How to Build a Nuxt.js Storefront Ecommerce With Medusa

Introduction

Medusa is an open source headless commerce engine in Node.js that allows you to build online stores through its API with just a few commands - link to repo. On the other hand, Nuxt.js is a front-end framework, built on top of Vue.js, that includes some features out-of-the-box such as server-side rendered sites, static sites, file system routing, data fetching, meta tags, SEO, and much more.

Through this guide, you will learn how to set up a starter storefront with Nuxt.js for the frontend part and link it with a Medusa server. To do that, first, you will create a Nuxt.js project and set up some simple components, pages and layout. Then, you will link the Nuxt.js project with the Medusa server to get some products from the API and display them on the home page, a product's page, and a product detail page.

You can find the final code at this GitHub repository.

If you have any problems underway in the setup, please reach out in the Medusa Discord.

Prerequisites

To follow along with this tutorial you need the following:

• Node.js, it is recommended to have the latest LTS version installed.
• One of the following package managers installed: Copy to clipboardnpm, Copy to clipboardyarn, or Copy to clipboardnpx (included by default with Copy to clipboardnpm v5.2+).
• A Medusa server is seeded with some dummy data to work with, so if this is not the case, please first read the QuickStart guide to set up a Medusa server and after that come back to continue.

Setting up the storefront

⚠️ This tutorial uses Nuxt v2.15.8 because at the time of writing this article there are two versions of Nuxt, but the newer one (Nuxt v3) is yet in beta state.

Install a Nuxt.js project

To install a Nuxt project, you can get started quickly with Copy to clipboardcreate-nuxt-app. Open your terminal and run the following command

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// npx create-nuxt-app <project-name>
npx create-nuxt-app nuxtjs-storefront

It will ask you some questions. You can choose the options that best fit your development workflow, but to keep this tutorial simple, I recommend installing the project using the following options:

Run Nuxt.js project

Once the Nuxt.js project is created, change to the directory of the storefront

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cd nuxtjs-storefront

And then run the following command

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yarn dev

This command will run the storefront app by default at Copy to clipboardhttp://localhost:3000. To test it, open your browser and go to Copy to clipboardhttp://localhost:3000. You will get something like this:

Later on, you will change the default port to learn how to integrate your frontend with the Medusa server in a port that is not the default.

Make the storefront layout

Before you go into connecting the Medusa server with the storefront, you need to add some components and pages to the storefront. Open the storefront’s project in your preferred IDE.

You should see the following directories:

You will be focusing mainly on the Copy to clipboardcomponents and Copy to clipboardpages directories to design the layout for the storefront.

Components

Components are what make up the different parts of your page. They can be reused and imported into your pages, layouts, and even other components.

The storefront you are creating will have the following components:

• Logo
• Navbar
• Footer
• Product card

Go to the Copy to clipboardcomponents directory and delete the default components that come with the Nuxt.js installation. Then add the following files

Logo → Copy to clipboardcomponents/App/Logo.vue

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<template>
  <div class="h-16 flex items-center">
    <div class="ml-4 flex lg:ml-0 lg:mr-8">
      <nuxt-link to="/">
        <img class="h-8 w-auto" src="https://i.imgur.com/y3yU55v.png" alt=""/>
      </nuxt-link>
    </div>
  </div>
</template>

<script>
export default {
  name: 'AppLogo'
}
</script>

Navbar → Copy to clipboardcomponents/App/Navbar.vue

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<template>
  <div class="sticky top-0 z-20">
    <header class="relative bg-white">
      <nav class="px-4 sm:px-6 lg:px-8 border-b border-ui-medium flex items-center justify-between">
        <div class="flex items-center">
          <app-logo />
          <div class="hidden lg:flex lg:items-center">
            <div class="hidden flex-grow items-center justify-center lg:flex text-sm font-medium">
              <nuxt-link
                to="/"
                class="block mt-4 mr-4 lg:inline-block lg:mt-0 text-gray-700 hover:text-gray-600 last:mr-0"
              >
                Home
              </nuxt-link>
              <nuxt-link
                to="/products"
                class="block mt-4 mr-4 lg:inline-block lg:mt-0 text-gray-700 hover:text-gray-600 last:mr-0"
              >
                Products
              </nuxt-link>

