Makerkit vs Supastarter: Plugin Architecture vs Integrated Platform
Two Premium Boilerplates, Two Design Philosophies
Makerkit and Supastarter sit in the same price tier and target the same audience: developers who want a production-ready SaaS foundation without building auth, billing, and team management from scratch.
But they approach the problem differently.
Makerkit is built around a plugin architecture. The core is lean, and you install only the features you need through a CLI-driven plugin system. Swap auth providers, databases, and payment processors without rewriting your app. Created by Giancarlo Buomprisco and maintained full-time since 2022.
Supastarter is an integrated platform. Everything ships together in a Turborepo monorepo — auth, payments, email, blog, admin, AI chatbot, background jobs — all wired up and working from the first pnpm dev. Created by Jonathan Wilke, with Timo Ischen maintaining the Nuxt version.
Both are excellent. The right choice depends on whether you want modular flexibility or an all-in-one foundation.
TL;DR
Makerkit ($299 Pro / $599 Teams, lifetime) offers three database stacks, a plugin system for modular feature installation, and support for Next.js and React Router. Supastarter ($299 Solo / $799 Startup, one-time) ships a complete integrated platform with five payment providers, background jobs, file storage, and an AI chatbot — all pre-wired in a monorepo. Choose Makerkit if you want to control exactly what goes into your codebase. Choose Supastarter if you want everything working together on day one.
Key Takeaways
- Both cost $299 for solo developers. Makerkit charges $599 for teams of up to 5. Supastarter charges $799 for teams of up to 5 with a 30-minute architecture consult included.
- Makerkit's plugin system is genuinely modular. Plugins install via CLI using the shadcn registry format, land in
packages/plugins/, and you own the code. Add testimonials, feedback widgets, roadmap, waitlist, analytics, and monitoring without bloating the core. - Supastarter ships more features out of the box. Background jobs (trigger.dev), cron jobs (QStash), S3-compatible file storage, a working AI chatbot, and legal page templates are all included. Makerkit leaves most of these to you.
- Database flexibility differs. Makerkit offers three stacks: Supabase, Drizzle + Better Auth, and Prisma 7 + Better Auth. Supastarter uses PostgreSQL with your choice of Prisma or Drizzle.
- Payment provider count favors Supastarter. Five providers (Stripe, Lemon Squeezy, Polar, Creem, Dodo Payments) versus Makerkit's three (Stripe, Lemon Squeezy, Paddle).
- Both support strict TypeScript, i18n, multi-tenancy, and RBAC. The core B2B SaaS feature set is comparable.
- Framework support is different. Makerkit supports Next.js and React Router (formerly Remix). Supastarter supports Next.js and Nuxt, with TanStack Start coming soon.
Quick Comparison
| Feature | Makerkit | Supastarter |
|---|---|---|
| Price (solo) | $299 lifetime | $299 one-time |
| Price (team) | $599 (up to 5) | $799 (up to 5) |
| Frameworks | Next.js, React Router | Next.js, Nuxt |
| Architecture | Plugin-based modular | Integrated monorepo (Turborepo) |
| Database | Supabase, Drizzle, Prisma 7 | PostgreSQL (Prisma or Drizzle) |
| Auth | Supabase Auth or Better Auth | Better Auth |
| Auth features | OAuth, Magic Links, MFA | OAuth, Magic Links, Passkeys, 2FA |
| Payments | Stripe, Lemon Squeezy, Paddle | Stripe, Lemon Squeezy, Polar, Creem, Dodo |
| Multi-tenancy | Yes (orgs, invites, RBAC) | Yes (orgs, invites, RBAC) |
| Billing models | Per-seat, metered, flat, one-time | Per-seat, subscription, one-time |
| i18n | Yes | Yes (multi-language blog + legal) |
| Admin panel | Super admin + impersonation | Super admin + impersonation |
| Blog | Markdoc | MDX (multi-language) |
| React.Email + Resend/Nodemailer | Customizable templates + multiple providers | |
| E2E testing | Playwright | Playwright + GitHub Actions |
| Background jobs | Not included | trigger.dev + QStash cron |
| File storage | Not included | S3-compatible + presigned uploads |
| AI features | MCP server + agent rules | AI chatbot + Vercel AI SDK |
| Monitoring | Sentry, PostHog, Signoz plugins | Sentry |
| API layer | Next.js API routes | Hono + oRPC (type-safe, OpenAPI) |
| Documentation | 400+ pages | Comprehensive docs |
| TypeScript | Strict mode | Strict mode |
| Plugin system | Yes (CLI-driven) | No |
| Open source tier | Yes (basic) | No |
Pricing Deep Dive
Makerkit
Makerkit offers three tiers:
- Open Source — Free. Basic Next.js + Supabase kit with limited features. Good for learning the architecture, but missing plugins, premium support, and the full feature set.
- Pro — $299 lifetime. One developer, unlimited projects, all stacks (Supabase, Drizzle, Prisma), all plugins, Discord support, 400+ pages of docs.
