Deploy RushDB
RushDB Cloud: nothing to deploy
Sign up at app.rushdb.com, create a project and an API key, and connect. RushDB runs, upgrades and backs up the engine. See RushDB Cloud.
Self-hosted: one binary
The self-hosted RushDB is the engine: rushdb, one self-contained, Apache-2.0 binary. rushdb serve runs the server and rushdb up runs a local node. Storage, write-ahead log, indexes and every protocol listener live in the one process; there is no other service to run.
| Channel | Command | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Install script | curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/rush-db/rushdb/main/install.sh | sh | Linux and macOS; verifies the SHA-256 checksum, and the Sigstore signature when cosign is installed |
| Homebrew | brew install rush-db/tap/rushdb | brew services start rushdb runs it in the background |
| Docker | docker run rushdb/rushdb (also ghcr.io/rush-db/rushdb) | linux/amd64 and linux/arm64, non-root; tags 3.0.1, 3.0, 3; signed, with SBOM and provenance |
| Cargo | cargo binstall rushdb-server or cargo install rushdb-server --locked | cargo install needs a C/C++ compiler |
| Release archive | rushdb-<target>.tar.gz from GitHub releases | Linux x86-64/arm64 (glibc 2.28+), macOS 11+ Apple silicon/Intel; checksum, SPDX inventory and Sigstore bundles |
| Source | cargo build --release -p rushdb-server --bin rushdb | Toolchain pinned in rust-toolchain.toml |
Alpine and other musl systems, and Windows, use the Docker image. Full instructions: Installation.
Ready-made configurations for Docker Compose (also behind Caddy with automatic TLS), Kubernetes (Helm chart), Linux VMs (cloud-init and systemd), Fly.io, Render, Coolify and Dokploy are in the engine repository's deploy/ directory.
The engine's distribution channels open with its first 3.x release.
Start a node
export RUSHDB_TOKEN="$(openssl rand -hex 32)"
rushdb up --data-dir ./rushdb-data # local: binds 127.0.0.1:3000
or in a container:
docker run -d --name rushdb \
-p 127.0.0.1:3000:3000 -p 127.0.0.1:5432:5432 \
-v rushdb-data:/data \
-e RUSHDB_TOKEN="$(openssl rand -hex 32)" \
rushdb/rushdb
Then connect the SDKs or the MCP server in direct mode, or query it with PostgreSQL and Neo4j drivers and the engine's HTTP and gRPC interfaces.
Take it to production
| Step | Engine manual |
|---|---|
| Run as a service (systemd, containers), ports, probes, sizing | Deployment |
| Configure listeners, languages, limits | Configuration · Reference |
| Tokens, TLS, network exposure, tenants | Security · Authentication · Tenants |
| Backups and restore | Backup and restore |
| Read replicas and failover | Replication |
| Metrics, logs, alerts | Monitoring · Metrics |
| Disk, memory and capacity | Storage and compaction · Capacity planning |
| Upgrades | Upgrading |
| Problems | Troubleshooting |
What self-hosting includes
The engine is the database: records, relationships, SearchQuery, keyword, vector and hybrid search, transactions, query languages, backups, replication and metrics. The dashboard, managed embeddings and AI features are RushDB Cloud's; see What RushDB Cloud adds for what to use instead.