The Complete Guide to Vercel: Deploy Your App Easily

If you are looking to deploy your static site or Jamstack web app, then Vercel is the way to go. In this guide, you'll get an overview of Vercel's service and find out how you can deploy your site or app with it.

Vercel is a platform for deploying static websites and Jamstack applications.

It supports any type of application, from traditional HTML/CSS/JS sites to server-side rendered React or Next.js applications, as well as GraphQL-powered backends.

The platform also provides powerful DevOps features like automatic scaling, deploy previews and canary deployments.

What is Vercel?

Vercel is a tool for deploying front-end code. Vercel helps developers automate processes and speeds up the development process.

It was originally called ZEIT and developed by Guillermo Rauch in 2015, but it has been improved and expanded upon over time with additional features being added to help the user's workflow when creating responsive, modern front-end code.

Vercel is frequently used to host and deploy static sites and Jamstack sites.

The cost efficiency of using Vercel might not work well if you want something less static. But if your app needs rapid deployments, then Vercel can definitely benefit your business.

Takeaways: A platform you can take from first project push to scale

• Vercel is a tool for deploying front-end code.
• It helps developers automate processes and speeds up the development process.
• Vercel is a cost-effective tool which has a range of benefits
• Vercel has limitations, but these can be overcome.

Vercel feature guide: Developer experience comes first

With its cloud-based infrastructure and developer-centric design, Vercel provides an incredible level of flexibility and power. This makes it one of the most popular tools for developers across the globe.

1. Deploy your static website or Jamstack web app with Vercel. Easily set up to a custom domain (or free URL), and get instant deployments of changes in branches or pull requests. Scaffold new sites quickly using Vercel's supported starter and example setups.
2. Get the most out of your front-end development. Use Vercel’s fast and secure services to quickly build, test, and deploy modern web apps.
3. Git integration makes it easy to manage your project. Automatic scaling means there's no need to configure servers or optimise your application.
4. Scale automatically for rapid deployments. Vercel scales automatically, there's no need to worry about server configuration or optimisation — Vercel takes care of all that for you!
5. Reduce DevOps costs. Eliminate the need for developers with expensive specialties or professional agencies.
6. Protect shared encrypted data with free SSL certificates. Enjoy the added security of an automatic SSL, protecting shared encrypted data between server and browser.
7. Easy to use, even for beginners. Vercel is simple enough for most beginner developers, but powerful enough to handle the complexities of modern web apps.
8. Preview changes before they go live with deploy previews and canary deployments. With Vercel, no need to worry about changes breaking your production site. Quickly view and test changes before they go live.
9. Enjoy the full power of serverless functions with Vercel’s Functions feature. Get more out of your applications by adding powerful back-end capabilities.
10. Enjoy rock solid stability and performance. With its cloud-based infrastructure and developer-centric design, Vercel provides an incredible level of flexibility and power.

Vercel provides a marketplace of tools, making the deployment process quicker and easier than ever before. Vercel allows you to connect with your team easily so you can configure settings such as your staging area.

The benefits: Why developers say they need Vercel

Vercel also has interoperability built into its system, giving teams more control in terms of how they want their projects deployed while using different languages or frameworks.

This means more time to create software without worrying about compatibility issues between platforms.

• You can deploy websites and applications on Vercel instantly.
• Vercel is configured with automatic scaling in mind.
• Vercel handles all the administrative work for your site.
• Vercel is suitable for developers who want to use modern frameworks.
• Vercel is a cloud platform which automatically manages scaling, updates, and maintenance.
• There is no need to worry about maintenance or server scaling when using Vercel.
• Vercel is easy for anyone technically-minded to use, regardless of experience.
• You can deploy your project at any time without limitations.
• Vercel provides a marketplace for connecting tools and teams.
• You can connect with your team to configure deployment settings.

With its numerous features and integrations, you can deploy and manage your application with ease. Whether you're a developer who needs an easy way to deploy their applications, or a business who wants to reduce costs and increase efficiency, Vercel is definitely worth considering.

