What is a static site generator? Ex­pla­na­tion, func­tion­al­i­ty, and benefits

To build static sites, de­vel­op­ers are in­creas­ing­ly adopting Jamstack ar­chi­tec­tures with static site gen­er­a­tors, which stream­line the de­vel­op­ment process and enable fast site de­ploy­ment. Dynamic features are handled through a dis­trib­uted setup, with client-side JavaScript con­nect­ing to mi­croser­vice APIs to deliver the required in­ter­ac­tiv­i­ty.

What is a static site generator (SSG)?

Static website gen­er­a­tors are ready-to-use code frame­works that allow you to create a static site. Unlike content man­age­ment systems that retrieve content from databases, static site gen­er­a­tors produce the HTML files of a site using a script from input files stored in a file system. This process also occurs at the time of creation, that is, while changes to code and content are being made, rather than when the visitor opens the site in a browser.

How do static website gen­er­a­tors work?

In­stal­la­tion and operation of a static site generator work through the command line. The actual website content is written in markup languages like markdown. Markdown documents can easily be adjusted using GitHub’s web tool for version control. Al­ter­na­tive­ly, you can use any text editors or special markdown editors. By using metadata at the beginning of the files (often referred to as “Front Matter”), the generator ensures that the website is displayed in the browser.

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What are the ad­van­tages of creating a static site?

In certain cases, such as blogs or company websites, the primary focus is on the simple trans­mis­sion of in­for­ma­tion. While content man­age­ment systems and website builders can also be used for such projects, static site gen­er­a­tors have decisive ad­van­tages over tra­di­tion­al solutions:

• Speed: Projects created with a static website generator offer excellent speed for users, which is also relevant for SEO. This is because the files are processed during the de­vel­op­ment or setup phase of the site, not at the time of page retrieval (keyword: database query).
• Version control for content: While the content of dynamic web projects is stored sep­a­rate­ly from the codebase in databases, the content of a static website is typically found in simple text files. Struc­tural­ly, the content elements do not differ from other com­po­nents of the codebase, making it easy to set up version control. This means, for example, that not only the code framework of a blog can be managed in a GitHub repos­i­to­ry but also the in­di­vid­ual blog posts.
• Security: Another advantage of websites created with static website gen­er­a­tors is that they offer only limited attack surfaces—unlike content man­age­ment systems like WordPress, which in­her­ent­ly carry the risk of security vul­ner­a­bil­i­ties and require regular updates. The entire risk potential is confined to the in­di­vid­ual access by the client when the page is called. Since typically not much more than struc­tured HTML pages are delivered, the like­li­hood of unwanted access is reduced to a minimum.
• Simple server main­te­nance: Although a static site generator as a software package has its de­pen­den­cies that need to be met, the number of necessary com­po­nents is rel­a­tive­ly small and they are only relevant during the de­vel­op­ment process. While other solutions require various modules, databases, libraries, frame­works, and packages for live operation, ne­ces­si­tat­ing regular updates, the generated static pages are only bound to a func­tion­al web server upon pub­li­ca­tion.

What dis­tin­guish­es static site gen­er­a­tors from tra­di­tion­al CMS?

Content man­age­ment systems have trans­formed website de­vel­op­ment. They elim­i­nat­ed the high manual effort once needed to program tra­di­tion­al static sites. The major shift from earlier methods was the storage of content in databases, enabling pages to be dy­nam­i­cal­ly assembled and displayed in response to user requests.

Static site gen­er­a­tors bridge the gap between tra­di­tion­al static websites and CMS projects. Like the classic pro­gram­ming approach, the pages and their contents are already generated before being accessed by users. Similar to content man­age­ment systems, static site gen­er­a­tors allow de­vel­op­ers to use templates and au­to­mat­i­cal­ly generate pages.

The key dif­fer­ence between a static site generator and a CMS is the timing of website creation – with the former, it’s during the de­vel­op­ment process, while with the latter, it’s at the moment of user access. Ad­di­tion­al­ly, a generator elim­i­nates the de­pen­den­cy on databases or other external data sources, as well as server-side data pro­cess­ing when accessing the website. It is, of course, possible to in­cor­po­rate external data sources with an API if needed.

Why use a static site generator?

