prompts.chat/cloudflare/README.md

Deploying prompts.chat to Cloudflare Containers

This guide covers deploying the Next.js application to Cloudflare Containers.

Prerequisites

• Docker running locally
• Wrangler CLI (npm i -g wrangler)
• A Cloudflare account on the Workers Paid plan
• An external PostgreSQL database (e.g. Neon, Supabase, or self-hosted)

Setup

1. Install dependencies

npm install @cloudflare/containers

2. Configure secrets

Set required environment variables as Wrangler secrets. These are injected into the container at runtime:

# Required
wrangler secret put DATABASE_URL
wrangler secret put AUTH_SECRET

# OAuth (if using these providers)
wrangler secret put AUTH_GITHUB_ID
wrangler secret put AUTH_GITHUB_SECRET
wrangler secret put AUTH_GOOGLE_ID
wrangler secret put AUTH_GOOGLE_SECRET

# Optional
wrangler secret put OPENAI_API_KEY
wrangler secret put SENTRY_DSN

3. Deploy

npx wrangler deploy

On the first deploy, Wrangler will:

1. Build the Docker image locally using Dockerfile.cloudflare
2. Push the image to Cloudflare's managed registry
3. Deploy the Worker that routes traffic to the container

The first deploy takes a few minutes for image push and container provisioning. Subsequent deploys are faster due to layer caching.

4. Check status

npx wrangler containers list

Architecture

User Request → Cloudflare Network → Worker (router) → Container (Next.js on Node.js)
                                                          ↓
                                                    PostgreSQL DB

• Worker (cloudflare/worker.js): Thin routing layer that forwards all requests to the container
• Container (Dockerfile.cloudflare): Multi-stage Node.js image running the Next.js standalone server
• The container runs the full Node.js runtime, so all dependencies (Prisma, next-auth, next-intl, sharp) work without modification

Configuration

Key settings in wrangler.jsonc:

Setting	Default	Description
max_instances	3	Maximum concurrent container instances
instance_type	standard-1	2 vCPU, 2 GiB memory
sleepAfter	5m	Container sleeps after 5 minutes of inactivity

Adjust max_instances and instance_type based on your traffic. See instance types for all options.

Local development

Local development remains unchanged:

npm run dev

To test the Docker image locally:

docker build -f Dockerfile.cloudflare -t prompts-chat .
docker run -p 3000:3000 --env-file .env prompts-chat

Notes

• Cold starts: Containers take 2-3 seconds to wake from sleep. The sleepAfter setting in cloudflare/worker.js controls when idle containers go to sleep.
• Database: Use an external PostgreSQL provider. Cloudflare Hyperdrive can be added for edge connection pooling if needed.
• Containers Beta: Cloudflare Containers is currently in beta. See beta info for limitations.