Software Alternatives, Accelerators & Startups

GatsbyJS VS Gridsome

Compare GatsbyJS VS Gridsome and see what are their differences

GatsbyJS logo GatsbyJS

Blazing-fast static site generator for React

Gridsome logo Gridsome

Gridsome is a free & open source Vue.js-powered framework for building websites & apps that are fast by default ๐Ÿš€.
  • GatsbyJS Landing page
    Landing page //
    2023-09-12
  • Gridsome Landing page
    Landing page //
    2021-09-15

GatsbyJS features and specs

  • Performance
    GatsbyJS pre-builds your site into static files for fast load times and instantaneous page loads thanks to features like code splitting, PRPL pattern, and Asset Optimization.
  • SEO-Friendly
    GatsbyJS generates static HTML, which helps search engines to index your site more effectively. Additionally, you have fine-grained control over metadata and other SEO optimizations.
  • Rich Plugin Ecosystem
    GatsbyJS boasts an extensive plugin ecosystem that covers a wide array of functionalities such as sourcing data from CMSs, adding analytics, integrating with various APIs, and much more.
  • Strong Community Support
    Gatsby has a robust and active community that provides ample documentation, tutorials, and support to help you get started and troubleshoot issues.
  • Secure and Scalable
    Since Gatsby sites are static, they are inherently more secure against traditional web-based vulnerabilities and can be scaled easily by deploying to a CDN.

Possible disadvantages of GatsbyJS

  • Build Time
    For larger sites, build times can become noticeably long as Gatsby rebuilds the entire site. This can be a bottleneck for frequent updates.
  • Less Suitable for Dynamic Content
    Since Gatsby generates static pages, it's less suited for applications that require real-time data updates or dynamic content unless they are integrated with client-side JS or third-party services.
  • Initial Setup Complexity
    Getting started with Gatsby can be complex for beginners unfamiliar with React and GraphQL, as it requires knowledge of these technologies.
  • GraphQL Learning Curve
    A significant part of customizing and extending Gatsby sites involves GraphQL queries, which can be a barrier for developers who are not yet familiar with GraphQL.
  • Plugin Quality Variability
    While Gatsby has a rich plugin ecosystem, the quality and maintenance of plugins can vary, requiring developers to vet the plugins they choose to integrate into their projects.

Gridsome features and specs

  • Performance
    Gridsome generates static sites that are highly optimized and fast. Since the sites are pre-rendered and served as static files, they load quickly, which is beneficial for user experience and SEO.
  • Scalability
    Static sites generated by Gridsome can easily scale to handle high traffic loads without the need for complex server-side infrastructure, making it ideal for websites with fluctuating traffic.
  • GraphQL Integration
    Gridsome uses GraphQL to query data from various sources, providing a unified and efficient way to fetch and manage data, and allowing developers to request only the data they need.
  • Vue.js Ecosystem
    As a framework built on top of Vue.js, Gridsome allows developers to leverage the powerful features and community support of Vue, including components, libraries, and tools.
  • SEO Friendly
    Gridsome supports pre-rendering and dynamic routing, which help in creating SEO-optimized websites that are easy for search engines to index.

Possible disadvantages of Gridsome

  • Build Time
    For large sites with extensive content, the build times can be significant, potentially impacting deployment speed and productivity when making frequent changes.
  • Limited Interactivity
    Since Gridsome generates static pages, implementing highly dynamic or real-time features requires additional client-side development, potentially increasing complexity.
  • Plugin Ecosystem
    Compared to more mature static site generators or full-fledged frameworks, Gridsome's plugin ecosystem is relatively smaller, which might limit out-of-the-box functionalities.
  • Learning Curve
    Developers new to Vue.js or GraphQL might face a steeper learning curve when initially adopting Gridsome, requiring time to become productive.
  • Community Size
    Gridsome's community is smaller compared to other popular frameworks, which might impact the availability of resources, support, and third-party contributions.

Analysis of Gridsome

Overall verdict

  • Gridsome is a strong choice for developers familiar with Vue.js who want to build static sites with enhanced performance and flexibility. Its modern development experience and robust feature set position it as a viable alternative to traditional CMS or server-side rendered options, particularly for projects prioritizing speed and security.

