Ten SaaS boilerplates ranked for 2027, by what matters when a coding agent writes most of the code. We put ours first, so here are the criteria and where each of the others beats us.
The best boilerplate for 2027 is the one your coding agent can't easily wreck, that covers every app you'll need, and that doesn't charge you for code you never asked for. On those three tests we rank our own, Hype Stack, first.
You should discount that immediately. We sell one of the kits on this list. We've written elsewhere that any list with a number one is selling the thing it names, and this one is no exception. Nearly every "best boilerplates" post you'll read is written by somebody with a kit to sell, and most of them don't say so.
So here's what you get instead of neutrality: the criteria, written down, so you can reweight them and get a different winner. Every other kit comes with the case where you should buy it over ours. Facts about other kits come from their own sites and repositories, read in November 2026. There are no prices, because they change and you can check them in one click.
What changed for 2027
A year ago, the question was which kit had the most features. Auth, billing, and a landing page are now table stakes, and an agent can write a passable version of any of them in an afternoon. What it can't do is keep the second version consistent with the first. So the job of a boilerplate has moved. It used to save you typing. Now it has to give the agent a codebase that corrects it.
Most of the serious kits have noticed. In the last year, AGENTS.md files, skills and MCP servers went from unusual to expected, and MakerKit and TurboStarter both ship an MCP server now. That raised the bar, ours included. Having a rules file no longer sets a kit apart, so the ranking below asks harder questions.
How we ranked them
Five questions, in order of how much weight we give them:
- Does the agent get guardrails, or only instructions? Rules files and an MCP server count. So do typed boundaries and checks that fail when the agent guesses wrong.
- Do you carry code you didn't ask for? Every feature in the repository is something the agent reads, and something you maintain.
- Does it cover more than one web app? A mobile app, an admin app, a browser extension, all on the same API.
- Can you try the real thing for free? And when you pay, do you pay only for what you use?
- Is anyone still working on it? A kit that went quiet a year ago is now a year behind its dependencies.
Weight these differently and the order moves. Care most about organic search on public pages, and any Next.js kit here beats us. We say so again below.
The list at a glance
| # | Kit | Stack | Orgs | Mobile | For agents | How you pay |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Hype Stack | React SPA, Hono, Prisma | Paid starter | Expo | Rules, skills, MCP | Free MIT template, one-time packs |
| 2 | TurboStarter | Next.js, Hono, Drizzle | Yes | Expo | Rules, skills, MCP | One-time |
| 3 | MakerKit | Next.js and others, Supabase or Drizzle | Yes | Expo starter | Rules, skills, MCP | One-time |
| 4 | Supastarter | Next.js, Nuxt or TanStack Start | Yes | On roadmap | AGENTS.md, skills | One-time |
| 5 | Open SaaS | Wasp, React, Node, Prisma | Not mentioned | Not mentioned | Rules, skills | Free, MIT |
| 6 | SaaS Pegasus | Django | Yes | Not confirmed | Rules, skills, admin DB MCP | Free tier, one-time paid tiers |
| 7 | ShipFast | Next.js, MongoDB or Supabase | Not mentioned | Not mentioned | Pitched for Cursor and Copilot | One-time |
| 8 | ixartz SaaS Boilerplate | Next.js, Drizzle, Clerk | Yes | Not mentioned | AGENTS.md on paid tiers | Free MIT core, paid tiers |
| 9 | next-forge | Next.js monorepo, Prisma, Clerk | Not mentioned | Not mentioned | Not mentioned | Free, MIT |
| 10 | create-t3-app | Next.js, tRPC, Prisma | No | No | None | Free, MIT |
"Not mentioned" means we couldn't find it on the kit's own site, which isn't proof it's missing.
1. Hype Stack
Our argument for first place is the shape, which is harder to change in a release than a feature list is. You start with an empty but working app, and you add what you need. The MIT template gives you a React 19 single-page app, a Hono backend on Postgres, a separate admin app, an Expo mobile app and a browser extension, all typed against the same routes. Then the CLI writes packs into your repository as source: 21 of them, five free, including a Better Auth starter, teams and projects. There are also eight templates that compose those packs into a working app. If you don't need billing, billing was never in your repo, and your agent never reads it. The longer version of that argument is Boilerplates have the wrong default.
The agent side goes past a rules file. create writes rules in your editor's own format, scoped by path, so a backend
rule loads only on backend files. It installs eleven skills. An MCP server gives the agent eleven tools to scaffold the
project, install packs and set up the database through the real CLI, so it doesn't improvise them. A renamed field in a
Zod schema stops the frontend compiling, so a wrong guess fails a check.