Footer → Copy to clipboardcomponents/App/Footer.vue

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<template>
  <footer>
    <div class="bg-white px-4 pt-24 pb-4 sm:px-6 lg:px-8 border-t border-ui-medium flex items-center justify-between text-sm">
      <div class="flex items-center">
        <a class="mr-3 last:mr-0 text-ui-dark hover:text-gray-700" href="/">Create return</a>
        <a class="mr-3 last:mr-0 text-ui-dark hover:text-gray-700" href="/">FAQ</a>
        <a class="mr-3 last:mr-0 text-ui-dark hover:text-gray-700" href="/">Terms & Conditions</a>
      </div>
      <div class="flex items-center">
        <a href="https://www.github.com/medusajs" class="mr-3 last:mr-0 text-ui-dark hover:text-gray-700">GitHub</a>
        <a href="https://www.twitter.com/medusajs" class="mr-3 last:mr-0 text-ui-dark hover:text-gray-700">Twitter</a>
        <a href="https://discord.gg/ruGn9fmv9q" class="mr-3 last:mr-0 text-ui-dark hover:text-gray-700">Discord</a>
      </div>
    </div>
  </footer>
</template>

<script>
export default {
  name: 'AppFooter'

ProductCard → Copy to clipboardcomponents/ProductCard.vue

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<template>
  <div>
    <nuxt-link :to="`/products/${item.id}`">
      <div
        class="group relative"
      >
        <div class="w-full min-h-auto bg-gray-200 aspect-w-1 aspect-h-1 rounded-md overflow-hidden group-hover:opacity-75 lg:h-80 lg:aspect-none">
          <div class="w-auto h-full object-center object-cover bg-gray-100">
            <img
              alt=""
              :src="item.thumbnail"
            >
          </div>
        </div>
        <div class="mt-4 flex justify-between">
          <h3 class="text-sm text-gray-700 font-normal">
            {{ item.title }}
          </h3>
          <p class="text-sm font-semibold text-gray-900">
            from {{ lowestPrice.amount/100 }} {{ lowestPrice.currency_code.toUpperCase() }}

Pay extra attention to the Copy to clipboardLogo, Copy to clipboardNavbar, and Copy to clipboardFooter components. They need to be inside a folder called Copy to clipboardApp.

Pages

The pages directory contains your storefront views and routes. For this tutorial you will need only 3 pages:

• Home page
• Products page
• Product detail page

On the Copy to clipboardpages directories, open the Copy to clipboardindex.vue file and replace the code that is already there with this one

Index → Copy to clipboard/pages/index.vue

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    <template>
      <div>
        <div class="bg-ui-light pb-12 lg:pb-0 w-full px-4 sm:px-6 lg:px-12">
          <div class="flex flex-col lg:flex-row items-center max-w-screen-2xl mx-auto">
            <div class="w-auto h-full object-center object-cover p-12">
              <img
                width="600"
                alt=""
                src="https://start.medusajs.com/static/9803c162c71fd1960d9d11253859c701/246b5/hero-merch.webp"
              >
            </div>
            <div>
              <h1 class="text-4xl">
                CLAIM YOUR MERCH
              </h1>
              <p class="mt-2 text-lg font-normal">
                Contribute to Medusa and receive free merch<br>as a token of our appreciation
              </p>
              <button class="btn-ui mt-4 min-w-full lg:min-w-0">
                Learn more

This page will be the home for your storefront. It is composed of a hero header and a grid configured to show only four products. The only thing to do here once you connect the storefront to the Medusa server will be to put the Copy to clipboardProductCard component in a Copy to clipboardv-for loop to display the products.

Now, you need to create a new directory called Copy to clipboardproducts which will hold inside the products page Copy to clipboard/pages/products/index.vue and the product detail page Copy to clipboard/pages/products/_id.vue. Add the following code to these pages.

Products page → Copy to clipboard/pages/products/index.vue

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<template>
  <div class="container mx-auto p-8">
    <div class="w-full border-b border-ui-medium pb-6 mb-2 lg:mb-6 flex items-center justify-between">
      <h1 class="font-semibold text-3xl">
        All Products
      </h1>
    </div>

    <div
      v-if="products.length"
      class="grid grid-cols-4 gap-8 "
    >
      <ProductCard
        v-for="product in products"
        :key="product.id"
        :item="product"
      />
    </div>
  </div>
</template>

This page is similar to the home page but without the hero header. Here you will show a grid with all the products sent by the Medusa server.

