Top 5 Sanity Alternatives for 2025 | Headless CMS Comparison

#Summary

In this article, we break down where Sanity falls short—complex UI, limited GraphQL, hosting restrictions, and gaps in content management—and explain why Hygraph is the strongest alternative. You’ll learn how Hygraph’s GraphQL-native platform, intuitive workflows, scalability, and editor-friendly features make it a better fit for teams looking to deliver structured, omnichannel content at scale.

• Sanity’s developer-heavy interface frustrates editors with missing workflows, staging, and bulk operations.
• Its proprietary GROQ language and restricted GraphQL API limit flexibility for modern teams.
• Hosting is tied to Sanity’s servers, with no choice of regional data centers.
• Content management features like localization, custom views, and batch editing are limited or missing.
• Hygraph solves these challenges with GraphQL-native APIs, scalable infrastructure, and a balanced experience for both developers and editors.

Sanity is a popular choice for developer teams that need a headless CMS platform, but it’s not the only game in town. More and more teams are searching for Sanity alternatives because they need a content solution that’s easier for editors, integrates better with modern tech stacks, or offers clearer pricing. Although Sanity has real‑time collaboration features, a fully managed content lake, and integrations with Next.js, Vercel and Netlify, it can feel limiting for non‑developers and doesn’t always scale the way larger organizations expect.

Why? Here are a couple of reasons:

• Developer‑centred interface: While developers may appreciate Sanity’s UI, editors might not. There are no content stages, and it’s difficult to customise content views or perform bulk actions. Even developers complain about the lack of TypeScript support and poorly maintained libraries.

• Hosting limitations: Your data lives on Sanity’s servers without the option to select specific data‑centre locations. This can be a dealbreaker if your client requires regional hosting.

• Proprietary query language and restricted GraphQL: If your team is already fluent in GraphQL, learning GROQ may feel like a detour. Sanity’s GraphQL API is limited to content delivery with no support for mutations. Users on Reddit have also complained about slow editing, freezing fields and lag when using custom‑built backends.

• Content management gaps: Custom content stages, batch operations, inline content embedding, custom views, localised search and nested components are either missing or limited, which makes it difficult to manage complex workflows.

#Why choose a Sanity alternative?

If your team struggles with these pain points, it might be time to explore Sanity alternatives. A modern headless CMS should empower both developers and editors, let you choose where your data lives and support GraphQL natively. The best sanity alternatives also offer structured content modelling, roles and permissions, and integrations with your favourite frameworks.

Below are five of the best Sanity alternatives for 2025. Each platform solves a different set of problems, but Hygraph stands out for its GraphQL‑native architecture, editor‑friendly features and scalability. Let’s dive in.

#1. Hygraph

Hygraph is a modern, API‑first headless CMS for creating and delivering structured content at scale. Unlike Sanity, Hygraph has a native GraphQL‑first API - including mutations - along with localisation, staged content workflows and a more intuitive UI for non‑developers. Custom views, nested components and content versioning come right out of the box.

Hygraph shines because it combines developer power with editor usability. You can link different content models and define one‑to‑one or one‑to‑many relationships; create lists of predefined models that content editors can choose from; and set up custom roles with granular permissions. Fast and reliable delivery is ensured through globally distributed CDNs. On the self‑serve plan you can choose between nine hosting locations; on the enterprise plan, it’s more than 77.

There’s also a rich set of APIs, SDKs and CLI tools, so you can tailor Hygraph to your unique business case. With schema migrations, you can safely make changes to the GraphQL schema and test new content types in sandbox environments.

Use cases:
‑ Composable websites: Stobag chose Hygraph to transform its brochure site into an integrated customer portal. Thanks to Hygraph’s structured content model and GraphQL API, Stobag’s online revenue climbed from 15 % to 70 % of the business.
‑ Data projects: The Oetker Group used Hygraph to centralise data and break down silos across 40 countries and subsidiaries.
‑ Applications and platforms: The German Chemical Society built an app with Hygraph to serve scientific articles, research papers and events to 30 000 members, powered by seven microservices.
‑ Content federation: Telenor centralised metadata for its streaming platform, integrating thousands of videos a month via Hygraph’s GraphQL APIs.

Pros
• GraphQL‑native: Built from the ground up with GraphQL, Hygraph supports queries and mutations. You’re free to interact with content outside the UI or integrate it into any stack.
• Very scalable: Content is delivered through a global CDN, with multiple hosting regions and no vendor lock‑in.
• Flexible content modelling: Link models as one‑to‑one or one‑to‑many references; create lists of pre‑defined models for editors.
• Multi‑tenancy and granular permissions: Assign roles, limit actions and manage multiple brands or projects easily.
• Developer‑friendly: Use SDKs, a CLI and webhooks to automate tasks and extend functionality.

Cons
• Fewer integrations: Compared with Strapi or Contentful, the marketplace of plugins and extensions is smaller.
• No native visual editing: Hygraph focuses on structured content rather than page‑building. It’s less suitable if you need drag‑and‑drop visual editing.

Start exploring Sanity’s best alternative by signing up for a free‑forever account.

