head to head · open source
Payload vs wondercms
Payload has 44,793 GitHub stars, 4,164 forks, 1,127 open issues and last shipped yesterday. wondercms has 740 stars, 168 forks, 16 open issues and last shipped 24 days ago. Payload leads on adoption by 5,953% (44,793 vs 740 stars). Payload is written in TypeScript under MIT; wondercms is written in PHP under MIT. Payload has attracted 9% as many forks as stars, wondercms 23%. Payload was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 3 topic tags (cms, content-management, content-management-system), so they are genuine substitutes rather than adjacent tools.
Two open source projects, one decision. Both are free and self-hostable — the differences are community size, license terms, language stack and release pace.
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Side by side
| Payload | wondercms | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 45K | ★ 740 |
| License | MIT | MIT |
| Written in | TypeScript | PHP |
| Last push | 2026-09-17 | 2026-08-25 |
| Forks | ⑂ 4.2K | ⑂ 168 |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick Payload if
- You weight community size — 45K stars and counting
- You want the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick wondercms if
- You want the wondercms feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the MIT license terms
- Your stack matches PHP
- You evaluated both and wondercms fits your workflow better
About Payload
Payload is an open source, MIT licensed headless CMS and fullstack framework, written in TypeScript and built to run natively inside a Next.js /app folder, aimed at developers who want a TypeScript backend and admin panel without signing up for another SaaS.
read the full Payload overview →
About wondercms
WonderCMS is a flat file content management system written in PHP and distributed under the MIT license. It is presented as a five file project, approximately 50KB when zipped, and it stores site data in a JSON database instead of a conventional external database server. The project lives in the content management system ecosystem, specifically the flat file CMS niche, and its topics include blogs, landing pages, lightweight sites, and content management.
read the full wondercms overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is Payload or wondercms more popular?
Payload has 44,793 GitHub stars and wondercms has 740. Payload has the larger community by that measure.
Are Payload and wondercms free?
Both are open source. Payload is licensed under MIT and wondercms under MIT. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between Payload and wondercms?
Payload is written in TypeScript and wondercms in PHP. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, Payload or wondercms?
Choose Payload if you want the larger community (44,793 stars) or its MIT licence terms. Choose wondercms if its feature set, stack or MIT licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.