Deployment and hosting

Deploy 86d to Railway, Vercel + Neon, or a self-hosted Docker server. Each option takes minutes to set up and needs only a few environment variables.

86d is under active development and is not yet recommended for production use. Use these flows for staging, internal stores, and evaluation.

86d ships with a Dockerfile and docker-compose.yml, and supports one-click deploys to Railway and Vercel. Pick the path that matches your infrastructure preferences. All three run the same codebase.

Docker Compose (self-hosted)

Docker Compose is the simplest self-hosted path. A single command starts PostgreSQL 16, MinIO object storage, and the store app. Migrations and demo data seeding run automatically on first boot.

Start the stack:

docker compose up

On first boot, the store:

1. Waits for PostgreSQL to be healthy
2. Runs all database migrations
3. Seeds demo data and creates the admin user ([e-mail] / password123)
4. Starts the Next.js server on port 3000

Services started:

Service	Default port
Store app	3000
PostgreSQL	5432
MinIO API	9000
MinIO Console	9001

Required environment variable for production:

BETTER_AUTH_SECRET="$(openssl rand -base64 32)"

Set this in a .env file alongside your docker-compose.yml before you run the stack. The default value baked into the Compose file is for development only.

Storage: Docker Compose uses MinIO (an S3-compatible object store) by default. Uploads land in the 86d-uploads bucket and are served at same-origin /uploads/... URLs.

To override default ports if they conflict with existing services:

POSTGRES_PUBLISH_PORT=5433 \
STORE_PUBLISH_PORT=3001 \
MINIO_API_PUBLISH_PORT=9002 \
MINIO_CONSOLE_PUBLISH_PORT=9003 \
docker compose up

Railway

Railway provides managed PostgreSQL and runs the store as a containerized service. Click the Deploy on Railway button on the GitHub repository to deploy directly.

Required environment variables:

Variable	Description
DATABASE_URL	Populated automatically by Railway’s PostgreSQL add-on
BETTER_AUTH_SECRET	Generate with openssl rand -base64 32
STORE_ID	UUID that identifies your store (from seed output)
86D_API_KEY	Your 86d platform API key (enables SSO and platform features)

Railway populates DATABASE_URL automatically when you attach a PostgreSQL service. Set BETTER_AUTH_SECRET in the Railway dashboard under Variables before your first deploy.

Storage on Railway: use a Railway Object Storage bucket (S3-compatible). Add these variables:

STORAGE_PROVIDER=s3
S3_ENDPOINT=<your-railway-bucket-endpoint>
S3_BUCKET=<your-bucket-name>
S3_ACCESS_KEY=<access-key>
S3_SECRET_KEY=<secret-key>
S3_VIRTUAL_HOSTED_STYLE=true

Railway sets RAILWAY_PUBLIC_DOMAIN at runtime. Configure your store’s public URL with APP_URL=https://$RAILWAY_PUBLIC_DOMAIN.

Vercel + Neon

Vercel hosts the Next.js store app and Neon provides serverless PostgreSQL. Click the Deploy on Vercel button on the GitHub repository to clone the repo and deploy.

Required environment variables:

Variable	Description
DATABASE_URL	Neon PostgreSQL connection string (pooled)
DATABASE_URL_UNPOOLED	Neon PostgreSQL connection string (direct, used for migrations)
BETTER_AUTH_SECRET	Generate with openssl rand -base64 32
STORE_ID	UUID that identifies your store
86D_API_KEY	Your 86d platform API key
STORAGE_PROVIDER	Set to vercel
BLOB_READ_WRITE_TOKEN	From your Vercel Blob store

Storage on Vercel: set STORAGE_PROVIDER=vercel and connect a Vercel Blob store in the Vercel dashboard. The store uses Vercel Blob for all file uploads. Set VERCEL_BLOB_STORAGE_HOSTNAME to your blob store’s public hostname.

Neon provides both a pooled connection string (for the app) and a direct connection string (for migrations). Set both DATABASE_URL and DATABASE_URL_UNPOOLED to the appropriate Neon URLs from your project dashboard.

Environment variables reference

The table below lists the variables you are most likely to configure. For the full list, see Environment variables or .env.example in the repository.

Variable	Required	Description
DATABASE_URL	Yes	PostgreSQL connection string
DATABASE_URL_UNPOOLED	Yes	Same connection string, used for migrations
BETTER_AUTH_SECRET	Yes	Auth signing key. Generate with openssl rand -base64 32
STORE_ID	Recommended	UUID identifying this store. Required for 86d API integration
STORAGE_PROVIDER	No	Storage backend: local, vercel, or s3 (default: local)
86D_API_KEY	No	Enables 86d platform API and admin SSO
APP_URL	No	Public URL of your store, for example https://mystore.com

Storage providers

Set STORAGE_PROVIDER to choose where uploaded files (product images, PDFs, and other assets) are stored.

Value	Use case	Additional variables required
local	Local development or self-hosted Docker	STORAGE_LOCAL_DIR (default: ./uploads)
vercel	Vercel deployments	BLOB_READ_WRITE_TOKEN, VERCEL_BLOB_STORAGE_HOSTNAME
s3	MinIO, AWS S3, Cloudflare R2, Railway Bucket	S3_ENDPOINT, S3_BUCKET, S3_REGION, S3_ACCESS_KEY, S3_SECRET_KEY

The local storage provider writes files to the container’s filesystem. In Docker, data persists for as long as the container volume exists. Do not use local storage on Vercel or other stateless environments. Files are lost on every deploy.

See Storage configuration for full per-provider setup.

Post-deployment checklist

After your first deploy, complete these steps before you accept real orders:

• Change the default admin password at /admin
• Set BETTER_AUTH_SECRET to a cryptographically random value (not the default)
• Configure a payment provider (Stripe, PayPal, Square, or Braintree) via environment variables (see Payment gateways)
• Set APP_URL to your store’s public domain
• Verify uploads work by adding a product image in the admin
• Run 86d doctor to confirm every required check passes