What is EcomGen?

EcomGen is a local-first AI-powered workbench for individual e-commerce sellers to create complete product image suites. It structures product facts, materials, target markets, and platform requirements into auditable storyboards, then uses a Pi Agent to generate final prompts for image generation providers. The system includes 25 built-in e-commerce templates covering hero, scene, infographic, packaging, comparison, and social media shots, plus over 1,100 reusable suite templates across 24 top-level categories. It supports OpenAI-compatible image APIs and Google Gemini native image generation (Nano Banana), with AI-powered layering that exports individual PNG layers, ZIP archives, and PSD files. The stack runs as three services (Fastify API, BullMQ Worker, React/Vite web UI) backed by Redis and SQLite, deployable via Docker Compose or manual Node.js/pnpm installation. All sensitive data including provider API keys are encrypted at rest. The project is MIT-licensed and actively developed.

Should you self-host EcomGen?

EcomGen scores 42/100 on selfhost.directory (how scoring works) and ranks #7 of 10 in E-commerce. It has 216 GitHub stars.

It shipped 2 stable releases in the past year. The latest, v0.2.0, came out on 4 October 2026.

Setup is advanced: plan for several services and some ongoing maintenance. It is MIT-licensed and written mostly in Typescript.

Its closest alternative on selfhost.directory is BTCPay Server (76/100, 7 859 stars). It scores higher overall, so compare the two before you pick. See EcomGen vs BTCPay Server side by side.

How to configure EcomGen

ECOMGEN_CORS_ORIGINSCORS origin whitelist: comma-separated full origins (scheme://host[:port]). Required for remote/container deployments; defaults to local dev servers only.
CORS origin whitelist: comma-separated full origins (scheme://host[:port]). Required for remote/container deployments; defaults to local dev servers only.
ECOMGEN_DATA_DIR./dataBusiness data directory: stores SQLite database, uploaded materials, generation results, and export files. API and Worker must use the same directory.
Business data directory: stores SQLite database, uploaded materials, generation results, and export files. API and Worker must use the same directory.
ECOMGEN_MASTER_KEYMaster key: Base64-encoded 32-byte key for encrypting sensitive data like Provider API Keys. API and Worker must use the same key.
Master key: Base64-encoded 32-byte key for encrypting sensitive data like Provider API Keys. API and Worker must use the same key.
ECOMGEN_QUEUE_NAMEecomgenQueue name: API enqueues and Worker consumes via this name; both ends must match.
Queue name: API enqueues and Worker consumes via this name; both ends must match.
HOST127.0.0.1API listen address.
API listen address.
PORT8787API listen port.
API listen port.
REDIS_URLredis://127.0.0.1:6379Redis connection address: BullMQ queues and event bus depend on this. API and Worker must use the same REDIS_URL.
Redis connection address: BullMQ queues and event bus depend on this. API and Worker must use the same REDIS_URL.
VITE_API_BASE_URL/api/v1Web build-time variable for the API base URL accessible from the browser (e.g., http://<server-ip>:8787/api/v1). Defaults to same-origin relative path /api/v1.
Web build-time variable for the API base URL accessible from the browser (e.g., http://<server-ip>:8787/api/v1). Defaults to same-origin relative path /api/v1.
WORKER_CONCURRENCY2Worker concurrency: number of simultaneous image generation/export tasks to process, adjusted for local resources and provider rate limits.
Worker concurrency: number of simultaneous image generation/export tasks to process, adjusted for local resources and provider rate limits.