First Project

This flow writes a project to disk, explains what the CLI generated, and shows how to preview output when you want an extra safety check.

1. Scaffold interactively

Run the wizard when you want prompts:

npm create better-fullstack@latest my-app

The default stack is TypeScript, TanStack Router, Hono, Bun runtime, SQLite, Drizzle, Better Auth, tRPC, Tailwind CSS, shadcn/ui, Vitest, Turborepo, Git, install enabled, stable versions, and CLAUDE.md.

Optional: Preview before writing files

Use --dry-run to generate the file tree in memory without writing files:

npm create better-fullstack@latest my-app -- --dry-run

2. Scaffold from a script

Use explicit flags when you want deterministic output. This example avoids dependency installation and Git initialization so you can inspect the files first:

npm create better-fullstack@latest my-app -- \
  --ecosystem typescript \
  --frontend next \
  --backend self \
  --runtime none \
  --database postgres \
  --orm drizzle \
  --auth better-auth \
  --api trpc \
  --db-setup none \
  --ai none \
  --payments none \
  --examples none \
  --addons none \
  --ai-docs none \
  --version-channel stable \
  --package-manager npm \
  --no-install \
  --no-git

3. Install dependencies

If you selected --no-install, install manually inside the project:

cd my-appnpm install

Non-TypeScript ecosystems use their generated toolchain commands instead:

cargo build
uv sync
go mod tidy
./mvnw test
./gradlew test

4. Inspect generated files

Generated projects include:

• bts.jsonc with the selected stack and schema reference.
• Framework, package, and config files for the selected ecosystem.
• A reproducible command printed by the CLI.
• Optional AI docs such as CLAUDE.md, Agents.md, or .cursorrules.
• README content and commands where the selected templates provide them.

5. Add features later

Inside a generated project, use add for supported addons:

npm create better-fullstack@latest add -- --addons mcp skills

The add command reads bts.jsonc and skips addons already present.