#2. Contentful

Contentful is a headless CMS built for teams that manage content at scale across channels. As a composable content platform, you can create flexible content models and deliver content to websites, apps and digital products via REST or GraphQL APIs. Unlike Sanity, Contentful uses non‑proprietary technologies and offers a native visual editor that’s intuitive for non‑technical users. Localisation support, granular roles and 100+ integrations are available depending on your plan.

Pros
• API‑first architecture
• Intuitive UI
• Side‑by‑side live preview
• Custom content modelling
• Roles, permissions and localisation

Cons
• Expensive for startups or small teams
• Limited rich‑text customization
• No modular components

Contentful is well suited to multi‑channel distribution and enterprise‑scale sites. For example, an airline might use it to power websites, mobile apps and in‑flight systems via a unified API. The trade‑off is cost: plans scale quickly, and advanced features are locked behind higher tiers.

#3. Strapi

Strapi is an open‑source headless CMS that gives you flexibility and control to tailor the platform to specific requirements. As a self‑hosted, developer‑first platform, it lets you define custom content models and APIs for any application or front‑end framework. While Sanity uses a proprietary query language, Strapi offers both REST and GraphQL out of the box, with full control over roles, permissions and data flow.

Pros
• Open‑source and self‑hosted
• Customisable REST and GraphQL APIs
• Visual content modelling
• Supports modern JavaScript frameworks

Cons
• Requires backend work for customisation
• No built‑in cloud hosting
• Lacks advanced content approval workflows or native localisation
• No enterprise‑grade add‑ons, so you must handle large‑scale performance tuning and multi‑region deployment manually

Strapi is ideal for custom web applications, on‑premise deployments and projects where you want open‑source flexibility. For example, a logistics company could build a custom dashboard that tracks shipments and generates reports, with APIs and user roles tailored to customer tiers. Because Strapi is self‑hosted, you control your infrastructure and security.

#4. Directus

Directus is an open‑source headless CMS you can use with any SQL database without a proprietary schema. Unlike Sanity, which requires you to learn its custom query language and manage data in its cloud, Directus connects directly to your existing database, giving you more visibility and control. Directus has a no‑code admin interface for content editors and strong APIs (REST and GraphQL) for developers. It’s a good choice when you want ease of use plus a flexible backend.

Pros
• Works with any SQL database
• Compatible with any tech stack
• No‑code admin panel
• Self‑hosted

Cons
• No native CDN
• Limited localisation
• Setting up complex workflows requires database expertise

Directus excels when you’re modernising legacy systems or building custom back‑end applications. For example, a hospital network could use Directus to build a content layer for patient portals, pulling data directly from an existing PostgreSQL database without restructuring. A media company might use it to curate content from multiple sources while managing ingestion rules and metadata.

#5. Prismic

Prismic is a hosted headless CMS that non‑technical content teams can use. It has a visual content editor called Slices that allows you to build pages without developers’ help. It’s a good choice for websites and content processes that need to replicate high‑performing content fast.

Compared with Sanity, which uses a custom query language and needs more setup, Prismic has a more intuitive UI. It also supports GraphQL and integrates well with Next.js. It’s ideal when you want to ship content with little to no intervention on the backend.

Pros
• Fully managed CMS
• Intuitive visual editor
• Built‑in preview, versioning and scheduling
• Quick setup with integrations for Next.js, Gatsby and Nuxt.js

Cons
• No UI customisations
• Lacks custom roles, stages or workflows
• No direct control over the underlying database

Prismic works well for marketing websites, editorial sites and campaign‑based content operations. For example, a B2B SaaS company can use Slices to publish feature pages; a travel content hub can schedule destination guides across regions; or a gaming publisher can run weekly promotions with pre‑built Slices.

#Sanity vs. Hygraph

As we’ve seen, Hygraph is a powerful alternative to Sanity that offers a good balance between developer freedom and enterprise‑grade features.

Strong GraphQL

Unlike Sanity’s proprietary GROQ query language and developer‑heavy setup, Hygraph is GraphQL‑native from day one. You get full schema control - including mutations - and a solid set of APIs, which makes it ideal for modern API‑first architectures. Developers can build confidently using Hygraph’s SDKs and CLI tools, while safely testing changes in sandbox environments.

Both dev‑ and editor‑friendly

Sanity’s editorial interface can be difficult for non‑technical users. Hygraph, on the other hand, is built with both developers and content teams in mind. It comes with built‑in support for content staging, localisation, nested components and custom views. This allows editors to work with more autonomy and reduces dependency on developer support for daily publishing tasks.

Scalability

On the infrastructure side, Hygraph offers enterprise‑grade scalability through globally distributed CDNs. Teams can choose hosting locations - something Sanity does not offer. And when it comes to managing complex, distributed teams or clients, Hygraph’s multi‑tenancy and granular role‑based permissions make it a clear winner for organisations operating multiple brands or requiring a high level of security.

To conclude, while Sanity wins in real‑time collaboration and the number of developer extensions, Hygraph is a more balanced, scalable and structured platform. This makes Hygraph a great choice - especially for businesses or projects that need a content solution that works just as well for editors as it does for engineers. Still undecided? Compare Sanity vs. Hygraph in detail to explore their differences in core features, content modelling, security and pricing.