What are some considerations when using Vercel?

When it comes to deploying an app, Vercel is a great choice for companies that want to use cloud-based infrastructure. However, there are some limitations to using this service.

Vercel is a static hosting service and doesn’t offer any dynamic back-end features or custom databases. So if you’re looking for an all-in-one solution for your web application, Vercel might not be the best choice.

In order to get the most out of Vercel, you need developers who have experience with cutting-edge technology. Additionally, you'll need to host the codebase elsewhere and set up systems to deploy website or app endpoints.

Amazon AWS allows you to serve content reliably across different areas in the world. However, there may be latency issues when serving content across different regions - to address this, Amazon AWS can provide unique endpoint URLs which enable users to access their service without any problems.

Overall, Vercel is a great choice for experienced developers and companies that want to use cloud-based infrastructure. However, it may not be the best option for those who are new to developing or need more automation.

How much does it cost to use Vercel for each use case?

As with most software, there is a cost associated with using Vercel. The pricing ranges from free up to $1 per gigabyte of data transferred.

• Vercel has a 'hobby' pricing plan which costs nothing. For non-commercial sites, all of the features are available without any cost.
• The Pro plan is priced at $20/user/month.
• The enterprise plan requires custom pricing.

Bandwidth and compute time: limits and costs

Hobby: At 100GB/month, Vercel's 'hobby' free tier offers a very generous bandwidth quota. It includes:

• 1 million edge middleware invocations
• 100GB-hours of serverless function compute time
• 10-second timeouts for serverless functions
• 6,000 minutes of build execution
• Build-time image optimization for 1,000 source images

Pro: The Pro plan offers users 1TB of bandwidth per month for the $20/user/month spend. After your terabyte has been consumed, expect to pay $40 for each additional 100GB of transfer. It also includes:

• 1 million edge middleware invocations
• 1,000GB-hours of serverless function execution
• 60-second serverless function timeouts
• 24,000 minutes of build execution
• 5,000 source images can be processed with build-time optimization

Enterprise plans are priced based on each company's individually-negotiated requirements. As you might expect, most of these usage allowances are determined by that custom plan. However, we do know that serverless function timeouts jump up to 900 seconds on enterprise plans.

The Hobby and Pro plans feature one concurrent build. The Pro plan offers the option to enable additional concurrent builds for $50/each.

All plans can make unlimited function requests and are only limited by the execution time available to them. However, the smaller your plan, the simpler and more efficient your functions will need to be. You'll need to ensure each function can reliably execute within the timeout period.

Publish to Vercel with automated production deployments: Quickstart guide

Vercel provides automated deployment options, so you can continuously develop and deploy apps without having to manually push changes.

You can set up webhooks which will trigger when a change is pushed to your repository and Vercel will run tests before the code is automatically deployed. This saves time as you don’t have to manually upload files or wait for changes to be deployed.

Vercel also offers a preview environment which allows you to test your code before pushing it live. The preview feature helps ensure that the updates are working as expected and provides an additional layer of security against bugs or errors.

Finally, Vercel’s integrated logging system makes it easy to track errors and monitor performance. This helps you identify and fix issues quickly, so you can get your project up and running without any delays.

Deploy your first site with Vercel

To deploy your first site with Vercel, you need to create a new project and link it to your GitHub repository. You can do this by clicking the New Project button on the Vercel dashboard.

Once you’ve created a new project, you can link it to your GitHub repository by clicking the Import Project button. You can also choose to import a project from a GitLab or Bitbucket repository.

Once you’ve linked your project to your repository, you can deploy it by clicking the Deploy button. This will trigger a build and deploy your app to Vercel’s servers.

Publish with Vercel to a custom domain

Vercel allows you to publish your app with a custom domain. This is useful if you want to use a domain name that is already registered or if you want to use a subdomain.

To publish with a custom domain, you need to add a CNAME record to your DNS settings. This will point your domain to Vercel’s servers, so your app will be accessible at your custom domain.

