Choosing headless CMS tools is messy because the category mixes developer-first content APIs, Git-backed editors, enterprise CMS platforms, and framework-specific content systems. This July 2026 ToolVitals dataset compares 46 open/source-visible Headless CMS Tools using the supplied health, shipping, licensing, GitHub star, and ToolVitals score fields.
The ranking includes open/source-visible tools only and sorts first by ToolVitals score, with GitHub stars used as a secondary popularity signal for ties. License and openness are treated conservatively: tools labeled OSI-approved OSS are identified with their supplied license_label, and no source-available, fair-code, or open-core claim is treated as OSI open source.
Rankings
| Rank | Tool | Openness | License | Health | Shipping | GitHub Stars | Score | Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Sanity | OSI-approved OSS | MIT | 96 | 98 | 6205 | 98 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 2 | dotCMS | OSI-approved OSS | GPL-2.0 | 91 | 100 | 950 | 96 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 3 | Enonic XP | OSI-approved OSS | GPL-3.0 | 90 | 98 | 209 | 95 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 4 | Sveltia CMS | OSI-approved OSS | MIT | 83 | 95 | 2555 | 91 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 5 | ExpressionEngine | OSI-approved OSS | Apache-2.0 | 85 | 89 | 502 | 90 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 6 | Orchard Core | OSI-approved OSS | BSD-3-Clause | 84 | 83 | 8116 | 88 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 7 | Byline CMS | OSI-approved OSS | MPL-2.0 | 76 | 93 | 34 | 88 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 8 | Contentful | OSI-approved OSS | MIT | 90 | 71 | 1291 | 87 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 9 | Gentics Mesh | OSI-approved OSS | Apache-2.0 | 84 | 80 | 594 | 87 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 10 | pagible | OSI-approved OSS | MIT | 79 | 88 | 560 | 86 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 11 | Sulu | OSI-approved OSS | MIT | 87 | 71 | 1337 | 85 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 12 | DNN Platform | OSI-approved OSS | MIT | 80 | 80 | 1133 | 85 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 13 | Backdrop CMS | OSI-approved OSS | GPL-2.0 | 84 | 70 | 1041 | 83 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 14 | Bolt CMS | OSI-approved OSS | MIT | 83 | 67 | 586 | 81 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 15 | CairnCMS | OSI-approved OSS | GPL-3.0 | 67 | 82 | 9 | 80 | 🟢 Excellent |
| 16 | Daptin | OSI-approved OSS | LGPL-3.0 | 69 | 82 | 1884 | 79 | 🟢 Good |
| 17 | content | OSI-approved OSS | MIT | 80 | 57 | 3645 | 78 | 🟢 Good |
| 18 | OpenDXP | OSI-approved OSS | GPL-3.0 | 80 | 64 | 94 | 78 | 🟢 Good |
| 19 | Concrete | OSI-approved OSS | MIT | 71 | 66 | 846 | 76 | 🟢 Good |
| 20 | b10cks CMS | OSI-approved OSS | AGPL-3.0 | 62 | 63 | 14 | 69 | 🟢 Good |
| 21 | Pages CMS | OSI-approved OSS | MIT | 66 | 48 | 3794 | 68 | 🟢 Good |
| 22 | openblog | OSI-approved OSS | MIT | 69 | 54 | 2 | 68 | 🟢 Good |
| 23 | Keystone | OSI-approved OSS | MIT | 66 | 41 | 9913 | 65 | 🟢 Good |
| 24 | Squidex | OSI-approved OSS | MIT | 69 | 33 | 2502 | 65 | 🟢 Good |
| 25 | Astropress | OSI-approved OSS | MIT | 49 | 47 | 0 | 59 | 🟡 Fair |
| 26 | Atomic Server | OSI-approved OSS | MIT | 63 | 22 | 1574 | 58 | 🟡 Fair |
| 27 | Twill | OSI-approved OSS | Apache-2.0 | 62 | 20 | 3961 | 56 | 🟡 Fair |
| 28 | BCMS | OSI-approved OSS | MIT | 63 | 14 | 461 | 56 | 🟡 Fair |
| 29 | MZinga | OSI-approved OSS | MIT | 59 | 18 | 8 | 53 | 🟡 Fair |
| 30 | FormCMS | OSI-approved OSS | MIT | 49 | 24 | 263 | 52 | 🟡 Fair |
| 31 | LeadCMS | OSI-approved OSS | MIT | 41 | 24 | 34 | 48 | 🟡 Fair |
| 32 | LinkBCMS | OSI-approved OSS | MIT | 54 | 0 | 2 | 45 | 🟡 Fair |
| 33 | VaahCMS | OSI-approved OSS | MIT | 43 | 7 | 575 | 41 | 🟡 Fair |
| 34 | cms | OSI-approved OSS | AGPL-3.0 | 36 | 0 | 3909 | 38 | 🔴 Needs Attention |
| 35 | DoraCMS | OSI-approved OSS | MIT | 36 | 0 | 3537 | 36 | 🔴 Needs Attention |
| 36 | Mixcore | OSI-approved OSS | MIT | 33 | 0 | 886 | 35 | 🔴 Needs Attention |
| 37 | Contentport | OSI-approved OSS | AGPL-3.0 | 28 | 0 | 761 | 33 | 🔴 Needs Attention |
| 38 | mave-cms | OSI-approved OSS | MIT | 30 | 0 | 7 | 33 | 🔴 Needs Attention |
| 39 | Cockpit CMS | OSI-approved OSS | MIT | 31 | 0 | 5397 | 31 | 🔴 Needs Attention |
| 40 | Puck CMS | OSI-approved OSS | MIT | 28 | 0 | 169 | 31 | 🔴 Needs Attention |
| 41 | HashBrown CMS | OSI-approved OSS | MIT | 28 | 0 | 158 | 31 | 🔴 Needs Attention |
| 42 | HonoHub | OSI-approved OSS | MIT | 24 | 0 | 464 | 30 | 🔴 Needs Attention |
| 43 | Burdy | OSI-approved OSS | MIT | 28 | 0 | 233 | 30 | 🔴 Needs Attention |
| 44 | StartupEngine | OSI-approved OSS | MIT | 28 | 0 | 140 | 30 | 🔴 Needs Attention |
| 45 | Contentive | OSI-approved OSS | MIT | 24 | 0 | 1 | 28 | 🔴 Needs Attention |
| 46 | bhd-cms | OSI-approved OSS | MIT | 19 | 0 | 1 | 26 | 🔴 Needs Attention |
Top 3 Highlights
Sanity ranks first with a ToolVitals score of 98, the highest score in the dataset. It pairs a 96 health score with a 98 shipping score, has 6,205 GitHub stars, and is labeled OSI-approved OSS under the MIT license_label.
dotCMS ranks second with a ToolVitals score of 96 and the strongest shipping score in the list at 100. Its health score is 91, it has 950 GitHub stars, and its openness_label is OSI-approved OSS with GPL-2.0 as the license_label.
Enonic XP ranks third with a ToolVitals score of 95, supported by a 90 health score and 98 shipping score. It has a smaller GitHub footprint than the two tools above it at 209 stars, but the ranking is driven by ToolVitals score first; its openness_label is OSI-approved OSS and its license_label is GPL-3.0.
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