Curator notes on stacks worth shipping — picked, tested, documented.
42 posts
Medusa, Saleor, and Vendure for open-source headless commerce on Next.js in 2026: language, license, real managed pricing, honest 'where it loses', and how to pick.
Twenty, EspoCRM, and Odoo are three very different open-source CRMs. We compare license, self-host cost, stack, and where each one loses in 2026.
Mastra, LangChain.js, and LlamaIndex.TS for building AI agents in TypeScript, 2026: stars, license, which is still maintained, and how to choose.
Inngest, Trigger.dev, and BullMQ for Next.js background jobs in 2026: where each runs, real pricing, honest 'where it loses', and how to pick.
The three best open-source Google Analytics alternatives in 2026, compared by license, self-host cost, and deploy path.
Convex, Supabase, and Firebase are three different bets on your data model and how much you own. A sourced 2026 comparison of free tiers, real costs, lock-in, and which backend fits your Next.js build.
UploadThing, Amazon S3, and Cloudflare R2 compared for Next.js file uploads in 2026: the egress-driven cost math, the DX tradeoffs, and which one to pick.
Payload, Sanity, and Contentful all run a Next.js SaaS, but they own very different amounts of your content backend. A 2026 decision guide on license, cost, and lock-in.
Vercel, Railway, and Render all deploy Next.js, but they own different amounts of your backend. A 2026 decision guide with real costs, free-tier traps, and a self-host escape hatch.
Resend, SendGrid, Postmark and Amazon SES compared on real 2026 pricing, free tiers, deliverability, and the open-source react-email layer, with a decision guide for Next.js SaaS builders.
Stripe acquired Lemon Squeezy and now sells its own merchant of record, so the real 2026 question is whether you rent that role to Paddle, Polar, or Stripe, or stay a raw Stripe processor. Real fees, honest tradeoffs, and which your Next.js SaaS should pick.
Neon or Supabase for your Next.js SaaS starter in 2026? A curator's honest, source-checked head-to-head: it is not two databases, it is a database vs a whole backend. Branching, scale-to-zero, the pricing that changed, and where each one loses.
