The Stack Overflow Podcast Off with your CMS’s head! Composability and security in headless CMS
Sep 19, 2025
Sebastian Gierlinger, VP of Engineering at Storyblok, brings his wealth of experience in web development and headless CMS to the table. He dives into the differences between headless and traditional CMS, explaining the benefits of decoupling content from rendering. The conversation highlights security tradeoffs in composable architectures, emphasizing how to mitigate risks while using prototypes. Sebastian also shares insights on building effective teams and APIs, ensuring smooth migration and collaboration in the ever-evolving software landscape.
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Decoupling Prevents Frontend Lock-In
- Headless CMS decouples content from frontend allowing technology swaps later without lock-in.
- Editors get convenience like rich text, validation, and preview tied to frontend rendering.
Hide CMS Behind A Proxy
- Avoid exposing your CMS directly to public visitors if security matters.
- Use a proxy or similar layer so visitors only see the proxy, not the backend CMS.
Pre-Render To Reduce Risk And Scale
- Pre-render static pages or components to reduce backend exposure and improve availability.
- Choose static generation for heavy traffic and reserve dynamic rendering for only necessary parts.