Building a Custom CMS: When It Makes Sense and When It Doesn't

The CMS question

Every project with dynamic content raises the same question: build a custom CMS or use an existing platform? I've done both. Here's when each makes sense.

When custom makes sense

You have specific content models. When I built Athletic AbhyAn, they needed to manage blog posts, testimonials, programmes, YouTube embeds, and a six-step onboarding form. Off-the-shelf CMSs would require plugins, workarounds, or compromises. Custom meant building exactly what they needed.

You want full control and no ongoing costs. Contentful, Sanity, and similar headless CMSs charge monthly fees that scale with usage. For small businesses, those fees add up. A custom CMS using a free Postgres database costs essentially nothing to run.

You care about the editing experience. WordPress admin is... functional. But it's also cluttered with options you don't need. A custom CMS shows exactly the fields relevant to your content, nothing more. That simplicity matters for non-technical clients.

You're already building a custom frontend. If the public site is custom Next.js, bolting on WordPress or Strapi for the backend adds complexity. Same codebase, same deployment, same mental model - that's the advantage of custom.

When you should use existing solutions

You need it yesterday. Building a CMS takes time - 30-40% of the project in my experience. If speed matters more than customisation, use what exists.

You need features that are hard to build. Content versioning, scheduled publishing, granular permissions, multi-user workflows - these exist in mature CMSs. Building them from scratch is reinventing the wheel.

Budget is tight. Custom means custom pricing. If you can get 80% of what you need from WordPress plus a good theme, that might be the pragmatic choice.

You need extensive plugin ecosystems. E-commerce, membership sites, complex forms - platforms like WordPress have plugins for everything. Custom means building or integrating each feature yourself.

What a custom CMS actually includes

For context, here's what I typically build:

Dashboard overview. Quick stats, recent content, actions needed.

Content editors. Rich text editing with formatting, image upload, link insertion. I use TipTap - it's headless, extensible, and feels modern.

Media library. Upload images, manage files, crop and optimise. CDN delivery so images load fast.

Settings panel. Site-wide configuration: logos, colours, metadata, contact info.

Submission management. For contact forms, enquiries, onboarding flows. View, filter, and export the data clients send.

Authentication. Secure login, session management, protected routes. Only authorised users can make changes.

The hybrid approach

Sometimes the answer is neither fully custom nor fully off-the-shelf.

Sanity or Contentful as a headless backend, custom Next.js frontend. You get professional content editing without building it yourself, plus complete control over the presentation layer.

Supabase with its auto-generated APIs. You define the database schema, it gives you CRUD endpoints automatically. Add a custom admin UI on top and you've got a CMS without the heavy lifting.

My recommendation

For most small business websites, a custom CMS makes sense if you're already building a custom frontend and the content model is specific enough that general solutions feel awkward.

If you just need to publish blog posts and update some text, WordPress or a headless CMS will serve you fine. No shame in using proven tools.

The goal isn't technical purity - it's building something maintainable that serves the business. Sometimes that's custom. Sometimes it's WordPress. Know when each is the right tool.