ContentItem

ContentItem is a discrete unit of digital content used in content management systems, repositories, or content APIs. It encapsulates both the content payload and its associated metadata, allowing the item to be stored, retrieved, edited, versioned, and published as part of a larger collection or hierarchy. A ContentItem can represent a webpage, article, image, document, or any data entity treated as content.

A typical ContentItem includes identifying and descriptive fields such as a unique id, contentType, title, and body or data payload, as well as language, author, creation date, and last modified date. It may also carry version information, status (for example draft or published), tags, and custom metadata. In many implementations, relationships to other items, blocks, or assets and access permissions are modeled within or alongside the ContentItem.

Lifecycle and governance often cover stages like draft, review, published, and archived. Versioning supports tracking changes over time, with mechanisms for locking, rollback, and workflow approval. Access control and workflow integration help manage who can view, edit, or publish content.

Representations and storage vary by system but commonly use JSON or XML formats and are persisted in databases or file stores. ContentItems are typically exposed via REST or GraphQL APIs and can be rendered by templates, front-end apps, or other services. They are used in headless and traditional CMS architectures to separate content from presentation.