Choosing a Deployment Strategy
Types of Deployments
There are two types of deployments:
- Simple Deployments from your local machine - We can use the
spin deploycommand to deploy your application from your local machine to your server. - Automated Deployments - You can use our GitHub Actions to help you automatically deploy your application when you push to GitHub.
| spin deploy | GitHub Actions | |
|---|---|---|
| Difficulty | Very Easy | Basic Understanding of SSH & GitHub Actions required |
| Team Size | Solo-developers | Small to very large teams |
| Zero-downtime Deployments | ✅ | ✅ |
| Automated Deployments | ❌ | ✅ |
Automated deployments are recommended for teams because they standardize the deployment process without human interaction. If you're a solo developer, you may find that spin deploy is so easy to use you'll never need to learn the complexities of CI/CD or GitHub Actions.
Simple Deployments from your local machine
To learn more about our simple deployments from your local machine, see the guide below.
Simple Deployments from your local machine →
Automated Deployments with GitHub Actions
To learn more about our automated deployments, see the guide below.
Automated Deployments with GitHub Actions →
Preparing an .env.<environment> file
Regardless of the deployment strategy you choose, you'll need to prepare an .env.<environment> file that will be used to deploy your application.
Use Any Host
Spin is designed to work self-hosting first, which makes it compatible with almost any host. This includes running servers on a major cloud provider down to an old computer running in your grandmother's basement 🤠. Check our server requirements for more details.
Preparing an .env.<environment> file
Preparing an `.env.<environment>` file is a crucial step in deploying your application. This file contains environment variables that are used by your application, specific to the environment you are deploying to.