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Version: 2.0.0-beta.13

Deployment

To build the static files of your website for production, run:

npm run build

Once it finishes, the static files will be generated within the build directory.

note

The only responsibility of Docusaurus is to build your site and emit static files in build.

It is now up to you to choose how to host those static files.

You can deploy your site to static site hosting services such as Vercel, GitHub Pages, Netlify, Render, Surge...

A Docusaurus site is statically rendered, and it can generally work without JavaScript!

Configuration​

The following parameters are required in docusaurus.config.js in order for Docusaurus to optimize routing and serve files from the correct location:

NameDescription
urlURL for your site. For a site deployed at https://my-org.com/my-project/, url is https://my-org.com/.
baseUrlBase URL for your project, with a trailing slash. For a site deployed at https://my-org.com/my-project/, baseUrl is /my-project/.

Testing your Build Locally​

It is important to test your build locally before deploying to production. Docusaurus provides a docusaurus serve command for that:

npm run serve

By default, this will load your site at http://localhost:3000/.

Trailing slash configuration​

Docusaurus has a trailingSlash config, to allow customizing URLs/links and emitted filename patterns.

The default value generally works fine. Unfortunately, each static hosting provider has a different behavior, and deploying the exact same site to various hosts can lead to distinct results. Depending on your host, it can be useful to change this config.

tip

Use slorber/trailing-slash-guide to understand better the behavior of your host and configure trailingSlash appropriately.

Choosing a hosting provider​

There are a few common hosting options:

  • Self hosting with an HTTP server like Apache2 or Nginx;
  • Jamstack providers, e.g. Netlify and Vercel. We will use them as references, but the same reasoning can apply to other providers.
  • GitHub Pages. (By definition, it is also Jamstack, but we compare it separately.)

If you are unsure of which one to choose, ask the following questions:

How much resource (person-hours, money) am I willing to invest in this?
  • 🔴 Self-hosting is the hardest to set up—you would usually need an experienced person to manage this. Cloud services is almost never free, and setting up an on-site server and connecting it to the WAN can be more costly.
  • 🟢 Jamstack providers can help you set up a working website in almost no time and offers features like server-side redirects that are easily configurable. Many providers offer generous build time quota even for free plans that you would almost never exceed. However, it's still ultimately limited—you would need to pay once you hit the limit. Check the pricing page of your provider for details.
  • 🟡 The GitHub Pages deployment workflow can be tedious to set up. (Evidence: see the length of Deploying to GitHub Pages!) However, this service (including build and deployment) is always free for public repositories, and we have detailed instructions to help you make it work.
How much server-side configuration would I need?
  • 🟢 With self-hosting, you have access to the entire server's configuration. You can configure the virtual host to serve different content based on the request URL; you can do complicated server-side redirects; you can put part of the site behind authentication... If you need a lot of server-side features, self-host your website.
  • 🟡 Jamstack usually offers some server-side configurations, e.g. URLs formatting (trailing slashes), server-side redirects...
  • 🔴 GitHub Pages doesn't expose server-side configurations besides enforcing HTTPS and setting CNAME.
Do I have needs to cooperate?
  • 🟡 Self-hosted services can achieve the same effect as Netlify, but with much more heavy-lifting. Usually, you would have a specific person who looks after the deployment, and the workflow won't be very git-based as opposed to the other two options.
  • 🟢 Netlify and Vercel have deploy previews for every pull request, which is useful for a team to review work before merging to production. You can also manage a team with different member access to the deployment.
  • 🟡 GitHub Pages cannot do deploy previews in a non-convoluted way. One repo can only be associated with one site deployment. On the other hand, you can control who has write access to the site's deployment.

There isn't a silver bullet. You need to weigh your needs and resources before making a choice.

