Does FastAPI Work With Strapi?
FastAPI and Strapi work together seamlessly as a decoupled backend architecture, with FastAPI consuming Strapi's REST/GraphQL APIs or vice versa.
Quick Facts
How FastAPI Works With Strapi
FastAPI and Strapi are designed to complement each other in a headless CMS architecture. Strapi handles content management, user authentication, and media assets through its REST and GraphQL APIs, while FastAPI provides a high-performance Python backend for custom business logic, data processing, or microservices. You can either have FastAPI consume Strapi's API as a content source, or use Strapi's plugin system alongside FastAPI services. The developer experience is excellent because both frameworks expose excellent automatic documentation—Strapi's admin panel and FastAPI's Swagger UI—making debugging straightforward. The decoupled nature means you can scale each independently and use the best tool for each job: Strapi excels at content workflows and permissions, FastAPI at computational tasks and rapid API development. CORS configuration is the main consideration; you'll need to set up proper headers so your FastAPI frontend or backend can communicate with Strapi.
Best Use Cases
Quick Setup: FastAPI consuming Strapi API
pip install fastapi uvicorn httpx python-dotenvfrom fastapi import FastAPI
import httpx
from pydantic import BaseModel
import os
app = FastAPI()
STRAPI_URL = os.getenv("STRAPI_URL", "http://localhost:1337")
class Article(BaseModel):
id: int
title: str
content: str
@app.get("/articles", response_model=list[Article])
async def get_articles():
async with httpx.AsyncClient() as client:
response = await client.get(f"{STRAPI_URL}/api/articles")
response.raise_for_status()
data = response.json()
return data.get("data", [])
@app.get("/articles/{article_id}", response_model=Article)
async def get_article(article_id: int):
async with httpx.AsyncClient() as client:
response = await client.get(f"{STRAPI_URL}/api/articles/{article_id}")
response.raise_for_status()
return response.json().get("data", {})Known Issues & Gotchas
CORS errors when FastAPI frontend tries to reach Strapi directly
Fix: Configure Strapi's middleware settings to allow your FastAPI origin, or proxy Strapi requests through FastAPI using httpx
Authentication tokens from Strapi JWT expire and need refresh logic on FastAPI side
Fix: Implement token refresh endpoints in FastAPI that handle Strapi JWT rotation, or use Strapi plugins for custom auth flows
Strapi API response structure changes between versions can break FastAPI parsers
Fix: Use Pydantic models in FastAPI to validate Strapi responses and catch breaking changes early
Alternatives
- •NextJS with Strapi—both JavaScript/Node stack, better if you want unified language
- •Django with Wagtail—all-in-one Python CMS, better if you want monolithic architecture
- •FastAPI with Contentful—FastAPI with commercial headless CMS, better for enterprise with managed infrastructure
Resources
Related Compatibility Guides
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