- Teams — $599 lifetime. Up to 5 developers via GitHub access, private Discord channel, AI templates, everything in Pro.
No subscription. One payment covers all future updates permanently.
Supastarter
Supastarter also offers three tiers:
- Solo — $299 one-time. One developer, unlimited personal projects, full SaaS stack, lifetime updates.
- Startup — $799 one-time. Up to 5 developers, unlimited team projects, 30-minute architecture consulting session, priority support.
- Agency — $1,499 one-time. Up to 10 developers, unlimited client projects, white-label rights, private Discord channel.
Additionally, Supastarter sells a $149 add-on for 60-minute 1-on-1 architecture consulting.
The Real Cost Difference
At the solo tier, both cost $299. The gap appears at scale: Makerkit's team plan is $599 versus Supastarter's $799. Makerkit saves $200, but Supastarter includes an architecture consulting session. Supastarter's Agency tier ($1,499) has no Makerkit equivalent, making it the better option for agencies needing white-label rights.
Feature Comparison
Authentication
Makerkit lets you choose between Supabase Auth (Supabase stack) or Better Auth (Drizzle or Prisma stacks). You get email/password, magic links, social OAuth (Google, GitHub, Facebook, Discord, and more), and TOTP-based multi-factor authentication.
Supastarter uses Better Auth exclusively with the same ground covered, plus passkey support. Passkeys are increasingly important for enterprise customers mandating phishing-resistant authentication.
If passkey support is on your requirements list, Supastarter includes it natively. Adding passkeys to Makerkit's Better Auth stacks is possible but requires additional configuration.
Payments and Billing
Makerkit supports Stripe, Lemon Squeezy, and Paddle. The billing system handles per-seat subscriptions, usage-based metered billing, flat-rate plans, and one-time purchases natively. Provider swaps are configuration changes, not code rewrites.
Supastarter supports five providers: Stripe, Lemon Squeezy, Polar, Creem, and Dodo Payments. The billing system covers subscriptions, one-time payments, and seat-based pricing. Five providers matters if you sell in regions where Stripe has limited coverage or want Merchant of Record flexibility.
Makerkit's metered billing is a more explicitly first-class feature. Supastarter positions usage-based billing as addable but not pre-configured.
Multi-Tenancy and Team Management
This is close to a draw. Both include:
- Organization creation and management
- Email-based member invitations
- Role-based access control with custom roles
- Per-organization billing
- Organization switching in the UI
- Super admin dashboard with user impersonation
Makerkit adds one configuration flexibility: you can set the app to personal-only accounts, organization-only accounts, or a hybrid where users choose. Supastarter defaults to organization-based accounts.
Content Systems
Makerkit uses Markdoc for its blog, with automatic sitemap generation, meta tags, and structured data. It also includes a built-in help center/documentation system and a changelog feature for product updates. Three content systems in one kit.
Supastarter uses MDX for its blog with multi-language support — each post can exist in multiple translations. It also ships with pre-built legal page templates (privacy policy, terms of service, acceptable use policy) in multiple languages. The blog supports external CMS datasources.
If you are building for international markets, Supastarter's multi-language blog and legal pages save real work. If you want a built-in help center and changelog alongside your blog, Makerkit has that covered.
Architecture: Plugin vs Integrated
This is the core philosophical difference and the most important factor in your decision.
Makerkit: Modular Plugin Architecture
Makerkit's plugin system uses the shadcn registry format. You install plugins through a single CLI command, the code lands in packages/plugins/, and you own every line. Plugins are wired into your project with AST-based codemods — automated code transformations that add the plugin's routes, components, and configuration to the right places.
Available plugins include testimonials, feedback collection, product roadmap, waitlist management, error monitoring (Honeybadger, Sentry), headless CMS integration (Directus), and analytics (PostHog, Signoz, Meshes Analytics).
The modular architecture extends beyond plugins. You can swap your auth provider, database layer, and payment processor without rewriting your app. The abstraction layers are designed so that switching from Supabase to Drizzle, or from Stripe to Paddle, requires configuration changes rather than architectural rewrites.
The advantage: Your codebase stays lean. You only include what you use. No dead code for features you never enable. When something breaks, the smaller surface area makes debugging faster. For developers who value control and minimal dependencies, this is the right model.
The trade-off: You do more assembly work upfront. Features that Supastarter ships pre-wired — background jobs, file storage, AI chatbot — are either plugins you install or features you add yourself.
Supastarter: Integrated Platform
Supastarter ships everything in a Turborepo monorepo with separated packages: ai, api, auth, database, i18n, logs, mail, payments, storage, and ui. The packages are pre-wired with proper cross-package imports, shared types, and consistent patterns.
The API layer uses Hono with oRPC for type-safe endpoints that automatically generate OpenAPI specs. Background jobs run on trigger.dev. Cron jobs use QStash. File uploads go to S3-compatible storage with presigned URLs. The AI chatbot works with multiple LLM providers through Vercel's AI SDK. All of this is configured and working when you clone the repo.
