Staxly

Penpot vs Payload CMS

Open-source design + prototyping platform — Figma alternative, self-hostable
vs. TypeScript-first open-source headless CMS — code-first, config-driven

Penpot (OSS) ↗Payload CMS website ↗

Pricing tiers

Penpot

Free (Cloud)
$0. Unlimited files, unlimited projects, unlimited users. Full feature set.
Free
Self-Hosted (OSS)
Free forever. MPL 2.0 license. Docker Compose deploy. Full feature parity with cloud.
$0 base (usage-based)
Enterprise
Custom. Self-hosted support contract, SLA, training.
Custom
Penpot (OSS) ↗

Payload CMS

Open Source (self-host)
MIT license. Run free on any Node host. Full admin + APIs.
$0 base (usage-based)
Cloud — Standard
$35/month. 3 GB DB storage, 30 GB file storage, 40 GB bandwidth.
$35/mo
Cloud — Pro
$199/month. Higher resources + priority support.
$199/mo
Cloud — Enterprise
Custom cloud hosting with dedicated support.
Custom
Payload CMS website ↗

Free-tier quotas head-to-head

Comparing free on Penpot vs oss on Payload CMS.

MetricPenpotPayload CMS
No overlapping quota metrics for these tiers.

Features

Penpot · 16 features

  • Accessibility Checks — Contrast + color blindness.
  • Animations — Transitions + effects.
  • Auto Layout — Responsive components.
  • Comments — In-file discussion.
  • Components + Variants — Reusable elements.
  • Design Canvas — Vector drawing + layout.
  • Design Tokens (W3C) — Named design variables.
  • Figma File Import — Migrate from Figma.
  • Flex + Grid Layout — Layout constraints.
  • Inspector + Code Export — CSS/HTML/React/Flutter code.
  • Native SVG — Not a proprietary blob.
  • Plugins API — Extend Penpot.
  • Prototyping — Interactive flows.
  • Self-Host (MPL-2.0) — Docker deploy.
  • Shared Libraries — Team asset libraries.
  • Version History — File revisions.

Payload CMS · 18 features

  • Access Control — Function-based per-collection/field access rules.
  • Admin UI — React admin — fully customizable components + views.
  • Authentication — Built-in JWT + HTTP-only cookies + API keys.
  • Blocks — Flexible page-builder pattern via block field.
  • Collections — Schema-defined content types with fields, hooks, access control.
  • Drafts & Versions — Version every change. Autosave, drafts, scheduled publish.
  • Field Types — Rich field library: text, textarea, richText (Lexical), upload, relation, blocks…
  • Form Builder Plugin — Dynamic forms with submissions storage.
  • Globals — Single-instance documents (site settings, header, footer).
  • GraphQL API (auto) — Full schema auto-generated.
  • Hooks — Lifecycle hooks: beforeChange/Read/Delete, afterChange, etc.
  • i18n — Multi-locale field values + admin UI translations.
  • Live Preview — Side-by-side editor + iframe preview of Next.js site.
  • Local API (zero latency) — Direct in-process data access. Ideal for Next.js server components.
  • Multi-Tenancy Plugin — Multi-tenant content isolation via plugin.
  • @payloadcms/plugin-seo — Built-in SEO meta fields.
  • Plugins — Official + community plugins (SEO, Stripe, Form Builder, multi-tenant, etc.).
  • REST API (auto) — Auto-generated REST endpoints for every collection.

Developer interfaces

KindPenpotPayload CMS
CLI—create-payload-app
SDKPenpot Plugins API@payloadcms/next (Node)
REST—Payload REST API
GRAPHQL—Payload GraphQL API
OTHERDesktop App, Export + Inspect, Penpot Web, Self-Host (Docker)Admin UI, Local API (Node.js direct)
Staxly is an independent catalog of developer platforms. Some links to Penpot and Payload CMS may be affiliate links — Staxly may earn a commission if you sign up through them, at no extra cost to you. Pricing is verified against vendor pages at publication time — reconfirm before buying.

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