Adminium

From connection string to shipped dashboard.

Adminium is an open-source engine (AGPL-3.0) that takes a database connection string — or a schema file — introspects the structure and relations, and generates a complete, professional, themable React admin dashboard.

Status: milestones M0–M11 complete — foundation, design system, engine and adapters, generated app, Studio, LLM assist, widget registry (176/176 annex ids), i18n, self-host distribution (CLI, Docker, zip export), and the Electron desktop shell. The free v1.0 release is M0–M11 plus a hardening pass.

Run it

A project folder (Node.js 22.14 or newer) — the way to work on an admin you want to change and commit:

npx @adminiumjs/adminium new my-admin --sample
cd my-admin
npm run dev   # → http://localhost:4600

new writes the folder, a .env holding a generated ADMINIUM_SECRET, and a pinned @adminiumjs/adminium dependency; --sample adds a small demo database. Without a name, npx @adminiumjs/adminium new turns the current folder into the project. Its pages and schema customizations are files under pages/ and schema/, which npm run dev keeps in step with Studio. Its own server code goes in hooks/ and actions/, and pages and widgets written in React in pages/ and widgets/. Projects · Page files · Hooks and actions · Pages and widgets · Deploying one.

ADMINIUM_SECRET is required and must stay stable across restarts — it derives the encryption key for every stored DSN and API key. Generate it once with openssl rand -hex 32.

Docker Compose — the reference deployment:

ADMINIUM_SECRET=$(openssl rand -hex 32) docker compose up
# → http://localhost:4600 → first-run wizard

npm (Node.js 22.14 or newer):

npm install -g @adminiumjs/adminium
export ADMINIUM_SECRET=${ADMINIUM_SECRET:-$(openssl rand -hex 32)}  # save this value
adminium start   # → http://localhost:4600

On a server, pin the version (@adminiumjs/adminium@0.3.22) and set ADMINIUM_DATA_DIR. Do not run a server with plain npx @adminiumjs/adminium. Without a version, npx looks for a newer release on every run. With no terminal attached, it installs one without asking, and start then migrates the meta store to it. A VPS without Docker sets up a pinned install under systemd.

Full guides — self-hosting, meta store, LLM assist — at docs.adminium.dev.

Where Adminium runs

Adminium is one long-running Node.js server. It runs on any host that keeps that process running and gives it a disk that survives restarts. It needs about 165 MB idle and about 220 MB during a first boot, so 1 GB suits a VPS where Docker and a proxy run beside it, and 512 MB is enough on a managed host that runs the container for you. A host without a disk also works, as long as the meta store is a managed Postgres or MySQL database and files go to a storage bucket.

Platform	How it runs	Meta store	Files	Setup
Any VPS or server, e.g. a DigitalOcean Droplet	Docker Compose, or Node.js under systemd	SQLite on the disk, or Postgres/MySQL	the disk	docker-compose.yml · VPS guide
Railway	the published image, with a volume	SQLite on the volume, or Railway Postgres	the volume, or a bucket	deploy/README.md
Render	the published image, with a disk	SQLite on the disk	the disk	deploy/render.yaml
Fly.io	the published image, with a volume	SQLite on the volume	the volume, or Tigris via fly storage create	deploy/fly.toml
DigitalOcean App Platform	the published image, with no disk	managed Postgres	a storage destination is required	deploy/do-app.yaml

Docker Compose and the VPS guide have been run end to end. The Railway, Render, Fly.io and App Platform setups are written against the published image and have not yet been tried on a live account.

Files means uploads, record attachments, export artifacts and the branding logo. They go to ADMINIUM_DATA_DIR/files on the server's own disk unless ADMINIUM_STORAGE_URL sends them to an S3-compatible bucket or a WebDAV server, which is required on a host with no persistent disk and optional everywhere else. Installed apps and add-ons are not files, and neither are the automatic pre-upgrade snapshots of an embedded SQLite store: they always stay in ADMINIUM_DATA_DIR. So on a host with no persistent disk, every installed app, and every add-on the image does not bundle, is lost at each deploy — see deploy/README.md.

Not supported: Vercel and Netlify

Adminium does not have a serverless mode at the moment, so it does not run on Vercel or Netlify. Both run code as short-lived functions: Vercel stops an idle instance after five minutes and keeps no disk, and Netlify functions cannot hold a live connection open. Adminium needs a process that keeps running for its background jobs, schedules and live updates. The example apps are static sites, so those do deploy to either.

