Payload vs Sanity

Payload and Sanity are both headless CMSs with schemas in code, a React editing interface, and strong Next.js support. They differ in who runs the content.

Payload is software you run. Since version 3 it installs directly into a Next.js app, so the admin panel, the API, and your website are one deployment. Content sits in your own database, Postgres, MongoDB, or SQLite, through official adapters, and you can query it in-process with the Local API.

Sanity is a service you use. Content sits in Sanity's hosted Content Lake and you query it with GROQ over Sanity's APIs and CDN. The Studio, the editing interface, is open source and can be hosted by Sanity, on your own domain, or embedded as a route in your Next.js app, but the content itself always lives with Sanity.

Pick Payload when you want your content and your app data in one database you own. Leads, orders, users, and content can be collections side by side, with access control written as code. For a business site that collects enquiries, that removes a second system.

Pick it when you want one deployment. The CMS runs inside the same Next.js app as the website, so there is no separate content service to pay for or connect, and the Local API reads content without a network call.

And pick it when data residency or exit matters. Your content is rows in your Postgres or documents in your MongoDB, backed up and moved like any other data.

Pick Sanity when several editors work on the same content at once. Real-time collaborative editing, presence, and history are core to Sanity, and its visual editing lets editors click on the page they see and change it.

Pick it when you do not want to run a database or worry about content scaling. Sanity hosts the Content Lake and serves it from a CDN, so there is less infrastructure on your side.

And pick it when content feeds many places, such as a website, an app, and email, from one structured source. GROQ is an expressive query language for shaping content per channel, and Portable Text keeps rich text structured rather than stored as HTML.

Payload is free, open-source software. You pay for the hosting and the database it runs on, which for a Next.js site you are often paying for already. Sanity has a free tier and paid plans priced by seats and usage, so cost grows with your editorial team and traffic. Check both pricing pages against your real numbers.

Leaving is different too. Moving off Payload means moving a database you already own. Moving off Sanity means exporting your datasets and rewriting the GROQ queries and Portable Text rendering in your frontend. Neither is a trap, but the Payload exit is shorter.

Our production CMS work is Payload, on Siona Jewels, and a custom admin on Firebase for The Sharp Interiors. We have not shipped a Sanity project, so our view of Sanity comes from its documentation and its public reputation, not our own year in production. We would still recommend it for a content team that values collaborative editing over owning the database.