Project structure
Your new Astro project generated from the create astro
CLI wizard already includes some files and folders. Others, you will create yourself and add to Astro’s existing file structure.
Here’s how an Astro project is organized, and some files you will find in your new project.
Directories and Files
Section titled Directories and FilesAstro leverages an opinionated folder layout for your project. Every Astro project root should include the following directories and files:
src/*
- Your project source code (components, pages, styles, etc.)public/*
- Your non-code, unprocessed assets (fonts, icons, etc.)package.json
- A project manifest.astro.config.mjs
- An Astro configuration file. (recommended)tsconfig.json
- A TypeScript configuration file. (recommended)
Example Project Tree
Section titled Example Project TreeA common Astro project directory might look like this:
Directorypublic/
- robots.txt
- favicon.svg
- social-image.png
Directorysrc/
Directorycomponents/
- Header.astro
- Button.jsx
Directorycontent/
- config.ts
Directoryposts/
- post1.md
- post2.md
- post3.md
Directorylayouts/
- PostLayout.astro
Directorypages/
Directoryposts/
- [post].astro
- about.astro
- index.astro
- rss.xml.js
Directorystyles/
- global.css
- astro.config.mjs
- package.json
- tsconfig.json
The src/
folder is where most of your project source code lives. This includes:
Astro processes, optimizes, and bundles your src/
files to create the final website that is shipped to the browser. Unlike the static public/
directory, your src/
files are built and handled for you by Astro.
Some files (like Astro components) are not even sent to the browser as written but are instead rendered to static HTML. Other files (like CSS) are sent to the browser but may be optimized or bundled with other CSS files for performance.
While this guide describes some popular conventions used in the Astro community, the only directories reserved by Astro are src/pages/
and src/content/
. You are free to rename and reorganize any other directories in a way that works best for you.
src/pages
Section titled src/pagesPages routes are created for your site by adding supported file types to this directory.
src/pages
is a required sub-directory in your Astro project. Without it, your site will have no pages or routes!
src/components
Section titled src/componentsComponents are reusable units of code for your HTML pages. These could be Astro components, or UI framework components like React or Vue. It is common to group and organize all of your project components together in this folder.
This is a common convention in Astro projects, but it is not required. Feel free to organize your components however you like!
src/content
Section titled src/contentThe src/content/
directory is reserved to store content collections and a configuration file. No other files are allowed inside this folder.
src/layouts
Section titled src/layoutsLayouts are Astro components that define the UI structure shared by one or more pages.
Just like src/components
, this directory is a common convention but not required.
src/styles
Section titled src/stylesIt is a common convention to store your CSS or Sass files in a src/styles
directory, but this is not required. As long as your styles live somewhere in the src/
directory and are imported correctly, Astro will handle and optimize them.
public/
Section titled public/The public/
directory is for files and assets in your project that do not need to be processed during Astro’s build process. The files in this folder will be copied into the build folder untouched, and then your site will be built.
This behavior makes public/
ideal for common assets like images and fonts, or special files such as robots.txt
and manifest.webmanifest
.
You can place CSS and JavaScript in your public/
directory, but be aware that those files will not be bundled or optimized in your final build.
As a general rule, any CSS or JavaScript that you write yourself should live in your src/
directory.
package.json
Section titled package.jsonThis is a file used by JavaScript package managers to manage your dependencies. It also defines the scripts that are commonly used to run Astro (ex: npm run dev
, npm run build
).
There are two kinds of dependencies you can specify in a package.json
: dependencies
and devDependencies
. In most cases, these work the same: Astro needs all dependencies at build time, and your package manager will install both. We recommend putting all of your dependencies in dependencies
to start, and only use devDependencies
if you find a specific need to do so.
For help creating a new package.json
file for your project, check out the manual setup instructions.
astro.config.mjs
Section titled astro.config.mjsThis file is generated in every starter template and includes configuration options for your Astro project. Here you can specify integrations to use, build options, server options, and more.
Astro supports several file formats for its JavaScript configuration file: astro.config.js
, astro.config.mjs
, astro.config.cjs
and astro.config.ts
. We recommend using .mjs
in most cases or .ts
if you want to write TypeScript in your config file.
TypeScript config file loading is handled using tsm
and will respect your project’s tsconfig
options.
See the configuration reference for complete details.
tsconfig.json
Section titled tsconfig.jsonThis file is generated in every starter template and includes TypeScript configuration options for your Astro project. Some features (like npm package imports) aren’t fully supported in the editor without a tsconfig.json
file.
See the TypeScript Guide for details on setting configurations.
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