Self-Hosting​

Docusaurus can be self-hosted using docusaurus serve. Change port using --port and --host to change host.

npm run serve -- --build --port 80 --host 0.0.0.0
warning

It is not the best option, compared to a static hosting provider / CDN.

warning

In the following sections, we will introduce a few common hosting providers and how they should be configured to deploy Docusaurus sites most efficiently. Some of the writeups are provided by external contributors. Docusaurus is not interest-related with any of the services. The documentation may not be up-to-date: recent changes in their API may not be reflected on our side. If you see outdated content, PRs are welcome.

For the same concern of up-to-datedness, we have stopped accepting PRs adding new hosting options. You can, however, publish your writeup on a separate site (e.g. your blog, or the provider's official website), and ask us to include a link to your writeup.

Deploying to Netlify​

To deploy your Docusaurus 2 sites to Netlify, first make sure the following options are properly configured:

docusaurus.config.js
module.exports = {
  url: 'https://docusaurus-2.netlify.app', // Url to your site with no trailing slash
  baseUrl: '/', // Base directory of your site relative to your repo
  // ...
};

Then, create your site with Netlify.

While you set up the site, specify the build commands and directories as follows:

  • build command: npm run build
  • build directory: build

If you did not configure these build options, you may still go to "Site settings" -> "Build and deploy" after your site is created.

Once properly configured with the above options, your site should deploy and automatically redeploy upon merging to your deploy branch, which defaults to main.

caution

Some Docusaurus sites put the docs folder outside of website (most likely former Docusaurus v1 sites):

repo           # git root
├── docs       # md files
└── website    # docusaurus root

If you decide to use the website folder as Netlify's base directory, Netlify will not trigger builds when you update the docs folder, and you need to configure a custom ignore command:

website/netlify.toml
[build]
  ignore = "git diff --quiet $CACHED_COMMIT_REF $COMMIT_REF . ../docs/"
warning

By default, Netlify adds trailing slashes to Docusaurus URLs.

It is recommended to disable the Netlify setting Post Processing > Asset Optimization > Pretty Urls to prevent lowercased URLs, unnecessary redirects, and 404 errors.

Be very careful: the Disable asset optimization global checkbox is broken and does not really disable the Pretty URLs setting in practice. Please make sure to uncheck it independently.

If you want to keep the Pretty Urls Netlify setting on, adjust the trailingSlash Docusaurus config appropriately.

Refer to slorber/trailing-slash-guide for more information.

Deploying to Vercel​

Deploying your Docusaurus project to Vercel will provide you with various benefits in the areas of performance and ease of use.

To deploy your Docusaurus project with a Vercel for Git Integration, make sure it has been pushed to a Git repository.

Import the project into Vercel using the Import Flow. During the import, you will find all relevant options preconfigured for you; however, you can choose to change any of these options, a list of which can be found here.

After your project has been imported, all subsequent pushes to branches will generate Preview Deployments, and all changes made to the Production Branch (usually "main" or "master") will result in a Production Deployment.

Deploying to GitHub Pages​

Docusaurus provides an easy way to publish to GitHub Pages, which comes for free with every GitHub repository.

Overview​

Usually, there are two repositories (at least, two branches) involved in a publishing process: the branch containing the source files, and the branch containing the build output to be served with GitHub Pages. In the following tutorial they will be referred to as "source" and "deployment", respectively.

Each GitHub repository is associated with a GitHub Pages service. If the deployment repository is called my-org/my-project (where my-org is the organization name or username), the deployed site will appear at https://my-org.github.io/my-project/. Specially, if the deployment repository is called my-org/my-org.github.io (the organization GitHub Pages repo), the site will appear at https://my-org.github.io/.

info

In case you want to use your custom domain for GitHub Pages, create a CNAME file in the static directory. Anything within the static directory will be copied to the root of the build directory for deployment. When using a custom domain, you should be able to move back from baseUrl: '/projectName/' to baseUrl: '/', and also set your url to your custom domain.

You may refer to GitHub Pages' documentation User, Organization, and Project Pages for more details.

