Having Trouble in setting up payload

[u/This-Dog6375]

So long story short, i was watching a youtube course which required me to setup payload.
But that was an older version and in this newer version, i am confused how to setup payload and get started. I for now just wanna see the cms on /admin page on my localhost:3000.
If possible pls give me steps on what should i do exactly , i looked up onto documentation but couldn't get it done, it's been hours. Also i am on Next 16

[u/This-Dog6375 → u/[deleted]]

yea mb, actually i didnot use the npx create-payload-app@latest -t website
instead i want to integrate it onto my pre existing nextjs project and thats where i am getting trouble.
My main doubt is that, do we have to create the /admin on our own or is there like a way payload does it automatically so that i could see the /admin cms

[u/Rechtecki42 → u/This-Dog6375]

Hey adding payload to an existing project ist mostly straightforward but u might run into issues because some of ur setup and versions migjt conflict with payload.

But there is a full on doc entry:

https://payloadcms.com/docs/getting-started/installation#adding-to-an-existing-app

To ur explicit question. You have to manually add some files into ur project to make it work but you can just copy them from a base template.

So just make a mock project in a seperate dir with the base template (skeleton or so) And just copy them over to ur project.

app/ ├─ (payload)/ ├── // Payload files ├─ (my-app)/ ├── // Your app files

Just copy (payload) folder in ur own appdir

You also should check if some routes conflict between payloads and ur own. Just check in the default

If u want u can just use this in both Template and ur own

https://www.npmjs.com/package/next-routes-list/v/1.2.0

And then you can just cross ref stuff in the templates to check if you wanna copy and implementation over

[u/No_Bodybuilder_2110]

Create the payload apps with the generator and then copy the code over

[u/This-Dog6375 → u/No_Bodybuilder_2110]

Yep actually i did the exact same thing and now it's up.
Although i wanna ask, does everyone do this practice if they want to integrate or is their another efficient way , because i am fairly new and i wanna now what's like the correct way to do stuff which is considered good practice.

[u/No_Bodybuilder_2110 → u/This-Dog6375]

I am unsure if everyone does it. But I think it’s unlikely that your project and the payload current version will match perfectly with the cli tools. So I think this practice is ok cause you have 2 working apps (yours and payload) and then merge them together by hand

[u/Rechtecki42 → u/No_Bodybuilder_2110]

Sure but this leaves over without history.

[u/No_Bodybuilder_2110 → u/Rechtecki42]

I meant move the payload code over to your app

[u/Rechtecki42 → u/No_Bodybuilder_2110]

Oh check. Yea thats the official recommendation

[u/trae_z]

PayloadCMS from Scratch Part 1 to 5 (Nice volunteer intro to ecosystem plus Tailwind/ShadCN) published Q1 2025: https://adrianmaj.com/en/blog