create-ej-app

CLI to bootstrap production-ready apps with Next.js, Better Auth, Drizzle ORM, Elysia, Workflow, shadcn/ui, React Email, OpenTelemetry, and deployment already wired up.

bunx create-ej-app@latest

Features

• Next.js 16: React 19, Server Components, App Router
• Better Auth:
  • Magic link
  • GitHub and Google OAuth
  • Account linking
  • user, admin, and superadmin roles
  • Organizations (SaaS starter)
• Drizzle ORM: type-safe SQL over PostgreSQL
• Stripe: subscriptions, trials, and the billing portal (SaaS starter)
• Elysia: HTTP APIs on Bun
• Workflow: durable background jobs
• React Email: transactional emails as React components
• OpenTelemetry: traces with one wide event per server action
• shadcn/ui: accessible components on Radix UI
• Tailwind CSS 4
• TypeScript: strict mode
• TanStack Query
• Bun tests on PGlite: in-memory Postgres, no database server needed
• Docker

Templates

Next.js full-stack app (nextjs)

Next.js 16, Better Auth, shadcn/ui, and Drizzle ORM. Use it for web apps that need sign-in, an admin panel, and server actions.

SaaS starter (saas-starter)

Everything in nextjs, plus organizations with invitations and roles, Stripe subscriptions with trials and the billing portal, R2 uploads, support tickets, in-app feedback, and a contact form.

API server (api)

REST API with Elysia on Bun, Drizzle ORM, PostgreSQL, and Zod validation. Use it for headless APIs, internal tools, and services.

Quick start

bunx create-ej-app@latest

You will be prompted for:

• Project name
• Description
• Template (nextjs, saas-starter, or api)
• Whether to initialize git. If yes, the CLI creates the main branch (or your configured default, unless it is master) and makes the initial commit, as long as .env is ignored.
• Whether to update packages to their latest versions. With Bun it runs bun update -i, so you pick which packages to update.

Example:

? Enter the project name: my-app
? Enter a description for the project: Production-ready Next.js app
? Select a template: nextjs
? Initialize a git repository? yes
? Update packages to their latest versions? The template can lag behind. yes

Without Prompts

Pass the answers as flags to skip the prompts, for example in scripts, CI or coding agents. Any answer you leave out is still asked:

bunx create-ej-app@latest --name my-app --description "Production-ready Next.js app" --template nextjs --git --no-update

| Flag | Answers | | -------------------------------- | --------------------------------------------- | | -n, --name <name> | Project name, also the folder name | | -d, --description <text> | Description | | -t, --template <template> | Template: nextjs, saas-starter, or api | | --git or --no-git | Whether to initialize git and commit | | --update or --no-update | Whether to update packages to latest versions |

Without a terminal, the CLI can't ask, so it exits and names the flags you still need to pass. --update without a terminal updates every package to its latest version, which can include major versions: run the type-check and tests afterwards.

What you get

Next.js and SaaS templates

| Layer | Stack | | ------------- | ------------------------------------------------- | | Framework | Next.js 16, React 19, React Compiler | | Runtime | Bun | | Database | PostgreSQL + Drizzle ORM | | Auth | Better Auth: magic link, GitHub, Google, roles | | Actions | next-safe-action with role-based clients | | Errors | AppError with customer-safe messages | | Observability | OpenTelemetry, one wide event per action | | Email | React Email + Nodemailer, sent by Workflow | | UI | shadcn/ui, Tailwind CSS 4, dark mode, Geist fonts | | Data fetching | TanStack Query + nuqs URL state | | Forms | react-hook-form + Zod | | Tests | Bun tests on in-memory Postgres (PGlite) | | Agent docs | AGENTS.md and CLAUDE.md with project rules |

Both templates ship with:

• An admin panel with user management, impersonation, and ban controls
• Profile page, error pages, 404 page, robots.txt, and sitemap
• A seed script, a database reset script, and focused tests
• A test that fails when a client component imports server-only code
• A test that fails when a foreign key has no index or delete rule

The SaaS starter adds:

• Organizations with owner, admin, and member roles, plus email invitations
• Stripe Checkout, trials, the billing portal, and idempotent webhooks
• Per-plan member limits
• Organization logos on Cloudflare R2, with ownership checks on every upload
• Support tickets shared by organization managers and answered from the admin panel
• In-app feedback and a public contact form, each with an admin inbox

API server template

| Layer | Stack | | ----------- | ------------------------------------------ | | Runtime | Bun | | Framework | Elysia | | Database | PostgreSQL + Drizzle ORM | | Validation | Zod v4 | | API docs | Auto-generated OpenAPI | | Containers | Docker, distroless images | | Types | TypeScript, strict mode | | Formatting | Prettier | | Environment | Validated env vars with @t3-oss/env-core |

Setup

Prerequisites

• Bun: the template scripts, tests, and Dockerfiles run on it
• PostgreSQL
• OAuth credentials for GitHub and Google (Next.js and SaaS templates)
• SMTP credentials from a provider such as Resend, SES, or Postmark (Next.js and SaaS templates)
• A Stripe account and the Stripe CLI (SaaS template)

Install

cd my-app
bun install

Bun is required: the templates' scripts and Dockerfiles call bun directly.

Environment variables

The CLI creates .env from .env.example with a random BETTER_AUTH_SECRET. Fill in the rest, and never commit .env.

Development

Next.js and SaaS templates

bun run dev

App: http://localhost:3000

API template

bun run dev

API: http://localhost:3000 OpenAPI docs: http://localhost:3000/docs

Docker

bun run build:docker
docker run --env-file .env -p 3000:3000 my-app

The Next.js and SaaS images are tagged my-app and the API image my-api; change the tag in package.json. The build uses .env.example values, so pass real ones at run time with --env-file. Run bun install first so bun.lock exists.

Next.js and SaaS templates

Each generated project documents itself. Read these first:

• README.md: setup steps and commands
• AGENTS.md: architecture, authorization rules, and writing rules for you and for coding agents
• src/lib/siteConfig.ts: product name, description, and contact email
• src/db/schema.ts: database schema

Push the schema with bun run db:push, seed it with bun run db:seed, and run the tests with bun test.

Add shadcn components with:

bunx shadcn@latest add your_component_name

API template architecture

• Routes (src/routes/): HTTP, validation, call data-access
• Data-access (src/data-access/): database access per resource
• Database (src/db/): Drizzle client, schemas, shared fields
• Library (src/lib/): shared utilities and Zod schemas

Includes a sample todos CRUD API with pagination, sorting, search, and OpenAPI docs.

API commands

| Command | Purpose | | -------------------- | -------------------------- | | bun run dev | Dev server with hot reload | | bun run build | Type-check and compile | | bun run type-check | TypeScript check | | bun run db:push | Push schema | | bun run db:studio | Drizzle Studio | | bun run db:seed | Seed the database |

Contributing

Pull requests are welcome. Please keep changes focused and working.

License

MIT.