Free Trial

Try Total CMS free for 45 days.

Every Pro feature, on your own server, with no credit card. Install it, run the setup wizard, and give it your name and email to start the trial. We’ll email you before it ends.

  • No credit card
  • Every Pro feature for 45 days
  • Your files stay on your server

With Composer

composer create-project totalcms/totalcms mysite

# then point your document root at mysite/public/

Or with a zip, on any PHP host

Extract into a tcms/ folder inside your site, upload it, and visit yoursite.com/tcms/.

Download the zip

Before you start

Check your server in ten seconds.

The setup wizard checks everything on first load, but it is quicker to know before you upload.

PHP 8.2 or later, with seven extensions
curl, exif, fileinfo, gd (with FreeType), json, mbstring and openssl. Most hosts have them all.
No database, and ordinary hosting
Apache rewrite rules ship in the download. On Nginx or Caddy, the wizard shows you the exact snippet to paste. Need a host? BetterSiteHost, which we also run, is managed VPS hosting with Git publishing.
Install on the real domain
A trial belongs to the domain it starts on, and repeat trials on the same domain may be declined. Put it where the site will live, or on a subdomain of it.
Building locally first? Skip the trial
On localhost, .localhost, 127.0.0.1 or .test, Total CMS runs free with every Pro feature and no time limit. (.local isn’t one of them.) Start the trial when the site moves to its real domain.
php -r 'foreach (explode(" ", "curl exif fileinfo gd json mbstring openssl") as $e) echo (extension_loaded($e) ? "✓" : "✗") . " $e\n";'

# a ✗ means your host needs that extension enabled

No shell access? The wizard runs the same check the first time you visit, and tells you exactly what is missing. Full requirements

Two ways in

Same wizard, same 45-day trial.

Composer

For developers with shell access

  1. Run composer create-project totalcms/totalcms mysite.
  2. Answer up to three questions: layout (the whole domain, or a /tcms/ subpath for a headless front end), a starter pack, and a frontend build pipeline. The defaults are fine.
  3. Point your document root at mysite/public/, then visit your site. The wizard starts.

Scripting it? TCMS_LAYOUT, TCMS_STARTER and TCMS_FRONTEND answer the questions for a --no-interaction install. Installation guide

Zip, into the site you already have

For shared hosting, cPanel, or anywhere without shell access

yoursite.com/        your document root, unchanged
├── index.php        your pages
├── images/  css/    your assets
├── tcms/            Total CMS, and only Total CMS
└── tcms-data/       your content, beside it
  1. Download the zip and extract it into a tcms/ folder inside your site.
  2. Upload with FTP or your host’s file manager. Leave the document root where it is.
  3. Visit yoursite.com/tcms/. At the data-path step, take the default.
Download the zip

Building in Stacks? The Total CMS stacks handle the install for you. See the Stacks integration

The setup wizard

Seven short screens.

  1. Welcome. Pick the admin’s language and name your site.
  2. Environment check. Runs by itself, and tells you exactly what to fix if anything is missing.
  3. Data path. Where your content lives. The default works on every host.
  4. Admin account. Your name, email and a password.
  5. Start the trial. Your name and email, then a 6-digit code we email you to verify it. No card.
  6. Error monitoring. Choose whether to share application errors with the developer. Never content or credentials.
  7. Server config. Rewrite rules, already in place on Apache. Then you’re in the dashboard.

On a local development domain, screen 5 shows a free Development license instead, with nothing to fill in.

After the trial

Your content was never going anywhere.

The site stays up
Pages keep serving to visitors. Nothing is switched off remotely.
The files stay yours
Content is flat files on your server. There is no export step, because there is nothing to migrate.
Editing pauses until you license it
Saving in the admin and form submissions wait for a license. Standard is $195 and Pro $395, once per domain. See pricing

Stuck?

Help is one click away.

Ready when you are.

Forty-five days, every Pro feature, no card. Install it where the site will live and decide with the real thing in front of you.

Get the software See pricing