⚡ Setup Payload CMS — TypeScript-First Headless CMS

Tutorial Steps

1 Download & Run the Installer

The script installs Docker, pulls the Payload CMS and MongoDB images, configures environment variables including the secret key, and starts both containers. Payload will be available on port 3000 with MongoDB running internally on port 27017 for data persistence.

wget https://raw.githubusercontent.com/mhmdali94/Docker/main/cms/payload/payload-ubuntu.sh
chmod +x payload-ubuntu.sh
sudo bash payload-ubuntu.sh

2 Access the Admin Panel

Open your browser and navigate to the Payload admin panel. On first run, you will be prompted to create your first administrator user with email, username, and password.

http://<your-server-ip>:3000/admin

3 Create Your First Collection

Collections in Payload are defined in TypeScript config files. Edit your payload.config.ts to add a Posts collection with fields for title (text), content (richText), author (relationship), and publishedAt (date). Payload automatically generates REST and GraphQL endpoints, admin UI forms, and TypeScript types for each collection. Restart the container after saving changes.

# Example collection definition in payload.config.ts
collections: [
  {
    slug: 'posts',
    fields: [
      { name: 'title', type: 'text', required: true },
      { name: 'content', type: 'richText' },
      { name: 'author', type: 'relationship', relationTo: 'users' },
      { name: 'publishedAt', type: 'date' },
    ],
  },
]

4 Query the REST API

Payload automatically exposes a REST API for every collection. Use GET to fetch documents, POST to create, PATCH to update, and DELETE to remove. For authenticated endpoints, include a Bearer token obtained from the /api/users/login endpoint. The API follows predictable URL patterns based on your collection slugs.

# Fetch all posts (public if access allows)
curl http://<your-server-ip>:3000/api/posts

# Create a post with authentication
curl -X POST http://<your-server-ip>:3000/api/posts \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer YOUR_TOKEN" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"title": "My First Post", "content": {"root": {}}}'