GitHub Pages picks up deploy-ready files (the output from docusaurus build) from the default branch (master / main, usually) or the gh-pages branch, and either from the root or the /docs folder. You can configure that through Settings > Pages in your repository. This branch will be called the "deployment branch".

We provide a docusaurus deploy command that helps you deploy your site from the source branch to the deployment branch in one command: clone, build, and commit.

docusaurus.config.js settings​

First, modify your docusaurus.config.js and add the following params:

NameDescription
organizationNameThe GitHub user or organization that owns the deployment repository.
projectNameThe name of the deployment repository.
deploymentBranchThe name of deployment branch. Defaults to 'gh-pages' for non-organization GitHub Pages repos (projectName not ending in .github.io). Otherwise, this needs to be explicit as a config field or environment variable.

These fields also have their environment variable counterparts, which have a higher priority: ORGANIZATION_NAME, PROJECT_NAME, and DEPLOYMENT_BRANCH.

caution

GitHub Pages adds a trailing slash to Docusaurus URLs by default. It is recommended to set a trailingSlash config (true or false, not undefined).

Example:

docusaurus.config.js
module.exports = {
  // ...
  url: 'https://endiliey.github.io', // Your website URL
  baseUrl: '/',
  projectName: 'endiliey.github.io',
  organizationName: 'endiliey',
  trailingSlash: false,
  // ...
};
warning

By default, GitHub Pages runs published files through Jekyll. Since Jekyll will discard any files that begin with _, it is recommended that you disable Jekyll by adding an empty file named .nojekyll file to your static directory.

Environment settings​

NameDescription
USE_SSHSet to true to use SSH instead of the default HTTPS for the connection to the GitHub repo. If the source repo URL is an SSH URL (e.g. git@github.com:facebook/docusaurus.git), USE_SSH is inferred to be true.
GIT_USERThe username for a GitHub account that has push access to the deployment repo. For your own repositories, this will usually be your GitHub username. Required if not using SSH, and ignored otherwise.
GIT_PASSPersonal access token of the git user (specified by GIT_USER), to facilitate non-interactive deployment (e.g. continuous deployment)
CURRENT_BRANCHThe source branch. Usually, the branch will be main or master, but it could be any branch except for gh-pages. If nothing is set for this variable, then the current branch from which docusaurus deploy is invoked will be used.

GitHub enterprise installations should work in the same manner as github.com; you only need to set the organization's GitHub Enterprise host as an environment variable:

NameDescription
GITHUB_HOSTThe domain name of your GitHub enterprise site.
GITHUB_PORTThe port of your GitHub enterprise site.

Deploy​

Finally, to deploy your site to GitHub Pages, run:

GIT_USER=<GITHUB_USERNAME> yarn deploy
caution

Beginning in August 2021, GitHub requires every command-line sign-in to use the personal access token instead of the password. When GitHub prompts for your password, enter the PAT instead. See the GitHub documentation for more information.

Alternatively, you can use SSH (USE_SSH=true) to login.

Triggering deployment with GitHub Actions​

GitHub Actions allow you to automate, customize, and execute your software development workflows right in your repository.

The workflow examples below assume your website source resides in the main branch of your repository (the source branch is main), under a folder called website/, and your publishing source is configured for the gh-pages branch (the deployment branch is gh-pages).

Our goal is that:

  1. When a new pull request is made to main and updates website/, there's an action that ensures the site builds successfully, without actually deploying. This job will be called test-deploy.
  2. When a pull request is merged to the main branch or someone pushes to the main branch directly and website/ is updated, it will be built and deployed to the gh-pages branch. After that, the new built output will be served on the GitHub Pages site. This job will be called deploy.

Here are two approaches to deploying your docs with GitHub Actions. Based on the location of your deployment branch (gh-pages), choose the relevant tab below:

  • Source repo and deployment repo are the same repository.
  • The deployment repo is a remote repository, different from the source.

