Deploy Node.js on Temps

Select the Autopack (Node.js) preset (nixpacks-node) and run up: Temps installs dependencies, runs your build script, starts your start script and routes HTTPS traffic to the port in PORT, with zero-downtime deploys. Express, Fastify, Hono and NestJS all deploy this way.

For an overview of self-hosting Node.js, including costs, see Deploy Node.js to your own server. Every framework and the preset it needs is listed under Supported platforms.

Quickstart

From your project root, deploy with your preferred package manager:

npx @temps-sdk/cli up --preset nixpacks-node

Temps doesn't detect a plain Node.js service from its package.json, so choose the Autopack (Node.js) preset (nixpacks-node), as above or under Project → Settings → Build & deploy → Build → Framework.

With that preset, Temps installs dependencies with the package manager your lockfile or packageManager field points to, runs your build script if there is one, and starts the app. Your app is live with HTTPS in a few minutes.

The start command is the first of these that exists:

1. The web: line in a Procfile
2. Your start script
3. The main file in package.json, run with node
4. A common entry file, run with node: server.js, server.mjs, index.js, index.mjs, app.js, src/index.js, dist/index.js or build/index.js

If none of them exists, the build stops and asks for a start command. The Node.js version comes from .nvmrc, .node-version or engines.node in package.json, and defaults to 24. Temps sets NODE_ENV=production for you.

Express, Fastify, Hono and NestJS

Each framework only needs to listen on PORT and bind to 0.0.0.0:

import express from 'express'

const app = express()
app.get('/', (req, res) => res.send('ok'))

app.listen(Number(process.env.PORT) || 3000, '0.0.0.0')

Fastify listens on localhost unless you pass host, so don't skip it. For NestJS, make sure your start script runs the compiled output ("start": "node dist/main.js") rather than nest start, which compiles again on every boot; the build script (nest build) runs during the build. The Temps repository has a working NestJS example.

What Temps handles automatically

Managed services

Create PostgreSQL or Redis under Databases → Create database, then link it from your project's Databases page. Temps injects the connection details into your app, such as POSTGRES_URL for PostgreSQL and REDIS_URL for Redis. It doesn't inject DATABASE_URL, so read POSTGRES_URL in your code or set DATABASE_URL yourself.

See Deploy with a Database for the full guide.

Environment variables

Set your own variables per environment:

npx @temps-sdk/cli environments vars set API_KEY "your-api-key" -e production

Changing a variable doesn't redeploy the app; deploy again for the new value to take effect.

Platform behavior

These rules apply to every app deployed on Temps, regardless of framework.

Health checks

After your container starts, Temps sends HTTP GET requests to verify it is healthy before routing traffic to it.

• Path: / (the root of your application) by default
• Success: 2 consecutive responses with a 2xx, 3xx, 404 or 405 status code
• Timeout: 300 seconds (5 minutes) for the app to become healthy, fixed in v0.1.0-beta.56. If the app answers with error responses (other 4xx, or 5xx) for 60 seconds in a row, the deployment fails sooner. From the next release the timeout is configurable from 30 to 3600 seconds under Project → Settings → Build & deploy
• Retry interval: 2 seconds between successful checks, 5 seconds after an error response or a failed connection

Connection errors and other 4xx or 5xx responses are retried until the timeout; if the app hasn't passed by then, the deployment fails. The check runs once, at deploy time. To check a different path, add a .temps.yaml to your repository root:

health:
  path: /health

Only path is used. Other health fields (status, interval, timeout, retries) are accepted but currently have no effect.

Auto-injected environment variables

Temps injects these variables into every deployment automatically:

You do not need to configure these manually. They are available in process.env (Node.js), os.environ (Python), os.Getenv (Go), and the equivalent in other languages.

Using a framework with server rendering? See the Next.js, Remix and SvelteKit guides. To control the image yourself, deploy with a Dockerfile.

Next Steps