Product detail page → Copy to clipboard/pages/products/_id.vue

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<template>
  <div class="container mx-auto p-8">
    <div class="flex flex-col lg:flex-row">
      <div class="lg:w-3/5 lg:pr-14">
        <div class="flex">
          <div class="hidden lg:flex flex-col items-center mr-4">
            <div class="w-auto h-full object-center object-cover px-4 space-y-4">
              <img
                v-for="image in product.images"
                :key="image.id"
                width="150"
                alt=""
                :src="image.url"
                class="cursor-pointer"
                @click="imageToShow = image.id"
              >
            </div>
          </div>

          <div class="h-auto w-full flex-1 flex flex-col rounded-lg overflow-hidden">

On this page, you will display all the information related to a specific product. For example, sizes, images, price, description, variants, etc...

⚠️ The three pages include a Copy to clipboardproduct object on the Copy to clipboarddata function to showcase the design while there isn’t a server to send requests. Once you connect the storefront with the Medusa server, the data coming from the server will replace the data in the Copy to clipboardproduct object.

Layouts

Layouts are a great help when you want to have a basic structure for your Nuxt app. For example, to include a navbar and footer that will be shown on all the pages of the app. By default, a Nuxt project doesn't come with layouts, but it is easy to add them to your project.

To have a default layout on your storefront, create a Copy to clipboardlayouts directory in the root of the project, and inside it, add a new file called Copy to clipboarddefault.vue with the following code:

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<template>
  <div class="min-h-screen flex flex-col">
    <app-navbar />

    <main class="flex-1">
      <Nuxt />
    </main>

    <app-footer />
  </div>
</template>

<script>
export default {
  name: 'DefaultLayout'
}
</script>

Because the layout file was named Copy to clipboarddefault.vue, the layout will automatically be applied to all the pages on the storefront.

Styling

Replace the content of Copy to clipboardwindi.config.ts in the root of your Nuxt.js project with the following:

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import { defineConfig } from '@windicss/plugin-utils'

export default defineConfig({
  /**
   * Write windi classes in html attributes.
   * @see https://windicss.org/features/attributify.html
   */
  attributify: true,
  theme: {
    extend: {
      fontSize: {
        '2xs': '0.5rem'
      },
      maxWidth: {
        '1/4': '25%',
        '1/2': '50%',
        '3/4': '75%'
      },
      maxHeight: {
        review: 'calc(100vh - 10rem)'

Change the Default Port

Now, you will change the port where the storefront app runs by default (port 3000). To do that, open the Copy to clipboardnuxt.config.js file and add the following right after the Copy to clipboardssr property

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server: {
  port: 3333
},

After that, run the following command to see in the browser what you have achieved with the components, pages, and layout that you just set up until this part of the tutorial.

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yarn dev

Open your browser and go to the URL Copy to clipboardlocalhost:3000. You should see something like this:

The storefront just shows static data for now. You will link the storefront with the Medusa server in the next section.

Link Medusa server with storefront

To link the server with the storefront, first, open up your Medusa project in your IDE, then open the Copy to clipboard.env file where all your environment variables are set up.

Add the variable Copy to clipboardSTORE_CORS with the value of the URL where your storefront will be running. Remember that you changed the default port on the storefront, therefore the URL is Copy to clipboardhttp://localhost:3333.

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STORE_CORS=http://localhost:3333

After this, your Medusa server will be ready to receive a request from your storefront and send back responses if everything works as expected.

⚠️ The medusa server is running by default in port 9000, so the URL to use on the storefront to send requests is Copy to clipboardhttp://localhost:9000.

Testing connection with Medusa server

To be able to list the products on the home page you need to test if you can send requests from your storefront to the Medusa server and receive some data to show on the front-end.

⚠️ Be sure the Copy to clipboard@nuxtjs/axios module is installed in your storefront project. If it’s not, then you need to install it following these instructions.

Once the project has the Copy to clipboardaxios module, you need to change the base URL for the Copy to clipboardaxios module that you’ll use to make the requests to the server.