While you can have both jobs defined in the same workflow file, the deploy job will always be listed as skipped in the PR check suite status. That's added noise providing no value to the review process, and as you cannot easily share common snippets, it is better to manage them as separate workflows instead.

We will use a popular third-party deployment action: peaceiris/actions-gh-pages.

GitHub action files

Add these two workflow files:

warning

These files assume you are using yarn. If you use npm, change cache: yarn, yarn install --frozen-lockfile, yarn build to cache: npm, npm ci, npm run build accordingly.

.github/workflows/deploy.yml
name: Deploy to GitHub Pages

on:
  push:
    branches: [main]
    paths: [website/**]

jobs:
  deploy:
    name: Deploy to GitHub Pages
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    steps:
      - uses: actions/checkout@v2
      - uses: actions/setup-node@v2
        with:
          node-version: 14.x
          cache: yarn
      - name: Build website
        working-directory: website
        run: |
          yarn install --frozen-lockfile
          yarn build

      # Popular action to deploy to GitHub Pages:
      # Docs: https://github.com/peaceiris/actions-gh-pages#%EF%B8%8F-docusaurus
      - name: Deploy to GitHub Pages
        uses: peaceiris/actions-gh-pages@v3
        with:
          github_token: ${{ secrets.GITHUB_TOKEN }}
          # Build output to publish to the `gh-pages` branch:
          publish_dir: ./website/build
          # Assign commit authorship to the official GH-Actions bot for deploys to `gh-pages` branch:
          # https://github.com/actions/checkout/issues/13#issuecomment-724415212
          # The GH actions bot is used by default if you didn't specify the two fields.
          # You can swap them out with your own user credentials.
          user_name: github-actions[bot]
          user_email: 41898282+github-actions[bot]@users.noreply.github.com
.github/workflows/test-deploy.yml
name: Test deployment

on:
  pull_request:
    branches: [main]
    paths: [website/**]

jobs:
  test-deploy:
    name: Test deployment
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    steps:
      - uses: actions/checkout@v2
      - uses: actions/setup-node@v2
        with:
          node-version: 14.x
          cache: yarn
      - name: Test build
        working-directory: website
        run: |
          yarn install --frozen-lockfile
          yarn build

Triggering deployment with Travis CI​

Continuous integration (CI) services are typically used to perform routine tasks whenever new commits are checked in to source control. These tasks can be any combination of running unit tests and integration tests, automating builds, publishing packages to NPM, and deploying changes to your website. All you need to do to automate the deployment of your website is to invoke the yarn deploy script whenever your website is updated. The following section covers how to do just that using Travis CI, a popular continuous integration service provider.

  1. Go to https://github.com/settings/tokens and generate a new personal access token. When creating the token, grant it the repo scope so that it has the permissions it needs.
  2. Using your GitHub account, add the Travis CI app to the repository you want to activate.
  3. Open your Travis CI dashboard. The URL looks like https://travis-ci.com/USERNAME/REPO, and navigate to the More options > Setting > Environment Variables section of your repository.
  4. Create a new environment variable named GH_TOKEN with your newly generated token as its value, then GH_EMAIL (your email address) and GH_NAME (your GitHub username).
  5. Create a .travis.yml on the root of your repository with the following:
.travis.yml
language: node_js
node_js:
  - '14.15.0'
branches:
  only:
    - main
cache:
  yarn: true
script:
  - git config --global user.name "${GH_NAME}"
  - git config --global user.email "${GH_EMAIL}"
  - echo "machine github.com login ${GH_NAME} password ${GH_TOKEN}" > ~/.netrc
  - yarn install
  - GIT_USER="${GH_NAME}" yarn deploy

Now, whenever a new commit lands in main, Travis CI will run your suite of tests and if everything passes, your website will be deployed via the yarn deploy script.

Triggering deployment with Buddy​

Buddy is an easy-to-use CI/CD tool that allows you to automate the deployment of your portal to different environments, including GitHub Pages.