Why this product is good

  • Gridsome is a popular static site generator that leverages the power of Vue.js to build fast, secure, and scalable websites. It offers a smooth integration with various CMSs and APIs, providing flexibility in how content is sourced and displayed. Developers appreciate its GraphQL layer, which allows for querying content in an intuitive and efficient way. Gridsome's focus on performance through code-splitting, lazy loading, and prefetching makes it an attractive choice for building high-performing sites.

Recommended for

  • Developers familiar with Vue.js
  • Projects requiring fast and optimized static sites
  • Websites sourcing content from various APIs or CMSs
  • SEO-focused projects thanks to its pre-rendering capabilities
  • Developers seeking a modern development workflow with features like hot-reloading and GraphQL

GatsbyJS videos

The Great Gatsby - Movie Review by Chris Stuckmann

More videos:

  • Review - The Great Gatsby movie review
  • Review - The Ultimate Gatsby Moving Rubber Review!

Gridsome videos

What is Gridsome Static Site Generation

More videos:

  • Review - Nuxt.js vs VuePress: Battle For The Best Blog App // Nuxt vs Gridsome
  • Tutorial - How to build a movie review website with GRIDSOME and STATICMAN

Category Popularity

0-100% (relative to GatsbyJS and Gridsome)
CMS
85 85%
15% 15
Developer Tools
69 69%
31% 31
Blogging
82 82%
18% 18
Static Site Generators
0 0%
100% 100

User comments

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Reviews

These are some of the external sources and on-site user reviews we've used to compare GatsbyJS and Gridsome

GatsbyJS Reviews

Top JavaScript Frameworks in 2025
Gatsby JS is a free, open-source, React-based framework that is used to create static websites. It has a great ecosystem of plugins that serve various needs like sourcing data from CMSs, integrating tools, managing images using lazy loading, and more.
Source: solguruz.com
Top 10 Next.js Alternatives You Can Try
Gatsby allows you to add plugins with versatile functions and customization to increase your efficiency when developing websites. Here, you can use multiple styling approaches like Sass and CSS-in-JS library solutions to build web pages more smoothly. Moreover, using Gatsby as an alternative to Next.Js provides you with a complete learning guide to enhance your developing...
20 Next.js Alternatives Worth Considering
A React-based maestro, Gatsby transforms the way sites come to life by hooking into a rich set of data sources. Picture this: a web thatโ€™s blazing fast, where your creations go live almost before you hit โ€˜publishโ€™. Thatโ€™s Gatsby for you. Inside its engine, itโ€™s got GraphQL superpowers, making data dancing across your pages a breeze.
10 Best Next.js Alternatives to Consider Today
A React-based framework, Gatsby excels in crafting static websites renowned for their exceptional performance. Leveraging GraphQL, Gatsby efficiently pulls data from diverse sources, empowering developers to build dynamic, data-driven websites effortlessly. Its expansive plugin ecosystem allows seamless integration with various data providers, content management systems...
20 Best JavaScript Frameworks For 2023
Gatsby lets users pull data from any data source imaginable โ€“ CMS like WordPress, Drupal, Netlify, Contentful, etc., or APIs, databases, or simple markdown. Unlike Next.js, which we discussed above, Gatsby does not perform server-side rendering. Instead, it generates HTML content on the client side during build time. As a result, Gatsby delivers blazing-fast performance,...

Gridsome Reviews

Top 10 Next.js Alternatives You Can Try
To build your web pages with ultra-performance, Gridsome offers you instant hot-reloading for any code change. This framework allows you to get asset optimization and progressive images that you can use with perfect page speed scores. Notably, this Next.js alternative can manage thousands to millions of hits without slowing your workflow.
20 Next.js Alternatives Worth Considering
Gridsome is to Vue.js what Gatsby is to React. A static site generation darling, it merges Vue with GraphQL and a suite of top-notch developer delights. Itโ€™s striking the perfect chord for devs digging data-driven JAMstack websites that are built to impress.
10 static site generators to watch inย 2021
Gridsome is a Vue.js-powered framework for building static generated websites & apps. Leading with the phrase โ€œfast by defaultโ€, Gridsome generates an HTML and also a JSON file for every page of your site and then uses progressive enhancement to add some client-side utilities to give you things like link pre-fetching based on the when links come into view, code splitting,...
Source: www.netlify.com

Social recommendations and mentions

Gridsome might be a bit more popular than GatsbyJS. We know about 22 links to it since March 2021 and only 16 links to GatsbyJS. We are tracking product recommendations and mentions on various public social media platforms and blogs. They can help you identify which product is more popular and what people think of it.

