What is Ghost?
Ghost is an open source publishing platform for professional publishers who want to create, share and grow a business around their content. It combines a website builder, an editor, built-in email newsletters and paid memberships in one application. The project is run by the Ghost Foundation, a non-profit organisation founded in April 2013 by John O'Nolan and Hannah Wolfe, and the source code is released under the MIT license.
Writers work in an editor with dynamic cards for image galleries, video, audio, products, accordion toggles, downloadable files and bookmarks, and each post can go out on the web and by email newsletter. Native signup forms turn readers into free members, and paid subscriptions run through a Stripe integration across monthly and yearly premium tiers. Engagement analytics, member tagging, offers and comments help a team understand and grow its audience. Themes come from the Ghost Marketplace or can be built from scratch, and a RESTful Content API with a JavaScript client delivers published content to other websites and apps.
There are two ways to run Ghost. Self-hosting is free: the Ghost CLI installs an instance locally or on a server, and the docs recommend an Ubuntu server with at least 1GB of memory, with Docker in preview. Ghost(Pro) is the official paid managed service, and its revenue funds the Ghost Foundation. Typical uses are independent newsletters, news and media publications, creator sites and company content marketing.
Ghost screenshots
Explore the interface. Open a screenshot to view it at full size.
Source: official Ghost project page.
Key capabilities
- Website and themes Launch a custom site with design settings, install themes from the Ghost Marketplace or build your own theme from scratch.
- Editor with dynamic cards Add image galleries, video, audio, products, accordion toggles, downloadable files and bookmarks to any post.
- Email newsletters Deliver posts by email and send several different newsletters to segmented audiences based on their preferences.
- Memberships and paid subscriptions Native signup forms create free members, and Stripe handles paid subscriptions, tips and premium tiers.
- Audience analytics Engagement analytics show which content gets the most attention and who your most engaged readers are.
- Content API A read-only RESTful API and a JavaScript client deliver published content to websites, apps and embedded media.
Where Ghost fits
- Publishing Write posts in an editor built for professional publishers and publish them on the web and by email newsletter at the same time.
- Membership management See who signs up, who pays and what they read, organize members with tags and import or export the list as CSV.
- Monetization Offer monthly and yearly premium tiers, one-time tips, special offers and promotions, with payments processed through Stripe.
- Integrations Connect tools for payment gateways, social sharing, comments, push notifications and A/B testing; the Publisher plan lists 8,000+ integrations.
- Developer tools The Ghost CLI sets up local and production installs with automatic SSL, and the developer docs cover themes, the Content API and the Admin API.
- Internationalization Write content and present the website in any language, on every Ghost(Pro) plan.
Install
npm install ghost-cli -gReviews of Ghost
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