How to setup a project in Next.js
Today we will show you how to setup a project in Next.js. It’s the first article of the Next.js where we will teach you the steps to initialize the Next.js project from scratch.
How to create a project in Next.js, Getting started with Next.js, Install next.js, create website with next js, Setting Up a Next.js Project, How to create a website with Next.js and React, Manual setup the Next.js.
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What is Next.js
Next.js is the open source react framework which helps us to create static, dynamic and web applications. It’s used for server rendered applications, SEO website, PWA and many more.
Find more about the Next.js
Steps to setup a project in Next.js
- Setup environment
- Create package.json and install dependencies
- Update scripts in package.json
- Create index.js file
- Run project
1. Setup environment
To work with the next application, first you have to install Node JS.
Run below command in command-line interface to check Node JS exists in your system. You can also get the version of node via the command below.
1 | node -v (OR node --version) |
If you get an error message like “node is not defined” then you have to install node using the link below.
https://nodejs.org2. Create package.json and install dependencies
To create an application in Next.js, you have to initialize the project with the help of package.json. In order to create package.json, first create an empty directory name as first-next-app
and run the below command in the project directory.
1 | npm init -y |
Now let’s install next
, react
and react-dom
in your project via the command below.
1 | npm install next react react-dom |
3. Update scripts in package.json
Update list of below scripts in package.json.
1 2 3 4 5 | "scripts": { "dev": "next", "build": "next build", "start": "next start" } |
- dev
next
– Start Next.js project in development mode. - build
next build
– Build the application for production usage. - start
next start
– Start the Next.js production server.
After updating the scripts in package.json
file, it will display the look like below.
package.json
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 | { "name": "first-next-app", "version": "1.0.0", "description": "This is the first Next.js application", "main": "index.js", "scripts": { "dev": "next", "build": "next build", "start": "next start" }, "keywords": [], "author": "Clue Mediator", "license": "ISC", "dependencies": { "next": "^9.2.2", "react": "^16.12.0", "react-dom": "^16.12.0" } } |
4. Create index.js file
Let’s create a new directory name as pages
in the project directory. Now create index.js
file in the pages
directory.
pages/index.js
1 2 3 | const Index = () => <h1>Welcome to the First Next.js Application</h1> export default Index; |
5. Run project
Execute the below command to run the project in development mode.
1 | npm run dev |
Now hit http://localhost:3000
in the browser and you can see the output like below.