.
• A web-based admin studio for managing tables, records, users, roles, and permissions.
• Granular access control with roles, policies, field-level permissions, and authentication.
• Data modeling tools for creating collections, relationships, fields, validation rules, and layouts.
• Automation flows for webhooks, scheduled jobs, approvals, notifications, and backend logic.
• Extensibility through custom endpoints, hooks, interfaces, displays, modules, and operations.

Clear use cases

• Turn an existing PostgreSQL, MySQL, SQLite, or other supported SQL database into a headless CMS without migrating to a proprietary content platform.
• Build an internal admin panel for support teams, operations staff, or non-technical users who need safe access to production data.
• Provide instant REST and GraphQL APIs for a frontend app, mobile app, or static site while keeping your database as the source of truth.
• Manage structured content for websites, documentation portals, product catalogs, directories, or multi-language publishing workflows.
• Add role-based data access, approval flows, and audit-friendly admin tooling around business data that currently lives in raw database tables.

The biggest strength is database-first architecture — Directus does not force you into a custom content repository or opaque storage model. You keep control of your schema, your SQL database, and your infrastructure, while Directus adds the layer most teams do not want to build from scratch: APIs, permissions, admin screens, file handling, and workflow automation. Compared with commercial headless CMS platforms, that makes it especially attractive when you need ownership, portability, and flexibility rather than a hosted black box.

Directus is also more than a CMS. The admin studio can act as a low-code back office for almost any relational dataset, and the generated APIs make it practical to build client applications quickly. The tradeoff is that you still need to understand your database design, permissions model, and deployment setup; it is not a no-thought website builder. But for teams comfortable with SQL and self-hosting, that control is exactly the point.

Best for developers, agencies, startups, and internal tools teams that want a self-hosted backend, headless CMS, or admin panel directly on top of their own SQL database.

Topics: the project is tagged with popular topics:

• 🏷️ api
• 🏷️ app
• 🏷️ cms
• 🏷️ composable
• 🏷️ data-visualization
• 🏷️ database
• 🏷️ directus
• 🏷️ graphql
• 🏷️ headless-cms
• 🏷️ javascript

Quick install

The project supports Docker Compose:

git clone https://github.com/directus/directus.git
cd directus
docker compose up -d

Check the README in the repo for required env variables.

Minimum system requirements

⚡ Deploy fast on VSIS

Use the VSIS VPS Lite 2GB RAM / 2 vCPU / 25GB SSD (~104k/tháng) plan from VSIS.NET — high-speed VN-based VPS, 24/7 support, ideal for running directus smoothly.

🎯 Benefits:

• One-command docker compose up -d deploy in 2 minutes
• Dedicated IPv4, root access, unmetered domestic bandwidth
• Daily snapshot backup
• Free install assistance from the VSIS team

👉 See matching VPS plans at vsis.net

Resources

• 🔗 GitHub: directus/directus
• 🌐 Homepage: https://directus.io
• 📚 Official docs: see README in the repo
• 💬 Community: GitHub Issues + Discussions

Article compiled from GitHub data on 05/05/2026. Star/fork counts may have changed — see live numbers via the GitHub link.