Quick Start

Philosophy

• Roll your own stack: pick only what you need, nothing extra.
• Minimal templates: bare-bones scaffolds with zero bloat.
• Latest dependencies: always current and stable by default.
• Free and open source: forever.

Get Started

Prerequisites

• Node.js LTS - Download from nodejs.org
• Git (optional) - Download from git-scm.com - if you want to initialize a git repository
• Bun (optional) - Download from bun.com - if you want to use Bun as your package manager

Authentication (private registry)

The CLI is published privately to GitHub Packages under the @sciam-fr scope. Before running it, authenticate once: create a GitHub personal access token with the read:packages scope, then add the @sciam-fr scope to your .npmrc (in ~/.npmrc for all projects, or the project root):

@sciam-fr:registry=https://npm.pkg.github.com
//npm.pkg.github.com/:_authToken=${GITHUB_TOKEN}

Export the token so npm/bun/pnpm can read it (${GITHUB_TOKEN} is expanded at runtime — the token never lands in the file):

export GITHUB_TOKEN=ghp_your_token_here

CLI (prompts)

npm create @sciam-fr/better-s-stack@latest

Follow the interactive prompts to choose your frontend, backend, database, ORM, API layer, and addons.

Skip prompts and use the default stack:

npm create @sciam-fr/better-s-stack@latest --yes

Stack Builder (UI)

• Visit /new to pick your stack and copy the generated command
• Or open it via:

npm create @sciam-fr/better-s-stack@latest builder

Common Setups

Default Stack

npm create @sciam-fr/better-s-stack@latest my-webapp \
  --frontend tanstack-router \
  --backend hono \
  --database sqlite \
  --orm drizzle \
  --auth better-auth \
  --addons turborepo

Convex + React + Clerk

npm create @sciam-fr/better-s-stack@latest my-api \
  --frontend tanstack-router \
  --backend convex \
  --auth clerk

Mobile App (Expo)

npm create @sciam-fr/better-s-stack@latest my-native \
  --frontend native-uniwind \
  --backend hono \
  --database sqlite \
  --orm drizzle \
  --auth better-auth

Empty Monorepo

npm create @sciam-fr/better-s-stack@latest my-workspace \
  --frontend none \
  --backend none

Flags Cheat Sheet

See the full list in the CLI Reference. Key flags:

• --frontend: tanstack-router, react-router, tanstack-start, next, nuxt, svelte, solid, astro, native-bare, native-uniwind, native-unistyles, none
• --backend: hono, express, fastify, elysia, convex, self, none
• --runtime: bun, node, workers, none
• --database: sqlite, postgres, mysql, mongodb, none
• --orm: drizzle, prisma, mongoose, none
• --api: trpc, orpc, none
• --auth: better-auth, clerk, none
• --payments: polar, none
• --addons: turborepo, nx, pwa, tauri, electrobun, biome, lefthook, husky, starlight, fumadocs, ultracite, oxlint, mcp, opentui, wxt, skills, evlog, none
• --examples: todo, ai, none

Next Steps