The talent marketplace where visionary founders recruit world-class engineers, designers, and growth specialists.
A full-stack startup-collaboration platform with role-aware dashboards, a gated application pipeline, Stripe-powered subscriptions, and plan-quota enforcement — built on the Next.js App Router.
One platform, three personas. Founders, collaborators, and admins each get a purpose-built workspace. Server-side route guards (requireAccountType) keep every role inside its own dashboard, and the landing banner resolves the viewer's persona before rendering role-specific telemetry.
Opportunity discovery that behaves like a real product.
- Search, filter, sort, paginate — opportunities filter by work type (Remote / Hybrid / On-site) and industry, sort by deadline or title, and paginate with configurable page sizes. All of it is URL-driven, so filter states are shareable and survive refresh.
- Gated application flow — expired deadlines, duplicate applications, unauthenticated visitors, and non-collaborator accounts are rejected before submit. A 100% profile-completeness gate (name, image, skills, bio) blocks half-baked applications.
- Bookmarks with instant local-state updates — optimistic toggling with rollback on failure.
A founder toolkit with real workflow.
- Submit a startup (logo via imgbb upload) through an admin approval workflow: Pending → Approved / Rejected → Resubmitted.
- Post and manage opportunities against a plan quota — the form shows a live usage bar and locks with an upgrade CTA once the limit is hit.
- Review applications with Accept / Reject decisions, applied optimistically and rolled back if the server call fails.
Monetization that is actually enforced.
- Stripe Checkout subscriptions with persona-specific pricing — Founder $29 / $99, Collaborator $19 / $49 — a receipt-style success page, and correct current / upgrade / downgrade states.
- Hard quota gating: posting and application limits (3 / 10 / 100 per month) are enforced against the user's plan server-side, and Next.js
proxymiddleware redirects free users away from premium routes like/profile.
An admin console for a running business.
- Platform overview with recharts analytics — monthly/daily revenue growth and user-role distribution.
- Manage users — search, filter, and ban/unban (better-auth admin API synced with the database).
- Manage startups — approve, reject, resubmit, or permanently delete listings.
- Transactions — Stripe receipts with plan mapping, payment-status filtering, and total revenue.
Engineered, not scaffolded.
- Next.js 16 App Router + React 19 — Server Components and Server Actions, React Compiler enabled, parallel data fetching (
Promise.all), streamingloading.jsxstates, and route groups for(main),(auth), anddashboard. - better-auth — email/password + Google OAuth, MongoDB adapter, admin and JWT plugins, and custom user fields (
accountType,plan,status). - In-app notifications — unread count badges, mark single/all read with optimistic UI.
- Dark mode out of the box via
next-themes, HeroUI + Tailwind 4 component layer, Lottie animations, and recharts throughout. - Trust & polish — verified badges, "Own Post" markers on your listings, toast notifications for action feedback, and full Privacy Policy / Terms of Service pages with SEO metadata.
| Category | Stack |
|---|---|
| Framework | Next.js 16 (App Router) · React 19 · React Compiler |
| Styling | Tailwind CSS 4 · HeroUI · next-themes |
| Motion & icons | framer-motion / motion · lucide-react · @gravity-ui/icons · Lottie (dotlottie) |
| Charts | recharts |
| Auth | better-auth + @better-auth/mongo-adapter · Google OAuth · Admin + JWT plugins |
| Payments | Stripe Checkout subscriptions |
| Data layer | Server Actions + authed REST fetchers (src/lib/core, src/lib/api, src/lib/actions) |
| Backend API | Express 5 · MongoDB 7 driver (separate startup-forge-server package) |
| Tooling | ESLint 9 · PostCSS · Vercel |
The project is a two-package setup: this Next.js client and a separate Express + MongoDB REST API (startup-forge-server).
