Deploying to Vercel

Vercel is the company behind Next.js, and its hosting platform is built to run Next.js apps with essentially no configuration. Every App Router feature — Server Components, Server Actions, ISR, Middleware, the Image Optimization API — works out of the box, and the deployment flow is built around connecting a Git repository once and letting pushes drive deploys from then on.

Git-connected, automatic deployments

The typical setup is: import a GitHub, GitLab, or Bitbucket repository into a Vercel project once. From then on:

Every push to the production branch (commonly main) triggers a new production deployment automatically.
Every push to any other branch, and every pull request, gets its own preview deployment with a unique URL.
Vercel detects that the project is Next.js and picks the correct build command and output directory automatically — no build configuration to write.

First deploy from the CLI (alternative to the Git integration)

Bash

npm install -g vercel
vercel        # deploy the current directory, prompts for project setup
vercel --prod # deploy straight to production

Preview deployments for every pull request

Preview deployments are one of the most practical reasons teams pick Vercel. Every pull request gets a fully working, publicly reachable deployment of that branch — including a real backend for Server Actions and Route Handlers — that reviewers can click through before merging, instead of only reading a diff.

Environment variables

Environment variables are configured per project in the Vercel dashboard (Project Settings → Environment Variables), and can be scoped independently to Production, Preview, and Development environments. Variables prefixed with NEXT_PUBLIC_ are inlined into the client bundle at build time, exactly as they are locally; everything else stays server-only.

Environment	When it applies
Production	Deployments from the production branch
Preview	Deployments from pull requests and non-production branches
Development	Values pulled locally via `vercel env pull`

Pull environment variables down for local development

Bash

vercel env pull .env.local

Note

The free "Hobby" tier is generous enough for personal projects, side projects, and evaluation — it includes automatic HTTPS, a global CDN, Git-connected deploys, and preview URLs. Commercial use and team collaboration require a paid plan, and usage-based limits (build minutes, bandwidth, function execution) apply on every tier, so check current pricing before committing production traffic to it.