Deploy a TanStack Start App

Last updated October 19, 2026

You can deploy TanStack Start as a frontend app or enable server-side rendering (SSR). With SSR enabled, the app is deployed as a backend app.

Build Process
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By default, App Platform prepares the build environment by running this command:

DEBIAN_FRONTEND=noninteractive apt-get update && apt-get install -y --no-install-recommends \
 curl \
 {% if system_dependencies %}{{ system_dependencies | join(' ') }}{% endif %} \
 && rm -rf /var/lib/apt/lists/*

system_dependencies is the list of system dependencies you specify in the dashboard. App Platform inserts them into the command during the build.

Next, App Platform installs the project dependencies. It picks the package manager (yarn, pnpm, or npm) based on your project files and runs the matching command:

yarn install
pnpm install
npm install

To build the app, App Platform runs the following command by default:

npm run build

Make sure your package.json file contains a build script.

The default build directory is /dist/client. After the build, App Platform publishes the files from this directory.

Deploy as a Frontend App
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Enable prerendering so your pages are generated as static HTML during the build.

Deploy with SSR
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  1. When creating the app, enable SSR support. The app switches to backend app mode, which means:
    • You select a server configuration.
    • After deployment, the dashboard interface is identical to a backend app.
    • You can set a start command.
  2. Configure the server build so that the dist/server/server.js file starts an HTTP server. The server must serve static files from dist/client and handle page requests.
  3. Make sure the server listens on 0.0.0.0, not 127.0.0.1. Otherwise, external connections won't work.

The default start command is:

node dist/server/server.js