We are the Dato CMS to Directus migration experts

Despite its strengths, Dato CMS may pose issues, particularly for projects requiring extensive customisation or specific feature sets, as it might lack depth in certain areas compared to other CMS platforms. We've never been huge believers in "drag-and-drop" schema builders because they lack inherent validation and extensibility.

The pricing model, which scales with the required functionality and traffic usage, could be a limitation for startups or smaller businesses. Additionally, the learning curve associated with its API-driven environment might pose challenges to non-developers. Some users may also need additional plugins or custom development to fully meet their needs.

Directus instantly wins points with us because, well… it has a rabbit for a logo. But beyond that, it’s genuinely a solid database-first CMS. If you like the idea of a CMS that sits directly on top of your SQL database without any abstractions, Directus feels incredibly natural.

You can self-host it, tweak it endlessly, and treat your schema exactly the way you want. Editors get a no-code admin UI that feels polished, developers get REST and GraphQL out of the box, and teams get workflows, versioning, automations, and proper permission controls. It’s flexible, fast, and a great fit if your content is really just structured data waiting for a smarter interface. If your project revolves around relational data and you want total control from database to API, Directus is one of the cleanest ways to build it.