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Create Your First Site in 5 Minutes

This tutorial is for first-time ReactPress end users. No repository clone or Docker setup required.

Step 1: Install the CLI​

npm install -g @fecommunity/reactpress@beta

Step 2: Initialize the site​

In any empty directory:

mkdir my-blog && cd my-blog
reactpress init

init automatically:

  1. Generates .reactpress/config.json and .env
  2. Initializes the SQLite database
  3. Starts API, Admin, and the default theme
  4. Prints access URLs in the terminal

On success you should see output similar to:

ServiceURL
Visitor sitehttp://localhost:3001
Adminhttp://localhost:3001/admin/
APIhttp://localhost:3002/api
Health checkhttp://localhost:3002/api/health

Step 3: Log in to Admin​

  1. Open http://localhost:3001/admin/ in your browser
  2. Log in with the default account: admin / admin
  3. Change your password immediately after first login (Settings → Account)
Security

Never use the default password in production. Before deployment, update ADMIN_USER / ADMIN_PASSWD or change the account in Admin.

Step 4: Install and enable a theme​

If the visitor site at :3001 shows no content yet, in Admin:

  1. Go to Appearance → Themes
  2. Install reactpress-theme-starter from the catalog (or the hello-world starter theme)
  3. Click Enable

After enabling, refresh http://localhost:3001 to see the visitor site.

Step 5: Publish your first post​

  1. In Admin, Posts → New
  2. Enter a title and Markdown body
  3. Choose category / tags (optional)
  4. Click Publish in the top right
  5. View the result at http://localhost:3001

Step-by-step with screenshots: Create your first blog post.

Step 6: Verify the API (optional)​

curl http://localhost:3002/api/health

A response of {"status":"ok"} means the API is healthy. For Headless integration, see Headless API guide.

Having trouble?​

reactpress doctor          # environment and service diagnostics
reactpress logs --follow   # live API logs
reactpress stop            # stop services, then re-run init

More troubleshooting: Troubleshooting.

What to learn next​

You are…Recommended reading
Content creatorUser guide: Content management
Site administratorSite settings & SEO
Frontend developerTheme development
Full-stack / integrationHeadless API
Ready to go liveProduction deployment