The advantage: Everything works together from day one. You run pnpm dev and have a complete SaaS platform. No assembly required. For teams that want to start building business logic immediately rather than wiring infrastructure, this saves days.
The trade-off: The codebase is larger. If you never use the AI chatbot, its code still lives in your monorepo. If you do not need file storage, that package is still there. You can delete unused packages, but the initial complexity is higher than a lean core with optional plugins.
Developer Experience
AI-Assisted Development
Both boilerplates invest in AI developer tooling. Makerkit includes an MCP server for structured AI interaction, plus custom rules for Claude Code, Cursor, Windsurf, Codex, and Gemini. Supastarter includes AGENTS.md and claude.md files, Cursor/Claude Code/Copilot optimization, and a working AI chatbot component built on Vercel's AI SDK.
Testing and CI/CD
Both ship with Playwright E2E tests. Supastarter adds GitHub Actions CI/CD pipelines, Docker Compose for local development (PostgreSQL + MinIO S3), and Biome for formatting and linting. Makerkit gives you the testing framework but leaves CI/CD pipeline configuration to you.
Documentation
Makerkit's 400+ page documentation covers architecture decisions, deployment guides, and troubleshooting — exceptional for a boilerplate. Supastarter's docs are comprehensive with clear per-package guides. The architecture consulting options ($149 for 60 minutes, or included in the Startup plan) provide direct creator access for complex questions.
When to Choose Makerkit
- You want modular control. You prefer to add features incrementally rather than start with everything and remove what you do not need.
- You are using React Router (Remix). Supastarter does not support React Router. If your team is invested in the Remix/React Router ecosystem, Makerkit is the clear choice.
- You want Supabase Auth natively. Makerkit's Supabase stack uses Supabase Auth with RLS policies out of the box. Supastarter uses Better Auth regardless of database choice.
- Metered/usage-based billing is a core requirement. Makerkit's billing system explicitly supports API credits, AI usage quotas, and metered billing as first-class features.
- You want an open-source starting point. Makerkit's free tier lets you evaluate the architecture before paying for the full kit.
- You want a help center and changelog built in. Three content systems (blog + docs + changelog) ship with Makerkit.
- Budget is a factor for teams. $599 for up to 5 developers versus $799 for Supastarter's team plan.
Best for: Solo developers and small teams who value lean codebases, modular architecture, and the ability to swap providers without lock-in.
When to Choose Supastarter
- You want everything pre-wired. Auth, payments, email, blog, admin, AI, background jobs, file storage, testing, CI/CD — all working together from
pnpm dev. - You need Nuxt support. Supastarter supports Nuxt alongside Next.js. Makerkit does not.
- Five payment providers matter. Stripe, Lemon Squeezy, Polar, Creem, and Dodo Payments cover more global markets and MoR options than Makerkit's three.
- Your product needs file storage. S3-compatible storage with presigned uploads is included. Makerkit does not bundle file storage.
- Background jobs are part of your architecture. trigger.dev and QStash cron integration are pre-configured. Adding these to Makerkit is your responsibility.
- You want a type-safe API with OpenAPI specs. Supastarter's Hono + oRPC layer generates API documentation automatically. Useful if you are building a product with a public API.
- You are building an agency. The $1,499 Agency tier with white-label rights and 10 developer seats has no Makerkit equivalent.
- Passkey authentication is required. Better Auth with passkey support is included.
Best for: Teams building feature-rich B2B SaaS products who want a complete integrated platform and plan to use most of the included features.
Verdict
Makerkit and Supastarter are both premium, well-maintained boilerplates built by experienced developers. At the $299 solo tier, the price is identical. The choice comes down to architecture philosophy.
Choose Makerkit if you believe in starting lean and adding what you need. The plugin architecture keeps your codebase minimal, the provider abstraction prevents lock-in, and the three database stack options give you genuine flexibility. You will do more setup work upfront, but your codebase will contain only the code you actually use.
Choose Supastarter if you believe in starting complete and removing what you do not need. The integrated monorepo gives you a working SaaS platform on day one, with more payment providers, background jobs, file storage, and a pre-built AI chatbot. You will have a larger initial codebase, but less assembly work before you start building business logic.
Both are strong investments that will save weeks of development time. The deciding question is not which has more features — it is whether you prefer to assemble your stack piece by piece or start with everything connected.
Methodology
This comparison is based on publicly available information from both products' official websites, documentation, and pricing pages as of March 2026. Feature claims were verified against official documentation. Pricing reflects standard publicly listed prices at the time of writing and may change. We have no affiliate relationship with either product.
Exploring more SaaS boilerplate options? Browse all boilerplates on StarterPick for side-by-side feature comparisons, community reviews, and stack analysis — so you can find the right foundation without the research rabbit hole.