Where we lose. There's no server rendering, because the frontend is a client-rendered SPA. If search traffic to public pages is how you plan to get customers, those pages need to live somewhere else, or you should buy a Next.js kit. Three apps to deploy and Docker on day one are a real cost for a product that never grows past one box. We're also younger than most of this list, with a smaller community, so you'll find fewer answers to your questions from strangers. And the organizations starters and the billing packs are paid. The template and the CLI are free, though the CLI itself isn't open source.
2. TurboStarter
The closest thing to us on this list, and the one we'd look at if we didn't make ours. A Turborepo with Next.js, Expo and a WXT browser extension, on Hono and Drizzle, with organizations, an admin panel and the widest billing list here, including RevenueCat and Superwall for mobile. It has rules, skills, an MCP server and a CLI, and its changelog had an entry the day before we checked.
Buy it over ours if you want web, mobile and extension with server rendering on the web side, or in-app purchases on day one. The trade is the one in our TurboStarter comparison: you get a full kit and remove what you don't need.
3. MakerKit
Strong multi-tenancy with row level security, on Next.js, React Router or TanStack Start, and Supabase, Drizzle or Prisma underneath. It ships an MCP server, agent skills and rules files, and it added an Expo starter in August 2026.
Buy it over ours if your customers sign up as companies, you want Postgres row level security as the boundary, and Supabase is already your plan.
4. Supastarter
The kit with the most framework choice: Next.js, Nuxt or TanStack Start, with five billing providers and seat billing on organizations. It has AGENTS.md and agent skills, and an admin area with impersonation. A mobile starter is listed as work in progress on its changelog.
Buy it over ours if your team is on Vue, or you need a billing provider we don't cover. More in Hype Stack vs Supastarter.
5. Open SaaS
The best free kit if you want the features included. MIT, run by the Wasp team, with auth, three billing providers, an admin dashboard, and agent rules and skills. Everything sits on the Wasp framework, which writes much of the wiring for you, and it's a dependency to be comfortable with.
Pick it over ours if you want a whole SaaS at no cost and you're happy to learn Wasp.
6. SaaS Pegasus
If you write Python, you can stop reading here. Django with HTMX or React, Celery for background work, teams, Stripe, and a release from October 2026. Recent versions added skills, rules files and an MCP server for the admin database.
Pick it over ours if your team knows Django. Choosing a stack your team doesn't know for the sake of a better kit is rarely a good trade.
7. ShipFast
The kit that made this category famous, and still a very fast way to launch one Next.js app with a landing page and a checkout. Stripe or Lemon Squeezy, MongoDB or Supabase, and Google sign-in and magic links. We found nothing on its site about organizations or mobile, and its own pricing page said "last update 9 months ago" when we looked.
Pick it over ours if you sell to individuals, you want a first sale this week, and you might throw the code away. ShipFast Alternative covers what it looks like when you outgrow it.
8. ixartz SaaS Boilerplate
A free MIT core on Next.js and Drizzle with Clerk for auth, and with multi-tenancy and roles in the free tier, which is unusual. Stripe and AGENTS.md sit in the paid tiers. Its repository was pushed to the day before we checked.
Pick it over ours if you want teams for free on Next.js and you're happy paying Clerk.
9. next-forge
Vercel's own Turborepo template: several Next.js apps, Prisma, Clerk, Stripe and a CMS, all MIT. It's a good picture of how a production monorepo fits together on Vercel. Its last release was in March 2026, and it leans on a lot of hosted services.
Pick it over ours if you're on Vercel already and like those vendors.
10. create-t3-app
Not really a boilerplate, and its own site says it isn't all-inclusive. It's a typed scaffold with Next.js, tRPC, Prisma and NextAuth, and you write everything else. Free, and much loved. The latest release we found is from November 2025, and it has been quiet for about a year.
Pick it over ours if you want a clean start with almost nothing in it. Our create-t3-app comparison covers where the two split. Vercel's Next.js SaaS Starter fills the same niche with Stripe added, and it's a fine reference to read. We left Divjoy off because we couldn't confirm it's still being maintained.
How to pick in one minute
- Your public pages have to rank in search: a Next.js kit. TurboStarter, MakerKit or Supastarter.
- Your team writes Django or Vue: SaaS Pegasus or Supastarter. Stop there.
- You need a first sale this week: ShipFast.
- You want to spend nothing: Open SaaS for the most features included, or our free template and packs if you want the separate API.
- You're building with a coding agent, you want a phone app on the same API, and you'd rather add features than delete them: that's who we built Hype Stack for.
To see it before you decide, this scaffolds the free template:
npx @hype-stack/cli create my-appTell us what we got wrong. Kits ship fast, and we'll correct this post when you show us a changelog.