You can find the CNAME record in the Domains section of your Vercel dashboard. You can also add a custom domain by clicking the Add Domain button.

Once you’ve added a custom domain, you can publish your app by clicking the Publish button. This will trigger a build and deploy your app to Vercel’s servers.

Deploy with Vercel’s CLI

Vercel also provides a command line interface (CLI) which allows you to deploy your app from your local machine. This is useful if you want to deploy your app from a CI/CD pipeline or if you want to deploy your app from a different repository.

To deploy with Vercel’s CLI, you need to install the Vercel CLI on your local machine. You can do this by running the following command:

npm install -g vercel

Once you’ve installed the Vercel CLI, you can deploy your app by running the following command:

vercel

This will trigger a build and deploy your app to Vercel’s servers.

Vercel and serverless function support

Serverless functions are small snippets of code that run in response to events. They can be used to handle tasks such as handling web traffic, processing payments or sending notifications.

Vercel's serverless function support enables you to write your code in any language and deploy it instantly. Vercel also offers integrated tools for debugging and performance monitoring, so you can ensure that your functions are running optimally.

Vercel's serverless functions are written in a fully-featured programming language, meaning you have complete control over how they work. This makes it easy to customize your functions and create complex workflows. Plus, serverless functions are easy to deploy, so you can quickly get up and running with minimal setup.

By leveraging Vercel's automated deployment features and serverless function support, you can save time and effort when building applications. With Vercel, deploying apps is as simple as pushing changes to your repository and Vercel will do the rest.

What are the benefits of using serverless functions?

Serverless functions offer several advantages over traditional server-based applications. Projects built with serverless functions are usually faster, cheaper, and more reliable than their server-based counterparts. Serverless functions also enable developers to quickly build complex workflows without the need for extensive setup or configuration.

By using Vercel's automated deployment features and integrated tools, developers can quickly and easily deploy their serverless functions. This saves time, effort and money while ensuring that projects are up and running quickly and with minimal errors.

Overall, using Vercel's serverless function support helps streamline the development process, so you can get your project launched faster with fewer issues. With Vercel, it's easy to deploy and manage applications at scale.

Vercel also offers additional features such as A/B testing, CI/CD pipelines, and custom domain support so you can further customize your projects. With Vercel's comprehensive set of features, you can quickly build powerful apps that are ready for the real world.

One of the main benefits of using serverless functions is that you only pay for the time that they are actually running. This makes them a cost-effective option for small tasks that don’t require a lot of resources.

Another benefit is that you don’t need to worry about setting up and managing servers. This takes care of the infrastructure for you and allows you to focus on writing code.

Finally, serverless functions can help improve your workflow. They can be used to trigger other tasks or workflows, which can help speed up development times.

Bundling files and dependencies with includeFiles

includeFiles is a powerful feature offered by Vercel that allows you to bundle external files and dependencies with your serverless functions. This makes it easy to include assets such as images, stylesheets, or any other additional resources in the Edge package.

To include files in a serverless function, you need to specify the file paths in the includeFiles property. This property is an array of strings that should contain the relative path from the project root to each file or folder. All dependencies for your serverless function will be bundled into a single file on the Edge when it is deployed.

By using serverless functions, you can benefit from increased scalability, cost-effectiveness and improved workflow. With the includeFiles property, you can easily include files in your serverless functions to create powerful workflows. Understanding how to use this feature effectively can help save time and money.

Route pre-fetching

Vercel also offers route pre-fetching, which allows your serverless functions to automatically fetch data when a page is requested. This can help reduce the amount of time it takes for pages to load as well as improve performance.

To enable route pre-fetching in Vercel, you need to add a special script tag to your project's index.html file. This script tag will call a special API that Vercel provides, which you can use to tell it which routes should be pre-fetched.

By using route pre-fetching, you can ensure that all the necessary data is available on the page as soon as it is requested. This can help speed up page load times and decrease latency, which can result in a better user experience.

