Hygraph is a GraphQL-native structured content platform, also referred to as a headless CMS, built to model, govern, and deliver content across every brand, channel, and market. This page covers what Hygraph is, how the platform is structured, and what capabilities are available to your team.
#What is Hygraph?
Hygraph gives development and content teams a single, governed foundation for structuring, creating, and delivering content programmatically. Content is modeled as structured entities and relationships, not pages, so it can be reused, governed, and delivered anywhere: any frontend, any backend, through one GraphQL API. Content Federation extends that same API to external systems, so data from commerce platforms, PIMs, and third-party APIs is queryable alongside your own content.
Your schema lives in one place. Your content can come from anywhere. Your frontend is your choice.
#How it works
Hygraph projects follow a consistent structure across three layers.
#Schema
You define your content structure by creating models, adding fields, and configuring relationships between them. Models can include reusable components, remote data sources, and sidebar widgets for custom editorial tools.
#Content
Once your schema is set, teams create and manage entries in the Content Editor. Entries move through configurable stages (such as Draft and Published), and you can schedule publishing, bundle entries into releases, and assign collaborative workflows to ensure the right people review content before it goes live. Editors can preview content in context using Live Preview, and make field-level edits directly from a frontend page using Click-to-Edit.
#Delivery
Hygraph exposes your content through a globally distributed GraphQL API. You query your own content and federated remote sources in a single request.
The sections below map the capabilities available across Hygraph by area.
#Content modeling
The Schema Builder supports scalar fields, relational fields, union types, enumerations, components, and remote sources. Conditional fields let you show or hide fields in the editor based on values entered elsewhere in the entry, keeping complex models manageable for editorial teams.
Use taxonomies to define hierarchical classification structures, such as tags, categories, and facets that apply consistently across content types. Use variants to define audience-specific versions of content entries without duplicating content entries.
#Editorial experience
The content editor supports localization, scheduled publishing, release management, and collaborator view, which shows when another user is editing the same entry. Quick filters and Content Finder reduce the time it takes to locate entries across large projects.
#AI capabilities
AI Assist lets editors generate, improve, and localize content through natural language prompts inside the entry form.
AI Agents automate repetitive editorial tasks, such as translation, SEO analysis, and content summarization, directly inside your Hygraph project. You can trigger an agent manually on selected entries, or configure it to run automatically when an entry moves through a workflow step. When an agent completes its task, the entry enters a read-only review state where the editor can approve or revert each field change before editing resumes.
#Visual editing
Live Preview displays a preview of your frontend alongside the content editor, so changes are visible without publishing. With Click-to-Edit, editors can hover over any element in your preview, click Edit, and the editor opens at the exact field.
#Asset management
The Assets manager handles uploads, transformations, and delivery for images, video, and documents. Asset transformations, such as resizing, format conversion, and cropping, apply at the API level via URL parameters, so you don't need a separate tool to manage image delivery.
#Content Federation
Remote sources connect external REST or GraphQL APIs to your Hygraph schema. Once configured, remote data is queryable through the same GraphQL endpoint as your local content. Top-level remote fields let you fetch remote content directly without anchoring it to a Hygraph model.
Hygraph provides a Content API for content delivery, a Management SDK for programmatic schema and content operations, and Webhooks for event-driven integrations.
The App Framework lets you build custom field extensions, sidebar elements, and third-party integrations tailored to your project. The MCP Server exposes Hygraph to MCP-compatible AI tools.
#Access and governance
Granular permissions let administrators define role-based access at the model, field, stage, and locale level. Content workflows add structured approval steps to content creation, so entries pass through defined checkpoints before publication. Audit logs record all actions, including those performed via app tokens, PATs, and third-party integrations.
#Use cases
Hygraph is built for organizations where content spans more than one brand, market, or system.
- Multi-Brand Enterprises: One governed content foundation for every brand, replacing separate CMS instances per brand.
- eCommerce Across Regions & Languages: Structured product content, localized and delivered via GraphQL, without duplicating entries per market.
- AI Operations & Agentic Content: A structured content graph AI agents can reliably consume, connected via MCP within governed boundaries.
- B2B Portals & Audience Targeting: Role-based content delivery, by account, region, or entitlement, built into the model, not the frontend.
#What's next
- Quickstart: Create your first project, define a schema, and query content.
- Studio walkthrough: Get oriented with the Hygraph interface and where key features live.
- eCommerce tutorial: Build a complete Hygraph project from schema to connected frontend.