8 Ways to Customize Strapi CMS for Your Project Needs

Unlock the full potential of Strapi with our comprehensive customization guide. We'll explore 8 ways to tailor this headless CMS to your project's unique needs. From building custom plugins and modifying the admin panel to creating bespoke APIs and implementing advanced database queries, this article will equip you with the tools to transform Strapi into your ideal content management solution.

What is Strapi?

Strapi is an open-source headless Content Management System (CMS) designed for developers. It provides a robust set of out-of-the-box features including an intuitive admin panel, customizable content types, and ready-to-use API endpoints. Strapi's flexibility allows developers to build complex, scalable applications without being constrained by default settings, making it an ideal choice for projects requiring a high degree of customization.

Customizing Strapi CMS in 8 Best Ways

1. Custom Plugins

Building a Custom Admin Panel with a React App. If you want to customise the admin panel beyond the standard options, Strapi allows you to build your own React application. With React's component-based setup, you can create a unique admin interface that works seamlessly with Strapi’s backend. This is perfect for projects that require a specialized user experience.

Example:

To include environment variables in your custom React app, you need to tweak the webpack.config.js file found in src/admin/webpack.config.js. This allows you to set up and inject environment variables into your React app effectively:

module.exports = (config, webpack) => {
  config.plugins.push(
    new webpack.EnvironmentPlugin([
      "REACT_APP_API_URL",
      "REACT_APP_USER",
      "REACT_APP_PASSWORD",
    ])
  );
  return config;
};

2. Customizing APIs

Strapi makes it easy to generate key components for your app with the npx strapi generate command, which allows you to create APIs, controllers, services, and middleware.

Custom Controllers and Routes

Strapi gives you the flexibility to create custom controllers and routes. Whether you're adding a new endpoint, changing existing logic, integrating third-party services, or adding middleware or policies it's possible with custom APIs. 

export default {
  routes: [
    {
      method: "POST",
      path: "/order",
      handler: "order.createOrder",
      config: {
        policies: [],
        middlewares: ["api::favourite.user-restriction"],
      },
    },
  ],
};

Custom Middleware

Middleware in Strapi can intercept requests and responses, which lets you add custom logic before a request reaches the controller. This is especially useful for things like authentication, logging, or transforming data.

import { Strapi } from '@strapi/strapi';

export default (config, { strapi }: { strapi: Strapi }) => {
  return async (ctx, next) => {    
    // Write your logic here
    await next();
  };
};

You can also apply global middleware to all requests, which is handy for features like authentication or logging across your entire app. To define global middleware, edit your ./config/middleware.js file.

Creating Custom Policies

Policies in Strapi are functions that decide if a request should be allowed or denied based on specific rules. This keeps your API secure and consistent. This helps when you don't want to make changes or give a response before checking the rules set in policies.

3. Plugins from the Marketplace (Installing Plugins)

Strapi’s plugin system makes it easy to add new features. You can install plugins made by the community to add things like SEO, analytics, image optimization, or enhanced authentication. Popular plugins include Swagger API Documentation, Multi-Select Input, Image Optimizer, and ChatGPT.

4. Customizing Roles and Permissions

You can create custom roles for users to define specific permissions. Each role can be configured to allow or restrict access to different APIs, ensuring that users only have access to the resources that align with their assigned roles. This role-based access control (RBAC) helps in maintaining security and proper management of user privileges within the application.

5. Customizing Media Management

Custom Media Handling

Strapi’s media library is highly adaptable, allowing you to decide how media files are managed and stored. You can enhance its default capabilities to better suit your needs, like integrating with cloud storage like s3 or adding custom metadata to files.

Custom Image Processing

If your project needs advanced image processing, Strapi allows you to implement your own image manipulation techniques. For example, using an image optimizer plugin can improve your website’s performance by converting images to more efficient formats like WebP. This reduces load times and enhances the user experience.

6. Customizing Lifecycle Hooks

Lifecycle hooks in Strapi let you run custom code at specific points in a content’s lifecycle, such as before or after it is created, updated, or deleted.

By using lifecycle hooks, you can add custom logic that runs automatically during content operations. This could include tasks like validating data, sending notifications, or updating related records. For instance, to stop users from deleting multiple entries at once, you could use the beforeDeleteMany hook to throw an error unless certain conditions are met.

Examples of Lifecycle Hooks in Strapi

• beforeUpdate: Runs before updating a content entry.
• beforeDelete: Runs before deleting a single content entry.
• beforeDeleteMany: Runs before deleting multiple content entries.
• afterCreate: Runs after creating a content entry.

Limitations of Using Lifecycle Hooks with Components

Although lifecycle hooks like beforeUpdate are great for validating or changing data before it’s saved, they don’t always work well with components. This is because component data is handled differently in Strapi, meaning that hooks might not catch changes to component data before it’s saved. If you rely on hooks to enforce rules on component data, you might need to add extra custom logic or rethink how your data is structured.

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7. Overcoming Limitations with Custom Database Queries

Strapi’s built-in ORM is powerful but might not cover all the complex queries or data retrieval needs of your project. Knowing its limitations helps you decide when to use custom database queries.

Writing Custom SQL Queries

When Strapi’s ORM isn’t enough, you can write custom SQL queries to get the job done. This allows for advanced data manipulation, retrieving complex datasets, or optimizing performance.

const commentsQuery = `
  UPDATE "comments"
  SET "is_disabled" = true
  WHERE "id" IN (
    SELECT "comment_id"
    FROM "comments_commented_by_links"
    WHERE "register_user_id" = ${userId}
  )
`;
await strapi.db.connection.raw(commentsQuery);

8. Custom Error Handling in the Admin Panel

To make the admin panel in Strapi more user-friendly, you can implement custom error messages. Instead of generic error responses, you can provide specific messages that help administrators quickly understand issues and how to fix them.

import utils from "@strapi/utils";
const { ApplicationError } = utils.errors;

module.exports = async (ctx, next) => {
  try {
    // Your logic here
  } catch (error) {
    throw new ApplicationError("Your custom error message here");
  }
};

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Conclusion

Strapi makes managing content a breeze. It’s easy to create content types and components that perfectly fit your needs, and building custom APIs with your own endpoints is straightforward. Strapi also offers plenty of options for managing media, so you can store and handle files in a way that works best for you. 

The admin panel is another highlight—it’s user-friendly and can be customized without a lot of extra work. Overall, Strapi is a flexible, powerful tool that takes the hassle out of content management, helping both developers and content creators work more smoothly and effectively.