Rendering with Vercel

Vercel also offers powerful rendering features that you can use to quickly and easily create dynamic pages. With Vercel's rendering capabilities, you can build server-side rendered applications with ease.

Vercel provides a range of options for building applications, such as frameworks like Next.js and Gatsby, or custom solutions built with your own code. You can use Vercel's powerful APIs to quickly create dynamic pages that are tailored to the needs of your project.

Is Vercel a good infrastructure choice for serverless apps?

Vercel is quickly becoming the go-to solution for serverless applications that require scalability, performance, and cost-effectiveness. It offers an extensive set of features that make it easy to build powerful and robust apps that are ready for the real world.

With Vercel, you have access to powerful serverless functions, efficient route pre-fetching, and convenient file bundling. You can also take advantage of its rendering capabilities to create dynamic pages that are tailored to your project.

Vercel is an excellent choice for serverless applications, and its features make it a great way to get started with building powerful apps that scale.

Next.js: Major JS framework is Vercel's open-source project

Vercel’s Next.js is a React-based framework that provides an easy and powerful way to build fast, enterprise-grade websites and applications.

Next.js is optimized for performance and scalability, making it the ideal choice for building robust web experiences.

Next.js has become a major force in the framework and tooling landscape over the last few years. It's well-loved by developers and its growth in popularity has been rapid.

As you may know, Vercel are the creators of Next.js. The success of Vercel's biggest open-source project speaks to the company's credibility and its bona fides in developer experience.

It also means that you can trust your deployment solution to work smoothly with Next.js and stay up-to-date with deep support for the latest releases.

Next.js on Vercel: Integration and support features

There is tight Next.js integration, support, and optimization built into Vercel's platform. If Next.js has become part of your tech stack, this can be a compelling benefit.

Building a website or app with Next.js is easy and fast with Vercel. Out-of-the-box support allows you to deploy your Next.js project quickly and easily.

• With zero configuration, you can simply git push to update your site and deploy it globally in seconds.
• Vercel's advanced observability tools mean you can monitor and understand the performance of your Next.js site.
• Vercel Edge Middleware means you can run A/B tests, experiment, and feature flag to get the most out of your Next.js site.
• Incremental Static Regeneration (ISR) allows developers to update content from their headless CMS or database in 300ms without redeploying.
• Additionally, Vercel's Server-Side Rendering (SSR) capabilities allow autoscaling serverless edge functions to dynamically render Next.js applications with speed and reliability.
• Vercel also provides Static Site Generation (SSG) capabilities for prerendering and caching Next.js pages globally.
• Vercel Edge API Routes allow developers to build high-performance APIs that are deployed to every Edge Network region.

With all these features, developers can easily deploy scalable, reliable, and fast websites and applications. Vercel provides an unparalleled experience for deploying Next.js applications and websites to production.

Vercel and the Astro web framework

Astro is a web framework that helps you build fast, content-focused websites.

Astro is designed to make building fast websites easier than ever before. Astro helps developers quickly build content-focused sites that can scale as their user base grows. It achieves this with its server-first API design, edge-ready deployment options, and zero JS runtime overhead.

Astro has a wide range of customizable integrations, and is designed to be UI-agnostic – meaning it supports all major frameworks like React, Preact, Svelte, Vue, Lit and more. This makes it easy for developers of any background to quickly build and deploy their websites.

The server-side rendering adapter for Vercel makes it easy to use Astro for your project. And as always, Vercel's GitHub integration makes it easy to keep your code up-to-date and deploy changes quickly.

Vercel review: a great step for website deployment

In conclusion, Vercel is a powerful platform for deploying updates to production and helps developers save time while increasing scalability and cost-effectiveness.

With the help of serverless functions, GitHub integrations, and Vercel's CLI, you can quickly create powerful applications. You can easily create powerful workflows and save time. This allows for increased scalability, cost-effectiveness and improved workflow.

By understanding how to effectively use Vercel, you can confidently deploy your code faster, enabling you to produce better results and using the strengths of Vercel to help ensure the success of your projects.