About ShipGarden
ShipGarden is an independent publication. We are a curated gallery of open-source SaaS and AI app boilerplates that are genuinely worth shipping, run by makers who clone and test every starter before it earns a frame on the wall.
What ShipGarden is
There are thousands of starter kits out there. Most are abandoned, half-documented, or a thin wrapper around a paywall. ShipGarden keeps a short, honest list of the ones we have actually run, so you can go from a starred repo to a working app without guessing whether the project still boots. Every entry is framed around three deploy paths, so you can pick whatever fits your workflow: clone the source straight from GitHub, one-click deploy to Vercel, or deploy it with the hosting platform of your choice. No lock-in, no sign-up wall, just the fastest honest route from interesting to a running URL.
How we curate
We clone every boilerplate and run it before it earns a card. We check that it boots cleanly from a fresh install, that the license is one you can actually read, that the deploy paths really take you to a working URL, and that the README is honest about what the project does and does not do. If a starter is abandoned, half-finished, or quietly hiding a paywall, it does not make the grid. When we are unsure, we say so plainly rather than pad the gallery.
Who runs ShipGarden
ShipGarden was founded and is edited by Aaron Brick and Yui Tanaka, two makers who spent years cloning starters that did not work and decided to keep a public record of the ones that do. We write in the first person plural because the gallery is a shared editorial project, and we stake our names on every pick. The work is reader-first: we are not paid to feature any stack, and a boilerplate cannot buy its way onto the grid.
Contact
Questions, corrections, or a boilerplate to submit? Use the contact form. We read every message.