GatsbyJS mentions (16)

  • React SEO: How to Build Search-Friendly Pages in React
    The most famous frameworks for developing SSR applications are Gatsby and Next.js. Although there are differences between them, their main goal is similar: to allow next-generation web applications to remain blazing-fast. - Source: dev.to / 6 months ago
  • External content for GatsbyJS
    If you enjoy React and want a standard-compliant and high performance web, you should look at GatsbyJS. - Source: dev.to / about 1 year ago
  • Replatforming from Gatsby to Zola!
    Since around 2019 I have used Gatsby as my static site generator. Its plugin system makes it super feature extensible. It uses React under the hood which makes components easy to write and has tons of community support. Once I had a Gatsby site styled and running, publishing blog posts is fairly trivial:. - Source: dev.to / over 1 year ago
  • Build a Documentation Website with Gatsby in 10 Mins
    Smooth DOC is a ready-to-use Gatsby theme to create a documentation website. Creating a pro-quality website like this one takes weeks. Smooth DOC saves you time and lets you focus on the content. - Source: dev.to / over 1 year ago
  • Where to begin?
    I'd start with learning HTML and CSS first, then Javascript after those. There are a lot of free online resources for learning those. For websites, I use jekyll which is a great way to start off because there are a lot of community website templates that you can customize, which is great for beginners and learning. Then I'd recommend learning/moving to React. The Gatsby website generator would be good for React... Source: about 3 years ago
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Gridsome mentions (22)

  • How Bun can help to revive a Gridsome project
    This website is built with Gridsome โ€” one of the oldest static site generators, which is practically not maintained anymore. It causes some troubles for working with websites based on it, specifically the necessity to use Node.js v14 which is quite obsolete and poorly supported on all the public deployment platforms, including Netlify. - Source: dev.to / 7 months ago
  • My Sixth Year as a Bootstrapped Founder
    Thanks for reading! The web tech stack is actually one of my biggest regrets. It's a static site generator called Gridsome[0] that the maintainers abandoned about three months after I used it to launch the TinyPilot website. At the time I made the TinyPilot site, I was very excited about Vue, so a Vue-based SSG seemed great. Since then, I've come to find SPAs and most frontend frameworks to be way too much... - Source: Hacker News / over 1 year ago
  • How To Choose the Best Static Site Generator and Deploy it to Kinsta for Free
    Nuxt.js and Gridsome are tailor-made for Vue.js developers. - Source: dev.to / almost 2 years ago
  • Top ten popular static site generators (SSG) in 2023
    Gridsome โ€” Jamstack SSG tool for Vue developers. - Source: dev.to / over 2 years ago
  • Will anyone hire a 33 yo newbie?
    Node is basically back-end Javascript. While powerful alone, almost exclusively you will use a back-end framework like Next.js or Gatsby when using React, and then maybe Nuxt or Gridsome in Vue. Source: over 2 years ago
View more

What are some alternatives?

When comparing GatsbyJS and Gridsome, you can also consider the following products

Jekyll - Jekyll is a simple, blog aware, static site generator.

Nuxt.js - Nuxt.js presets all the configuration needed to make your development of a Vue.js application enjoyable. It's a perfect static site generator.

Hugo - Hugo is a general-purpose website framework for generating static web pages.

Next.js - A small framework for server-rendered universal JavaScript apps

Ghost - Ghost is a fully open source, adaptable platform for building and running a modern online publication. We power blogs, magazines and journalists from Zappos to Sky News.

Hexo - A fast, simple & powerful blog framework, powered by Node.js