Open the Copy to clipboardnuxt.config.js file and look for the Copy to clipboardaxios property. Change the Copy to clipboardbaseURL property to match the URL where the medusa server will be running:

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axios: {
  baseURL: 'http://localhost:9000/'
},

With this change, you don’t have to type the full URL each time you need to make an HTTP request to the Medusa server. So, instead of this:

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$axios.$get('http://localhost:9000/store/products')

You will do this:

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$axios.$get('/store/products')

If the server URL changes in the future, you only need to come back to one place and update that just one time, and everything will be working fine.

To fetch data from the API, this tutorial uses the Copy to clipboardfetch function that Nuxt.js offers as part of the core.

Open the file Copy to clipboard/pages/index.vue and add the Copy to clipboardfetch function in the Copy to clipboardscript section:

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async fetch () {
    try {
      const { products } = await this.$axios.$get('/store/products')
            console.log(products)
      this.products = products
    } catch (e) {
      // eslint-disable-next-line no-console
      console.log('The server is not responding')
    }
  }

This function receives just one parameter Copy to clipboard$axios which is a service that allows making an HTTP request to the Medusa server. So, inside the function, a request is sent to the endpoint Copy to clipboard/store/products to obtain the list of products from the Medusa server. Then, the list of products is returned.

To test this out, run the following command in the terminal to start the medusa server:

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medusa develop

And start the storefront server:

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yarn dev

Open your browser and go to the URL Copy to clipboardlocalhost:3000. Then, open the Copy to clipboardWeb Developer Tools.

If you find something like this in the console tab then your connection to the Medusa server is working. Otherwise, check that you follow all the steps and are not missing anything.

🧠 Remember, the URL where your storefront app is running has to be the same that was set up on Copy to clipboardSTORE_CORS variable on the medusa server.

Display Products on the Home Page

Now is time to render the Copy to clipboardproducts result returned from the Medusa server on the storefront.

In the same file Copy to clipboard/pages/index.vue, update the Copy to clipboardfetch function to the following,

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async fetch () {
    try {
        const { products } = await this.$axios.$get('/store/products')
        this.products = products.splice(0, 4)
    } catch(e) {
        // eslint-disable-next-line no-console
        console.log('The server is not responding')
  }
}

With this update, the data coming back from the server replaces the Copy to clipboardproducts array with only four products to display on the homepage.

The Copy to clipboardv-for applied on the Copy to clipboardProductCard iterates the Copy to clipboardproducts array and passes to the component, as a Copy to clipboardprop, a product with all the properties specified on the Medusa API for that endpoint.

If you check the storefront on the browser it should look something like this:

Display Products on The Products Page

In the navigation bar, there is a “Products” link. If you click on it, you will be redirected to the products page, but there will be only one static product. Let’s fix that to display all the products in your Medusa server on the page.

Open the Copy to clipboard/pages/products/index.vue file, go to the Copy to clipboardscript section and add the following Copy to clipboardfetch function

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async fetch () {
  try {
    const { products } = await this.$axios.$get('/store/products')
    this.products = products
  } catch (e) {
    // eslint-disable-next-line no-console
    console.log('The server is not responding')
  }
}

Check the products page in your browser and you should get something like this:

Display Product Details

The last page to update is the product detail page. If you click on any product on the home page or the products page, it will take you to the product’s details page, but you won’t see any details at all. To fix it, you need to request a specific product to the Medusa server so you can get all the product info.

Open the file Copy to clipboard/pages/products/_id.vue and add the following Copy to clipboardfetch function

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aasync fetch () {
  try {
    const { product } = await this.$axios.$get(`/store/products/${this.$route.params.id}`)
    this.product = product
    this.imageToShow = this.product.images[0].id
  } catch (e) {
    // eslint-disable-next-line no-console
    console.log('The server is not responding')
  }
},

If you go again to your browser and click on any product, you will be taken to the product details page like before, but this time you’ll see all details rendered on the page.

Conclusion

As you learned in this tutorial it is very easy to make a storefront from zero with Nuxt.js and integrate it with your Medusa server.

The next steps for you would be to check the Medusa API to learn about all the different requests that you can call from your storefront to turn your Nuxt.js storefront into a full-fledged online store.

For example, you can implement the Cart functionality. The process would involve making the pages or components on the Nuxt.js app and then making the respective requests to the Medusa server to get the data to render on the storefront.

If you are interested in learning more about our Next.js based Medusa storefront, then check out our Next Starter template.

Should you have any issues or questions related to Medusa, then feel free to reach out to the Medusa team via Discord.