Follow these steps to create a pipeline that automatically deploys a new version of your website whenever you push changes to the selected branch of your project:

  1. Go to https://github.com/settings/tokens and generate a new personal access token. When creating the token, grant it the repo scope so that it has the permissions it needs.
  2. Sign in to your Buddy account and create a new project.
  3. Choose GitHub as your git hosting provider and select the repository with the code of your website.
  4. Using the left navigation panel, switch to the Pipelines view.
  5. Create a new pipeline. Define its name, set the trigger mode to On push, and select the branch that triggers the pipeline execution.
  6. Add a Node.js action.
  7. Add these commands in the action's terminal:
GIT_USER=<GH_PERSONAL_ACCESS_TOKEN>
git config --global user.email "<YOUR_GH_EMAIL>"
git config --global user.name "<YOUR_GH_USERNAME>"
yarn deploy

After creating this simple pipeline, each new commit pushed to the branch you selected deploys your website to GitHub Pages using yarn deploy. Read this guide to learn more about setting up a CI/CD pipeline for Docusaurus.

Using Azure Pipelines​

  1. Sign Up at Azure Pipelines if you haven't already.
  2. Create an organization and within the organization create a project and connect your repository from GitHub.
  3. Go to https://github.com/settings/tokens and generate a new personal access token with the repo scope.
  4. In the project page (which looks like https://dev.azure.com/ORG_NAME/REPO_NAME/_build create a new pipeline with the following text. Also, click on edit and add a new environment variable named GH_TOKEN with your newly generated token as its value, then GH_EMAIL (your email address) and GH_NAME (your GitHub username). Make sure to mark them as secret. Alternatively, you can also add a file named azure-pipelines.yml at your repository root.
azure-pipelines.yml
trigger:
  - main

pool:
  vmImage: ubuntu-latest

steps:
  - checkout: self
    persistCredentials: true

  - task: NodeTool@0
    inputs:
      versionSpec: 14.x
    displayName: Install Node.js

  - script: |
      git config --global user.name "${GH_NAME}"
      git config --global user.email "${GH_EMAIL}"
      git checkout -b main
      echo "machine github.com login ${GH_NAME} password ${GH_TOKEN}" > ~/.netrc
      yarn install
      GIT_USER="${GH_NAME}" yarn deploy
    env:
      GH_NAME: $(GH_NAME)
      GH_EMAIL: $(GH_EMAIL)
      GH_TOKEN: $(GH_TOKEN)
    displayName: Install and build

Using Drone​

  1. Create a new ssh key that will be the deploy key for your project.
  2. Name your private and public keys to be specific and so that it does not overwrite your other ssh keys.
  3. Go to https://github.com/USERNAME/REPO/settings/keys and add a new deploy key by pasting in our public key you just generated.
  4. Open your Drone.io dashboard and login. The URL looks like https://cloud.drone.io/USERNAME/REPO.
  5. Click on the repository, click on activate repository, and add a secret called git_deploy_private_key with your private key value that you just generated.
  6. Create a .drone.yml on the root of your repository with below text.
.drone.yml
kind: pipeline
type: docker
trigger:
  event:
    - tag
- name: Website
  image: node
  commands:
    - mkdir -p $HOME/.ssh
    - ssh-keyscan -t rsa github.com >> $HOME/.ssh/known_hosts
    - echo "$GITHUB_PRIVATE_KEY" > "$HOME/.ssh/id_rsa"
    - chmod 0600 $HOME/.ssh/id_rsa
    - cd website
    - yarn install
    - yarn deploy
  environment:
    USE_SSH: true
    GITHUB_PRIVATE_KEY:
      from_secret: git_deploy_private_key

Now, whenever you push a new tag to GitHub, this trigger will start the drone CI job to publish your website.

