3.1.1CUSTOM_WEB_DEV

When the template becomes the bottleneck.

Next.js 16, React 19, TypeScript, edge-cached — built for performance budgets, design systems, and integrations that no off-the-shelf platform will ever support cleanly.

LCP_TARGET

SUB-1.5s

LIGHTHOUSE

95+

WCAG

2.2 AA

the_logic

Custom is not always the answer. When it is, it has to be right.

Webflow hits its ceiling when you need programmatic SEO across 500 city pages, a design system that 8 engineers contribute to, or a form that writes directly to your internal API. At that point the platform is not a tool — it is a constraint.

Custom means Next.js 16 App Router, React 19 server components, TypeScript strict, edge-cached on Vercel or Cloudflare. It means sub-1.5s LCP is a hard requirement, not a stretch goal. It means the design system lives in a component library your team can extend, not a theme file nobody touches.

We do not recommend custom when CMS or Shopify will do the job. When we do recommend it, the brief is honest about scope, timeline, and what post-launch maintenance actually costs.

capabilities

01
Server-rendered + edge-cached
App Router RSCs with edge caching on Vercel. Sub-second TTFB to users in Mumbai, Delhi, Bengaluru, and beyond.
02
Design system + component library
Figma tokens → Storybook → production components. Every element documented, typed, and reusable.
03
Sub-1.5s LCP hard target
Performance budget defined at kick-off. Lighthouse 95+ and Core Web Vitals in green before any staging URL is shared.
04
WCAG 2.2 AA accessibility
Screen-reader tested, keyboard-navigable, colour-contrast validated. Not a checkbox — baked into the component spec.
05
Type-safe data layer
TypeScript end-to-end. Zod-validated API responses. No silent runtime failures from shape mismatches.
06
Source ownership, zero platform fees
You own the repo. No Webflow seat, no Framer subscription, no CMS licence renewing annually to keep the site alive.

runtime.exec

How it actually runs.

STEP_01 · WORKSHOP

Stack-selection + scope

Confirm that custom is the right call, define the performance budget, agree on the component inventory.

$ workshop --confirm=custom --output=scope.md

STEP_02 · DESIGN

Figma → Storybook handoff

Full desktop + mobile in Figma, exported as a typed component library in Storybook before a line of page code is written.

$ design --figma=tokens --storybook=components --typed=true

STEP_03 · BUILD

CI + Vercel preview per PR

Every PR gets a preview URL. Every merge to main deploys to staging. No big-bang reveals.

$ build --previews=per-pr --staging=auto

STEP_04 · AUDIT

Performance + a11y audit

Lighthouse, WebPageTest from an Indian node, axe-core accessibility scan — all green before sign-off.

$ audit --lighthouse --axe --webpagetest-region=india

STEP_05 · RETAINER

Post-launch maintenance

Dependency updates, security patches, and performance monitoring on a monthly retainer. Priced at kick-off, not invented post-launch.

$ retainer --scope=deps,security,perf --cadence=monthly

use_cases

Where this gets deployed.

SaaS marketing sites

Pricing, docs, changelog, and sign-up — wired to product analytics from day one, not retrofitted.

Programmatic SEO at scale

Hundreds of city/service/category pages generated from a data model. WordPress cannot handle this cleanly at scale.

Headless commerce front-ends

Shopify or Medusa.js as the commerce engine, Next.js as the storefront. Performance without Shopify's theme constraints.

Series-A investor sites

Design-first, motion-rich, built to a brief that a Webflow template would mangle.

Conference and event microsites

High-traffic spikes, edge-cached, with dynamic schedule and speaker pages generated from a CMS.

Multi-region + multi-language launches

i18n routing, per-locale content, hreflang — handled properly, not via a plugin that breaks on upgrade.

Brand microsites with motion

Framer Motion or GSAP animations inside a React component system — no iframes, no embed lag.

Webflow / Framer migration

When the no-code platform has become the bottleneck. We migrate without losing SEO rankings.

case_study

B2B_SAAS

Bengaluru series-A SaaS migrated off Webflow. 200 programmatic city pages. LCP 1.2s.

A B2B SaaS outgrew Webflow when their growth team needed 200 geo-targeted landing pages and a blog CMS their engineers could extend. Webflow's CMS limit and its form-to-HubSpot sync kept breaking. We rebuilt in Next.js 16 — programmatic pages from a Sanity dataset, HubSpot forms native, edge-cached on Vercel. Organic traffic up 3x in 90 days as pages were indexed.

LCP

1.2s

PROGRAMMATIC_PAGES

200

ORG_TRAFFIC

+3x / 90d

LIGHTHOUSE

next_step