Directus

A headless CMS that charges you nothing per seat, per record or per locale

Contentful made headless content management mainstream, then priced it like enterprise software: per-seat charges, record limits, locale limits and paid tiers that climb sharply as your content grows. Directus gives you the same headless model, instant REST and GraphQL APIs plus a polished admin app, running over a SQL database you own. Node deploys, manages and supports Directus as a production service hosted in the UK, with flat pricing however many editors, entries or projects you add.

What Directus is

Directus is an open source data platform that wraps any SQL database with two things: instant REST and GraphQL APIs for developers, and a no-code admin app that non-technical teams use to create and manage content. Point it at a database and every table becomes a manageable collection with granular roles and permissions, workflow states, revisions and file handling built in.

Used as a headless CMS, Directus does what Contentful does: editors work in a clean interface, developers consume structured content through APIs, and the content is decoupled from any particular website or app. The crucial difference is underneath. Directus does not trap your content in a proprietary store; it works over a plain SQL schema that remains yours, readable by any other tool you choose.

That database-first design makes Directus more than a CMS. Teams use it as an instant admin panel and API layer for operational data, product catalogues, customer records and internal tools, because it can be layered onto an existing database without migrating or restructuring anything.

Why self-hosted Directus instead of Contentful

No per-seat pricing: Contentful charges per user on its paid tiers, which at the time of writing start at hundreds of pounds a month, so growing the editorial team grows the bill. Self-hosted Directus has no seat count. Add every editor, developer and reviewer you like.

No record or locale limits: SaaS content platforms meter entries, content types, locales and API calls, and breaching a limit means an upgrade conversation. Directus imposes none of these ceilings; your capacity is your infrastructure, which Node sizes and manages for you.

Your content in your database: with Contentful, your content model and entries live in the vendor's cloud and leave through its export APIs. With Directus, everything sits in a standard SQL database on UK infrastructure you control, queryable directly and portable by definition.

UK data residency: content platforms routinely hold customer data, form submissions and unpublished commercial material. Directus managed by Node keeps all of it in the UK with an Article 28 data processing agreement, a clean answer for your data protection officer.

No feature gating: roles and permissions, revisions, webhooks and automation flows are part of the platform, not upsells scattered across enterprise tiers.

One platform, many front ends

Directus is genuinely headless: its APIs feed websites, mobile apps, digital signage and other systems from a single content source. Developers get REST and GraphQL out of the box, with query filtering, relational data and file transformations handled by the platform. Editors get an admin app with customisable layouts, field-level permissions, content revisions and workflow states, so marketing can move quickly without a developer in the loop.

Because it is API-first, Directus also plugs into the rest of your stack. Webhooks and built-in automation flows fire on content changes, and paired with n8n those events can drive real business processes: publishing triggers a review task, a price change updates downstream systems, a new entry posts to your channels.

Keycloak and single sign-on

Every application in a Node tenant joins your organisation's own Keycloak realm on our platform. Editors and developers sign in to Directus with the same corporate credentials they use across all their Node-managed applications, MFA and session policies apply consistently, and access is granted and revoked in one place.

How Node runs Directus for you

Deployment: we deploy Directus in a production configuration with its database, file storage, TLS and domains set up, either as a fresh headless CMS or layered over a database you already have.

Upgrades and maintenance: Directus releases steadily. We test and apply upgrades, manage database migrations and keep your instance current and secure without disrupting editors or API consumers.

Monitoring and support: we monitor availability, API performance and database health, take daily backups, and our UK team is available when your content platform needs attention.

Your infrastructure or ours: hosted on Node's UK infrastructure or deployed into your own environment, on-premises or in your cloud accounts, with the same managed service either way.