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From Sitecore to Storyblok

We are the Sitecore to Storyblok migration experts

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Challenges with Sitecore

Key pain points

Sitecore is one of the most expensive CMS platforms on the market. Licensing starts around $40,000-$65,000/year for basic XM, and a full XP or XC deployment with implementation lands in the $500,000+ range over three years. On top of the licence, you need specialised .NET developers on retainer, and those contracts aren't cheap either.

The complexity catches most teams off guard. Upgrading between Sitecore versions is closer to a rebuild than an update. Content is stored in a tree structure that doesn't map cleanly to other systems, which makes migrations painful and locks you into the platform longer than you'd like. The editor UI still feels like a late-2000s enterprise portal, and anything beyond basic publishing needs developer involvement.

Most mid-sized companies using Sitecore pay for personalisation and marketing automation they never turn on. If that sounds familiar, a headless CMS paired with a modern frontend gives you 80% of the useful capability at a fraction of the cost. We've moved clients off Sitecore and cut annual platform spend by 60-80% without losing functionality that actually mattered.

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Benefits of Storyblok

Key advantages

If you've ever tried explaining "headless" to a content team and watched their eyes glaze over, Storyblok is your peace offering. The visual editor is genuinely good: editors see changes on the real page preview instead of filling out abstract field forms.

That's the upside. The downside is that the API lacks a few basics, like fetching child or sibling pages directly, and the tier jumps get steep once you need more locales or seats. If Storyblok is your choice, we can make it work, we know where the rough edges are and how to set it up cleanly.

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Visual editing capabilities

Visual editing capabilities

Yes, you read that right, you can do real-time, on-page editing. Make a change, see it instantly, no staging limbo, which means you can stop “guess and publish.”

Component-based approach in Storyblok

Component-based approach

You can build a component once and use it everywhere. You can also update a button or banner in one place, and the entire site fixes itself.

Efficient content structuring for ease

Efficient content structuring

Your content stays clean, organised, reusable, and not scattered across 40 pages. Developers work with structured data, editors drag-and-drop pieces like Lego. Everyone gets to stay sane.

multi-language support

Strong multi-language support

One CMS, many languages, no chaos. Localise content without duplicate pages or messy spreadsheet exports.

collaborate with your team on Storyblok

Collaborative environment

Writers, designers, and editors can all jump in at the same time without breaking each other’s work. Add comments and approvals. View version histories for teamwork without the headache.

Highly customisable

Highly customisable

If your design system can imagine it, you can use Storyblok to model it. There are custom fields, workflows, and logics that can bend to your stack rather than the other way around.

Common questions

Sitecore to Storyblok migration FAQs

Answers to the most common questions about Sitecore to Storyblok migration

How much does Sitecore cost?
Sitecore doesn't publish pricing, but based on what we've seen across client projects, expect to pay six figures annually. Licensing alone typically starts around $40,000 to $65,000 per year for a basic XM setup, and jumps well past $100,000 once you add XP or XC modules. Factor in implementation (often $150,000 to $500,000+), hosting, and the specialised developers you'll need on retainer. For mid-sized companies, the total cost of ownership over three years can easily exceed $500,000. We've helped teams migrate off Sitecore and cut their annual platform spend by 60-80%.
How hard is it to migrate away from Sitecore?
It depends on how deep you are. A basic Sitecore XM site with standard content types can be migrated in 8-12 weeks. If you're using Sitecore's personalisation engine, custom pipelines, or XP analytics heavily, the timeline stretches to 3-6 months. The biggest pain points are content extraction (Sitecore stores content in a tree structure that doesn't map cleanly to other systems) and rebuilding any custom .NET components in a modern stack. Our team typically runs the migration in phases, starting with content export and schema mapping before touching the frontend.
Is Sitecore worth it for mid-sized companies?
No, not in most cases. Sitecore was built for large enterprises with dedicated IT teams and six-figure CMS budgets. Mid-sized companies consistently overpay for features they never use. The personalisation engine sits idle, the marketing automation goes untouched, and the team ends up using it as a glorified page editor. A headless CMS paired with a modern frontend framework gives you better performance, lower costs, and faster development cycles. We've moved multiple mid-sized companies off Sitecore onto leaner stacks and the feedback is always the same: they wish they'd done it sooner.
What are the best Sitecore alternatives for enterprise teams?
It depends on what you actually use Sitecore for. If you need structured content with real-time collaboration and flexible APIs, Sanity is our go-to recommendation. If your team is locked into the Adobe ecosystem, AEM is the obvious (expensive) alternative. For teams that want enterprise workflow controls without the Sitecore price tag, Contentful or Hygraph are worth evaluating. The key question is whether you genuinely need a monolithic DXP or whether a composable stack of best-in-class tools would serve you better. In our experience, composable wins almost every time.
What are the best Storyblok alternatives?
Sanity is the alternative we recommend most often. It offers deeper content modelling, real-time collaboration, and a pricing model that doesn't spike when you add features. Contentful is another option if you want a mature ecosystem, though it's pricier. For teams that loved Storyblok's visual editor, Sanity's Presentation tool now provides a similar live preview experience. We've migrated several Storyblok projects to Sanity, and the feedback from both editors and developers has been positive.
How much does Storyblok cost?
Storyblok's Starter plan is $0 with 1 seat, 2 locales, 100K API requests, and 100GB of traffic. Growth is $99/month for 5 seats, 2 locales, 1M API requests, and 400GB. Growth Plus is $349/month for 15 seats, 10 locales, 4M API requests, and 1TB. Add-ons run $15/month per extra seat, $20/month per extra locale, $10 per extra 1M requests, and $75 per extra 250GB. Premium and Elite are custom-priced and gate SSO, custom roles, and the GraphQL API. The catch most teams hit is the gap between tiers, because there's no gradual scaling. A Growth account that runs over on traffic or locales jumps straight to $349/month, a 3.5x increase for what's often a small overage.
Does Storyblok have a visual editor?
Yes, and it's one of the best in the headless CMS space. You see real-time changes as you edit, directly on your site preview. It's the main reason many teams pick Storyblok. That said, Sanity now offers a comparable experience through its Presentation tool, which gives you live visual editing with more flexibility in content modelling. If the visual editor is your primary reason for choosing Storyblok, it's worth comparing both before committing.
Can I migrate from Storyblok to another CMS?
Yes. We export your stories, components, and assets through Storyblok's API, then restructure everything for the target platform. Storyblok's component-based content model actually maps well to Sanity's block system. Most migrations take 3-5 weeks. The main challenge is handling Storyblok's nested component structure and translating field-level localization to the new platform's approach. We keep your site running on Storyblok throughout, so there's zero downtime during the switch.
Is Storyblok good for large websites?
It works for mid-size sites but starts to strain at enterprise scale. The API slows when fetching deeply nested content, and the tier pricing is the bigger problem. Teams with multiple locales and heavy traffic land on Growth Plus ($349/month) or get pushed toward custom-priced Premium sooner than expected, since custom roles and SSO only exist on enterprise plans. We've seen the public complaints about Storyblok hiking existing customers' bills when they cross a usage or locale limit, and that risk grows with site size. For large projects we usually recommend Sanity instead. GROQ handles complex content relationships well, and the pricing scales in steps you can actually predict.

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