# Ultimate Backend

A free, MIT-licensed NestJS microservices SaaS starter with CQRS, GraphQL, and 7 core services

https://topboilerplates.com/ultimate-backend

Framework: NestJS | Pricing: Free | GitHub stars: 2903

## Verdict

Best for: Teams building an enterprise-scale, multi-tenant SaaS backend who specifically want a microservices/CQRS/event-sourcing architecture rather than a monolith.

Skip if: You want a simple monolithic starter - Ultimate Backend's microservices/CQRS architecture is a significant complexity and operational overhead for smaller projects.

## Description

Ultimate Backend is an open-source, MIT-licensed multi-tenant SaaS starter kit built on NestJS with a CQRS/event-sourcing architecture, GraphQL (Apollo) and gRPC APIs, and Domain-Driven Design patterns. It ships as 7 core microservices - account, access, role, billing, notification, tenant, and project - backed by MongoDB/ArangoDB, Redis, and NATS/Event Store, with Consul for service discovery and Docker/Kubernetes deployment. It's built by Rex Isaac Raphael and has nearly 3,000 GitHub stars.

## Pros and cons

+ Free, open source, MIT licensed, with a large and established GitHub following (~2,900 stars)

+ Genuine microservices/CQRS/event-sourcing architecture is rare among SaaS starters and battle-tests DDD patterns

+ Comes pre-split into 7 core services (account, billing, tenant, notification, etc.) covering common SaaS domains

- Microservices architecture (Consul, event stores, multiple databases) adds substantial operational complexity versus a monolith

- Steeper learning curve - requires familiarity with CQRS, DDD, and distributed systems concepts

- Running it locally/in production needs more infrastructure (Kubernetes, service discovery) than most solo developers need

## Features

- auth-included
- social-login
- rbac-roles
- multi-tenant
- payments-included
- subscriptions
- in-app-notifications
- open-source
- mit-licensed
- free-tier

## Stack

- MongoDB
- Redis
- Docker
- TypeScript

## Links

- Website: https://topboilerplates.com/go/ultimate-backend
- GitHub: https://github.com/juicycleff/ultimate-backend

## Alternatives

- [IndieKit](https://topboilerplates.com/indiekit)
- [Carrot Seed](https://topboilerplates.com/carrot-seed)
- [ShipFast](https://topboilerplates.com/shipfast)