Some managed hosts run a revenue-share or affiliate program; Adminium may earn a commission from them, and the price you pay is unchanged.

Example apps

Thirteen complete, production-shaped frontends that run on a database Adminium generated. Each one is a separate public repo, ships with its own db/schema.sql and db/seed.sql, a manifest.json Adminium reads to scaffold the tables, and a docker-compose.yml that stands up Postgres, the generated dashboard and the app together. docker compose up brings the whole thing up on realistic data with nothing to configure; DEMO_DATA=0 starts empty on the same schema instead, and npm run demo:wipe takes the demo rows back out whenever you are ready for your own — the schema, and anything you added yourself, stay. Every one also runs offline as a static build with a bundled demo dataset, so the live links below need no backend.

Browse them at adminium.dev/marketplace.

App	For	Source	Live demo
Ecommerce Storefront	Commerce	ecommerce-storefront	demo
Point of Sale	Retail & restaurant counters	point-of-sale	demo
Booking Scheduler	Studios & appointments	booking-scheduler	demo
Support Desk	Ticketing & SLAs	support-desk	demo
Learning Platform	Courses & enrolment	learning-platform	demo
Sales CRM	Pipelines & deals	sales-crm	demo
People Ops	HR & onboarding	people-ops	demo
Client Portal	Agencies & studios	client-portal	demo
Online Ordering	Restaurants	online-ordering	demo
Event Ticketing	Events & door lists	event-ticketing	demo
Clinic Desk	Clinics & health	clinic-desk	demo
Factory Ops	Manufacturing	factory-ops	demo
Hotel Reservations	Hotels	hotel-reservations	demo

All thirteen are AGPL-3.0, carry their own vitest suites asserting their rules against the shipped seed, and ship the same eight locales as Adminium itself — including Arabic, so each one has a full RTL layout rather than a mirrored afterthought.

They exist to be taken apart. Each reads its data through a one-file DataSource seam (src/data/source.ts), so pointing an app at a live Adminium deployment instead of its bundled seed is a single implementation, with no change to any screen. The split they all demonstrate is the product argument: the app is the daily workflow, and the dashboard Adminium generates from the same schema is the records, history and reporting behind it.

Monorepo

Workspace names below are the in-repo identifiers. On npm the packages publish under the @adminiumjs scope — the @adminium scope and the bare adminium name both belong to unrelated parties — so the CLI installs as @adminiumjs/adminium and still provides the adminium command.

Path	Workspace	Purpose
apps/server	@adminium/server	Fastify API + serves the dashboard
apps/dashboard	@adminium/dashboard	React SPA: Studio + Generated App
apps/desktop	@adminium/desktop	Electron offline app
apps/docs	@adminium/docs	docs.adminium.dev
apps/e2e	@adminium/e2e	Playwright end-to-end suites (web + desktop)
packages/tokens	@adminium/tokens	Design tokens, palettes, fonts, Tailwind preset
packages/ui	@adminium/ui	Component library (Tiers 1–3)
packages/charts	@adminium/charts	Dependency-light SVG charts
packages/widgets	@adminium/widgets	Widget registry + page templates
packages/engine	@adminium/engine	Introspection, classification, config generation
packages/adapter-*	—	Postgres / MySQL / SQLite adapters
packages/schema-import	@adminium/schema-import	ORM/DDL schema-file parsers
packages/llm	@adminium/llm	LLM assist (API + BYO round-trip)
packages/meta	@adminium/meta	adminium_* meta-store + migrations
packages/i18n	@adminium/i18n	8 locales, RTL utils, Intl formatters
packages/manifest	@adminium/manifest	Micro-SaaS manifest spec + installer
packages/add-on-contracts	@adminium/add-on-contracts	The typed contracts add-ons fill, and their slot ids
packages/public-client	@adminium/public-client	Browser client for the scoped public API
packages/config	@adminium/config	Shared tsconfig/ESLint (incl. no-style-prop)/Prettier

Development

Three commands from a fresh clone to a running admin panel:

corepack enable
pnpm install
pnpm dev

The first pnpm dev writes a .env with a stable ADMINIUM_SECRET and builds a sample database to start on, so there is nothing to configure first. Then:

pnpm lint && pnpm typecheck && pnpm test
pnpm preflight      # every gate CI runs that can run locally, in CI's order

The design system's in-repo source of truth is packages/tokens + packages/ui; browse it through the @adminium/ui Storybook.

CONTRIBUTING.md has the rest, and the decisions many files rest on are public at docs.adminium.dev/anatomy/decisions.