Feature Request: Express.js Backend Monorepo Example for Turborepo

Open Source
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Goals

  1. Provide a clean and maintainable monorepo structure for Express.js using TypeScript and Turborepo.
  2. Help backend-only teams adopt Turborepo to organize multiple Express apps and shared packages.
  3. Improve the developer experience for Express.js development in a monorepo with shared utils and unified build/dev tooling.

Non-goals

  1. Not requesting frontend integration (no React, Next.js, etc.).
  2. Not focused on full-stack SSR or frontend-backend shared rendering.
  3. Not addressing deployment strategies in this feature request.

Background

Turborepo is a fantastic tool for monorepos but mostly targets frontend use cases. Many developers (like me) want to organize Express.js backends — possibly multiple microservices — inside a monorepo, without needing any frontend tooling.

Right now, it’s hard to find a good, official, or community-backed example of an Express.js-only monorepo setup using Turborepo.

Common pain points:

  • Lack of consistent structure for Express in Turborepo.
  • Manual setup of shared tsconfig, turbo.json, and scripts.
  • No reference for using tools like tsup, nodemon, or ts-node-dev.

Proposal

Create a starter example or template for Express.js monorepos using Turborepo, with a structure like this:

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Sounds like a great idea for an open source project! I moved your post to the Open Source category for better visibility.

If anyone is interested in building this, here are some existing repos and posts that can help you jumpstart your own template: