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payloadcms/templates/with-vercel-mongodb
Elliot DeNolf dbd91bf354 templates: bump for v3.55.0 (#13754)
🤖 Automated bump of templates for v3.55.0

Triggered by user: @denolfe

Co-authored-by: github-actions[bot] <github-actions[bot]@users.noreply.github.com>
2025-09-09 12:26:12 -04:00
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Payload Blank Starter

Deploy with Vercel

This template comes configured with the bare minimum to get started on anything you need.

Quick start

Click the 'Deploy' button above to spin up this template directly into Vercel hosting. It will first prompt you save this template into your own Github repo so that you own the code and can make any changes you want to it.

Set up the following services and secrets and then once the app has been built and deployed you will be able to visit your site at the generated URL. From this point on you can access your admin panel at /admin of your app URL, create an admin user and then click the 'Seed the database' button in the dashboard to add content into your app.

Services

This project uses the following services integrated into Vercel which you will need to click "Add" and "Connect" for:

Mongo Atlas - MongoDB-based cloud database used to host your data

Vercel Blob Storage - object storage used to host your files such as images and videos

The connection variables will automatically be setup for you on Vercel when these services are connected.

Secrets

You will be prompted to add the following secret values to your project. These should be long unguessable strong passwords, you can also use a password manager to generate one for these.

PAYLOAD_SECRET - used by Payload to sign secrets like JWT tokens

Quick Start - local setup

To spin up this template locally, follow these steps:

Clone

After you click the Deploy button above, you'll want to have standalone copy of this repo on your machine. If you've already cloned this repo, skip to Development.

Development

  1. First clone the repo if you have not done so already

  2. cd my-project && cp .env.example .env to copy the example environment variables. You'll need to add the MONGODB_URI and BLOB_READ_WRITE_TOKEN from your Vercel project to your .env if you want to use Vercel Blob and the Neon database that was created for you.

  3. pnpm install && pnpm dev to install dependencies and start the dev server

  4. open http://localhost:3000 to open the app in your browser

That's it! Changes made in ./src will be reflected in your app. Follow the on-screen instructions to login and create your first admin user. Then check out Production once you're ready to build and serve your app, and Deployment when you're ready to go live.

Docker (Optional)

If you prefer to use Docker for local development instead of a local MongoDB instance, the provided docker-compose.yml file can be used.

To do so, follow these steps:

  • Modify the MONGODB_URI in your .env file to mongodb://127.0.0.1/<dbname>
  • Modify the docker-compose.yml file's MONGODB_URI to match the above <dbname>
  • Run docker-compose up to start the database, optionally pass -d to run in the background.

How it works

The Payload config is tailored specifically to the needs of most websites. It is pre-configured in the following ways:

Collections

See the Collections docs for details on how to extend this functionality.

  • Users (Authentication)

    Users are auth-enabled collections that have access to the admin panel.

    For additional help, see the official Auth Example or the Authentication docs.

  • Media

    This is the uploads enabled collection. It features pre-configured sizes, focal point and manual resizing to help you manage your pictures.

Docker

Alternatively, you can use Docker to spin up this template locally. To do so, follow these steps:

  1. Follow steps 1 and 2 from above, the docker-compose file will automatically use the .env file in your project root
  2. Next run docker-compose up
  3. Follow steps 4 and 5 from above to login and create your first admin user

That's it! The Docker instance will help you get up and running quickly while also standardizing the development environment across your teams.

Questions

If you have any issues or questions, reach out to us on Discord or start a GitHub discussion.