hugo/content/en/getting-started/directory-structure.md

title	description	categories	keywords	menu	weight	aliases	toc
Directory structure	Hugo's CLI scaffolds a project directory structure and then takes that single directory and uses it as the input to create a complete website.	fundamentals getting started	source organization directories	docs parent weight getting-started 30	30	/overview/source-directory/	true

New site scaffolding

{{< youtube sB0HLHjgQ7E >}}

Running hugo new site example from the command line creates a directory structure with the following elements:

example/
├── archetypes/
│   └── default.md
├── assets/
├── content/
├── data/
├── layouts/
├── public/
├── static/
├── themes/
└── hugo.toml

Directory structure explained

The following is a high-level overview of each of the directories with links to each of their respective sections within the Hugo docs.

archetypes

You can create new content files in Hugo using the hugo new command. By default, Hugo will create new content files with at least date, title (inferred from the file name), and draft = true. This saves time and promotes consistency for sites using multiple content types. You can create your own archetypes with custom preconfigured front matter fields as well.

assets

Stores all the files which need be processed by Hugo Pipes. Only the files whose .Permalink or .RelPermalink are used will be published to the public directory.

config

Hugo ships with a large number of configuration directives. The configuration directory is where those directives are stored as JSON, YAML, or TOML files. Every root setting object can stand as its own file and structured by environments. Projects with minimal settings and no need for environment awareness can use a single hugo.toml file at its root.

Many sites may need little to no configuration, but Hugo ships with a large number of configuration directives for more granular directions on how you want Hugo to build your website. Note: the config directory is not created by default.

content

All content for your website will live inside this directory. Each top-level folder in Hugo is considered a content section. For example, if your site has three main sections---blog, articles, and tutorials---you will have three directories at content/blog, content/articles, and content/tutorials. Hugo uses sections to assign default content types.

data

This directory is used to store configuration files that can be used by Hugo when generating your website. You can write these files in YAML, JSON, or TOML format. In addition to the files you add to this folder, you can also create data templates that pull from dynamic content.

layouts

Stores templates in the form of .html files that specify how views of your content will be rendered into a static website. Templates include list pages, your homepage, taxonomy templates, partials, single page templates, and more.

static

Stores all the static content: images, CSS, JavaScript, etc. When Hugo builds your site, all assets inside your static directory are copied over as-is. A good example of using the static folder is for verifying site ownership on Google Search Console, where you want Hugo to copy over a complete HTML file without modifying its content.

{{% note %}} From Hugo 0.31 you can have multiple static directories. {{% /note %}}

resources

Caches some files to speed up generation. Can be also used by template authors to distribute built Sass files, so you don't have to have the preprocessor installed. Note: resources directory is not created by default.