Astro Scholar is an open-source Astro 7 theme for academic personal sites, research blogs, project showcases, and BibTeX-generated publication lists, built as a static-first, Markdown-first starter by mychiffonn.
What is Astro Scholar?
Astro Scholar is an Astro theme that takes Markdown content and a BibTeX file as inputs and generates a static academic website with home, projects, publications, uses, and blog pages as output. It runs on Astro 7, requires Node.js at least version 22.12.0 and pnpm, and includes demonstration content that researchers replace with their own work. The theme builds on astro-erudite v2.0.1 and borrows patterns from Maggie Appleton's digital garden and al-folio.
Key Features
- Astro 7 static build — Serves content-first pages without a required UI framework or server adapter; integrations can be added via
pnpm astro add. - BibTeX publications — Reads a BibTeX file and renders a publications page automatically.
- Academic profile and projects — Includes profile, projects, updates, authors, and publications content types out of the box.
- Blog with subposts — Supports tags, stages, a table of contents, share actions, and multiple authors for each post.
- Markdown-first writing — Provides Sätteri, callouts, math, code highlighting, heading anchors, and sidenotes.
- SEO tooling — Ships sitemap, robots.txt, Open Graph metadata, and generated social images.
- Type-safe configuration — Uses Zod schemas and TypeScript for content and config validation.
- Native CSS and icons — Uses native CSS with minimal interaction scripts, plus local and Iconify-backed SVG icons.
Who is it for?
Astro Scholar is for researchers, academics, PhD students, and lab groups who want a static personal or group site without a database or server backend. Individual researchers can build a personal homepage with a BibTeX-generated publication list and a research blog. PhD students can showcase projects, updates, and a now page. Academic labs can set up a portfolio with project pages and shared publications. Hobbyist writers can use the blog system with subposts, tags, and stages to organize long-form research notes.
What can you do with Astro Scholar?
- Researchers — Import a BibTeX library and get a formatted, SEO-ready publications page without writing HTML.
- Lab groups — Publish project updates and blog posts with multiple authors and stage labeling.
- Personal site owners — Add a
nowpage and a uses page to share current activities and toolsets.
How does Astro Scholar work?
Create a new site from the GitHub template with pnpm create astro@latest --template mychiffonn/astro-scholar, start the development server with pnpm dev, and visit localhost:4321. The installation guide in docs/INSTALL.md covers configuration, and docs/CUSTOMIZATION.md explains how to personalize content and design. The default build is fully static; adding integrations uses Astro's setup command pnpm astro add.
Alternatives
- al-folio — A Jekyll-based academic portfolio theme that serves a similar audience with a different static-site generator.
- astro-erudite — The v2.0.1 base theme that Astro Scholar builds on, focused on digital-garden-style content.
FAQ
Is Astro Scholar a free theme?
Yes, it is an open-source starter available as a GitHub template from mychiffonn/astro-scholar. There is no pricing or license restriction mentioned in the repository, so you can use it directly with the Astro CLI.
Does it require a UI framework like React?
No. The default static build uses native CSS and minimal scripts, and the theme does not require a UI framework or server adapter. You can add one later with pnpm astro add, after reading the Astro integrations guide.
Can I use Astro Scholar for a lab or group site?
Yes. The repository describes the theme as suitable for academic portfolios or labs. It supports multiple authors on blog posts and includes project and publication pages for group content.
What are the minimum requirements?
You need Node.js at least version 22.12.0 and pnpm installed. The installation wizard handles dependencies and can initialize Git for you.