Deploying to Render​

Render offers free static site hosting with fully managed SSL, custom domains, a global CDN and continuous auto-deploy from your Git repo. Get started in just a few minutes by following Render's guide to deploying Docusaurus.

Deploying to Qovery​

Qovery is a fully-managed cloud platform that runs on your AWS, Digital Ocean and Scaleway account where you can host static sites, backend APIs, databases, cron jobs, and all your other apps in one place.

  1. Create a Qovery account. Visit the Qovery dashboard to create an account if you don't already have one.
  2. Create a project.
    • Click on Create project and give a name to your project.
    • Click on Next.
  3. Create a new environment.
    • Click on Create environment and give a name (e.g. staging, production).
  4. Add an application.
    • Click on Create an application, give a name and select your GitHub or GitLab repository where your Docusaurus app is located.
    • Define the main branch name and the root application path.
    • Click on Create. After the application is created:
    • Navigate to your application Settings
    • Select Port
    • Add port used by your Docusaurus application
  5. Deploy All you have to do now is to navigate to your application and click on Deploy.

Deploy the app

That's it. Watch the status and wait till the app is deployed. To open the application in your browser, click on Action and Open in your application overview.

Deploying to Hostman​

Hostman allows you to host static websites for free. Hostman automates everything, you just need to connect your repository and follow easy steps:

  1. Create a service.

    To deploy a Docusaurus static website, click Create in the top-left corner of your Dashboard and choose Front-end app or static website.

  2. Select the project to deploy.

    If you are logged in to Hostman with your GitHub, GitLab or Bitbucket account, at this point you will see the repository with your projects, including the private ones.

    Choose the project you want to deploy. It must contain the directory with the project’s files (usually it is website or my-website).

    To access a different repository, click Connect another repository.

    If you didn’t use your Git account credentials to log in, you’ll be able to access the necessary account now, and then select the project.

  3. Configure the build settings.

    Next, the Website customization window will appear. Choose the Static website option from the list of frameworks.

    The Directory with app points at the directory that will contain the project's files after the build. You can leave it empty if during Step 2 you selected the repository with the contents of the website (or my_website) directory.

    The standard build command for Docusaurus will be:

    npm run build

    You can modify the build command if needed. You can enter multiple commands separated by &&.

  4. Deploy.

    Click Deploy to start the build process.

    Once it starts, you will enter the deployment log. If there are any issues with the code, you will get warning or error messages in the log, specifying the cause of the problem. Usually, the log contains all the debugging data you'll need.

    When the deployment is complete, you will receive an email notification and also see a log entry. All done! Your project is up and ready.

Deploying to Surge​

Surge is a static web hosting platform, it is used to deploy your Docusaurus project from the command line in a minute. Deploying your project to Surge is easy and it is also free (including a custom domain and SSL).

Deploy your app in a matter of seconds using surge with the following steps:

  1. First, install Surge using npm by running the following command:
    npm install -g surge
  2. To build the static files of your site for production in the root directory of your project, run:
    npm run build
  3. Then, run this command inside the root directory of your project:
    surge build/

First-time users of Surge would be prompted to create an account from the command line(happens only once).

Confirm that the site you want to publish is in the build directory, a randomly generated subdomain *.surge.sh subdomain is always given (which can be edited).

Using your domain​

If you have a domain name you can deploy your site using surge to your domain using the command:

surge build/ yourdomain.com

Your site is now deployed for free at subdomain.surge.sh or yourdomain.com depending on the method you chose.

Setting up CNAME file​

Store your domain in a CNAME file for future deployments with the following command:

echo subdomain.surge.sh > CNAME

You can deploy any other changes in the future with the command surge.

Deploying to QuantCDN​

  1. Install Quant CLI
  2. Create a QuantCDN account by signing up
  3. Initialize your project with quant init and fill in your credentials:
    quant init
  4. Deploy your site.
    quant deploy

See docs and blog for more examples and use cases for deploying to QuantCDN.