Using a static site generator to build your web project can pay off for a variety of reasons. Perhaps the most sig­nif­i­cant reason is the per­for­mance boost that the created websites offer. The excellent loading times when accessing the site, resulting from the pre-generated content, pos­i­tive­ly affect the user ex­pe­ri­ence. Since all website files are centrally stored in one location, projects based on a static site generator also offer maximum flex­i­bil­i­ty and avail­abil­i­ty. Ad­di­tion­al­ly, the man­age­ment effort is minimal.

However, if

• content needs to be updated regularly,
• new features are to be added later,
• user input must be processed, or
• design changes should be possible at any time with minimal expertise,

then website builders or content man­age­ment systems are often the better choice.

Weak­ness­es of static site gen­er­a­tors

While static pages offer clear benefits—like out­stand­ing load speed and strong security—there are important reasons why a static site generator may not be suitable for larger projects. Using one typically demands solid knowledge of Markdown, HTML, and similar tech­nolo­gies, and it lacks many au­toma­tions that come standard with content man­age­ment systems or website builders.

In addition, static site gen­er­a­tors come with the following drawbacks:

• No real-time content: A static site generator in its standard con­fig­u­ra­tion offers no means to generate dynamic content (rec­om­men­da­tions, price updates, full-text search, etc.). Elements that au­to­mat­i­cal­ly adjust to the user by eval­u­at­ing real-time data can only be im­ple­ment­ed with the help of client-side scripts (es­pe­cial­ly JavaScript).
• Tedious use of user input: Another issue with the lack of server scripts and databases becomes apparent when the web project needs to allow user inputs in certain sit­u­a­tions (like a contact form). Here, too, JavaScript is required, or the support of third-party services is necessary. The platform DISQUS can, for example, be used to add a comment function (including mod­er­a­tion and spam man­age­ment) to static website generator projects.
• No standard user interface: Many static site gen­er­a­tors, like headless CMS, lack an interface for adding new content or modifying or deleting existing content without the ap­pro­pri­ate extension, instead operating through the terminal. WYSIWYG editors help to write the necessary markdown code and preview the result in advance, but they do not eliminate the need for manual uploading of the finished files to the server.

In summary, projects based on static pages mostly exhibit weak­ness­es where time­li­ness, change, and user in­ter­ac­tion are required.

What are some well-known static website gen­er­a­tors?

The number of gen­er­a­tors with which you can create a static site has increased sig­nif­i­cant­ly in recent years. On GitHub, there are project di­rec­to­ries of numerous open-source solutions that can be used for free to build your own website and adapted as needed.

An overview of the most popular options is provided by jamstack.org: The site lists the various options al­pha­bet­i­cal­ly or sorted by GitHub stars, forks, or issues (sug­ges­tions/tasks). Ad­di­tion­al­ly, the website frame­works can be filtered by the un­der­ly­ing pro­gram­ming language (including Ruby, JavaScript, Go…).

The following table lists some of the most important gen­er­a­tors based on StaticGen in­for­ma­tion:

Create client websites with Jamstack

This whitepa­per explores the chal­lenges of tra­di­tion­al CMS, explains why Jamstack-based static sites are emerging as a strong al­ter­na­tive, and shows how they can stream­line workflows while de­liv­er­ing better results for clients.

How deploying a static site generator via GitHub works

You can easily and straight­for­ward­ly store and manage the code of static site gen­er­a­tors, including contents, assets, and scripts re­spon­si­ble for gen­er­at­ing the output, in a GitHub repos­i­to­ry. This way, you link your project with version control and simplify code col­lab­o­ra­tion.

Finally, you just need to deploy the files on a web server, where the build process for HTML and CSS files must be repeated with each repos­i­to­ry update. You can sig­nif­i­cant­ly simplify this task as well—with hosting services for static site gen­er­a­tors like Deploy Now. The IONOS solution au­to­mat­i­cal­ly triggers an update of the static content on your webspace when you make changes to your static site generator‘s directory. Deploy Now uses a GitHub Actions workflow, allowing you to monitor the build logs directly in the GitHub interface.

Deploy Now, the new way to create static websites

Deploy Now is a practical hosting service that supports all popular static site gen­er­a­tors and is also well-suited for Jamstack hosting. Ad­di­tion­al­ly, Deploy Now features simple staging and offers a free SSL/TLS cer­tifi­cate and DDoS pro­tec­tion for your project.

The decision to bring and integrate your own domain or register a new domain is up to you. For more in­for­ma­tion on technical con­fig­u­ra­tions, tutorials, and starter projects, refer to the official Deploy Now doc­u­men­ta­tion.