Production Checklist

Go through this list before your first production deploy, and again when you add a new Holo feature. Each item links to the page with details.

App and environment

• APP_ENV is production or unset on the server, and the server's .env doesn't set APP_ENV=development. Holo then loads .env.production. See Environment Variables.
• APP_KEY is set to a value from npx holo key:generate, and stays the same across deploys. Changing it signs every user out, and breaks CSRF tokens, signed storage URLs, and encrypted social login tokens.
• APP_DEBUG=false, so errors don't show internal details.
• APP_URL is the public HTTPS URL.
• .env files with secrets are not committed. Only .env.example is.
• Secrets are only read in server code, never passed to client components or public runtime config.

Database

• DB_* variables point at the production database.
• npx holo migrate runs as a deploy step, before holo build and before new code serves traffic. See Deploying.
• You never run migrate:fresh or seed against production. (migrate:fresh, migrate:rollback, and seed ask for confirmation in production, and stop without a terminal unless you pass --force.)
• Postgres pool settings (DB_POOL_MAX and friends) fit your database's connection limit across all web and worker processes.

Build and start

• The build runs npm run build (holo build) with database access.
• The server starts with npm run start (holo start), not the framework's server command.
• APP_ENV=production npx holo config:cache runs on every deploy if you use the config cache. See config:cache.

Queues

Skip this if QUEUE_CONNECTION=sync.

• At least one holo queue:work process runs under a process manager that restarts it.
• Every queue your jobs use (for example default, emails, media) is covered by a worker's --queue list.
• npx holo queue:restart runs after each deploy.
• The failed jobs table exists (npx holo queue:failed-table), and you check npx holo queue:failed. See Failed Jobs.

Scheduler

Skip this if your app has no server/schedule.ts (or .mts, .js, or .mjs).

• One cron entry runs npx holo schedule:run every minute, or holo schedule:work runs under a process manager that restarts it.
• Tasks that use withoutOverlapping() or onOneServer() use a cache store every scheduler process shares (redis or database across servers). See Task Scheduling.

Broadcasting

Skip this if you don't use the holo broadcast driver.

• holo broadcast:work runs as a supervised process behind a proxy with WebSocket support.
• BROADCAST_APP_ID, BROADCAST_APP_KEY, and BROADCAST_APP_SECRET are set to values from holo new or holo install broadcast, not copied from a development .env.
• BROADCAST_SCHEME=https, and worker.allowedOrigins lists your app's URL.
• More than one worker? Redis scaling is turned on. See Scaling in Production.

Cache and sessions

• The cache driver works with more than one server. file and memory are per server; use redis or database when you run several. See Cache Drivers.
• The session store is shared the same way (SESSION_DRIVER=redis or database for several servers). See Sessions.
• SESSION_SECURE=true, so session cookies are only sent over HTTPS.

Storage

• On servers with temporary disks (containers, serverless), uploads go to an S3 disk, not local or public. See Amazon S3.
• S3 credentials are set through STORAGE_DISKS_S3_* variables.
• If you use local disks, storage/ is on a persistent volume and backed up.

Security

• CSRF protection is on for apps with cookie-based forms. See CSRF Protection.
• Rate limits aren't on the memory driver when you run more than one process. Use file for several processes on one server and redis for several servers. See Rate Limiting.
• config/cors.ts lists only your real frontend origins.
• TRUSTED_PROXIES (or trustedProxies in config/security.ts) lists only proxies that every request passes through. With *, including in Next.js apps, the app is reachable only through the proxy. See Trusted proxies.

Mail

• MAIL_MAILER is a real mailer such as smtp, not preview, log, or fake.
• MAIL_FROM_ADDRESS uses a domain you've set up for sending.

Logging

• Database query logging (logging and security.debugSqlInLogs in config/database.ts) is off unless you're debugging.
• Your host collects stdout and stderr from the web server and every worker.

Related

• Deploying Holo Apps
• Environment Variables
• Configuration Files