Kick off your project with this default boilerplate. This barebones starter ships with the main Gatsby configuration files you might need.
Have another more specific idea? You may want to check out our vibrant collection of official and community-created starters.
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Install the Gatsby CLI.
The Gatsby CLI helps you create new sites using Gatsby starters (like this one!)
# install the Gatsby CLI globally npm install -g gatsby-cli
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Create a Gatsby site.
Use the Gatsby CLI to create a new site, specifying the default starter.
# create a new Gatsby site using the default starter gatsby new my-default-starter
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Start developing.
Navigate into your new siteβs directory and start it up.
cd my-default-starter/ gatsby develop
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Open the source code and start editing!
Your site is now running at
http://localhost:8000
!Note: You'll also see a second link:
http://localhost:8000___graphql
. This is a tool you can use to experiment with querying your data. Learn more about using this tool in the Gatsby tutorial.Open the the
my-default-starter
directory in your code editor of choice and editsrc/pages/index.js
. Save your changes and the browser will update in real time!
A quick look at the top-level files and directories you'll see in a Gatsby project.
.
βββ node_modules
βββ src
βββ .gitignore
βββ .prettierrc
βββ gatsby-browser.js
βββ gatsby-config.js
βββ gatsby-node.js
βββ gatsby-ssr.js
βββ LICENSE
βββ package-lock.json
βββ package.json
βββ README.md
βββ yarn.lock
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/node_modules
: The directory where all of the modules of code that your project depends on (npm packages) are automatically installed. -
/src
: This directory will contain all of the code related to what you will see on the front-end of your site (what you see in the browser), like your site header, or a page template. βSrcβ is a convention for βsource codeβ. -
.gitignore
: This file tells git which files it should not track / not maintain a version history for. -
.prettierrc
: This is a configuration file for a tool called Prettier, which is a tool to help keep the formatting of your code consistent. -
gatsby-browser.js
: This file is where Gatsby expects to find any usage of the Gatsby browser APIs (if any). These allow customization/extension of default Gatsby settings affecting the browser. -
gatsby-config.js
: This is the main configuration file for a Gatsby site. This is where you can specify information about your site (metadata) like the site title and description, which Gatsby plugins youβd like to include, etc. (Check out the config docs for more detail). -
gatsby-node.js
: This file is where Gatsby expects to find any usage of the Gatsby node APIs (if any). These allow customization/extension of default Gatsby settings affecting pieces of the site build process. -
gatsby-ssr.js
: This file is where Gatsby expects to find any usage of the Gatsby server-side rendering APIs (if any). These allow customization of default Gatsby settings affecting server-side rendering. -
LICENSE
: Gatsby is licensed under the MIT license. -
package-lock.json
(Seepackage.json
below, first). This is an automatically generated file based on the exact versions of your npm dependencies that were installed for your project. (You wonβt change this file directly). -
package.json
: A manifest file for Node.js projects, which includes things like metadata (the projectβs name, author, etc). This manifest is how npm knows which packages to install for your project. -
README.md
: A text file containing useful reference information about your project. -
yarn.lock
: Yarn is a package manager alternative to npm. You can use either yarn or npm, though all of the Gatsby docs reference npm. This file serves essentially the same purpose aspackage-lock.json
, just for a different package management system.
Looking for more guidance? Full documentation for Gatsby lives on the website. Here are some places to start:
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For most developers, we recommend starting with our in-depth tutorial for creating a site with Gatsby. It starts with zero assumptions about your level of ability and walks through every step of the process.
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To dive straight into code samples head to our documentation. In particular, check out the βGuidesβ, API reference, and βAdvanced Tutorialsβ sections in the sidebar.