# 1. Clone
git clone https://github.com/takebul/startup-forge-client.git
cd startup-forge-client
# 2. Install dependencies
npm install
# 3. Start the backend API (startup-forge-server)
# cd ../startup-forge-server && npm install && npm start
# 4. Run the development server
npm run devOpen http://localhost:3000 — the app runs against the backend via NEXT_PUBLIC_SERVER_URL.
| Script | Description |
|---|---|
npm run dev |
Start the development server with HMR |
npm run build |
Production build |
npm run start |
Serve the production build |
npm run lint |
Run ESLint |
Note: Auth, plans, and billing are fully functional locally — create the free account to explore the founder/collaborator dashboards, then head to
/pricingto walk through the Stripe checkout flow.
startup-forge-client/
├─ src/
│ ├─ app/
│ │ ├─ (main)/ # Public site — home, startups, opportunities, pricing, privacy, terms
│ │ ├─ (auth)/ # Sign in / sign up
│ │ ├─ dashboard/ # Role-gated workspaces (founder · collaborator · admin)
│ │ │ ├─ founder/ # overview, startups, opportunities, applications, profile
│ │ │ ├─ collaborator/ # browse, applications, bookmarks, profile, premium
│ │ │ └─ admin/ # overview, users, startups, transactions, profile
│ │ └─ api/ # better-auth handler + Stripe subscription route
│ ├─ components/ # Navbar, Footer, Banner, HomePage, Opportunities,
│ │ # Startups, Pricing, Legal, Auth, Dashboard, ApplyModal, Toast
│ ├─ lib/
│ │ ├─ core/ # Session guards + authed server fetch/mutation helpers
│ │ ├─ api/ # Client-side fetchers
│ │ ├─ actions/ # Server Actions (mutations to the REST API)
│ │ ├─ auth.js # better-auth config (MongoDB, Google, admin + JWT)
│ │ ├─ auth-client.js # better-auth client hooks (session, admin, JWT)
│ │ └─ stripe.js # Stripe client + plan → price-id mapping
│ └─ proxy.js # Plan-gating middleware (/profile → /pricing)
├─ public/ # Static assets & screenshot
└─ next.config.mjs # React Compiler, image remote patterns
Create a .env.local at the project root (it's gitignored — never commit real values).
| Variable | Purpose | Where to get it |
|---|---|---|
BETTER_AUTH_SECRET |
Signs auth sessions | openssl rand -base64 32 |
BETTER_AUTH_URL |
Base URL of this app | http://localhost:3000 |
NEXT_PUBLIC_CLIENT_URL |
Public client origin | http://localhost:3000 |
NEXT_PUBLIC_APP_URL |
Public origin used for SEO metadata (canonical / Open Graph) | http://localhost:3000 |
NEXT_PUBLIC_SERVER_URL |
Backend REST API base URL | your running Express server |
MONGODB_URI |
MongoDB connection string | MongoDB Atlas |
MONGO_DB_NAME |
Database name | MongoDB Atlas |
GOOGLE_CLIENT_ID |
Google OAuth client ID | Google Cloud Console |
GOOGLE_CLIENT_SECRET |
Google OAuth client secret | Google Cloud Console |
NEXT_PUBLIC_IMGBB_API_KEY |
Logo / image uploads | imgbb API |
NEXT_PUBLIC_STRIPE_PUBLISHABLE_KEY |
Stripe Checkout (client) | Stripe Dashboard |
STRIPE_SECRET_KEY |
Stripe Checkout (server) | Stripe Dashboard |
The startup-forge-server package needs its own .env with the MongoDB connection details and port — see that package's setup.
Try the deployed app — no signup required to browse startups and opportunities:
Takebul Islam — full-stack developer building products that pair clean UX with real business logic.
- 🌐 Portfolio: takebulislam.vercel.app
- 💼 LinkedIn: takebulislam
- 🐙 GitHub: @takebul
No license has been selected for this repository yet — package.json is marked private and no LICENSE file is present. If you plan to open-source it, tell me your license (MIT, Apache-2.0, GPL-3.0, …) and I'll drop in the section and badge.