Install Appflare

Install from your browserCopy Anchor Link

Install Appflare

The recommended way. Open appflare.dev/deploy, sign in to Cloudflare, choose the account and Appflare's address, and the page deploys Appflare there. You need a Cloudflare login and nothing else: no API token, no Git account, nothing on your computer. Install from your browser goes through it step by step.

Or use Cloudflare's Deploy button. It goes through a copy of Appflare in your GitHub or GitLab account, which you remove afterwards. Deploy with the button walks through it.

Cloudflare's Deploy button

Every way deploys the same signed release into your own account and ends in the same setup wizard.

Which way to chooseCopy Anchor Link

• From your browser is the shortest, and the one to pick unless something below applies. You choose Appflare's address before it is deployed, so you sign in and add passkeys there from the first visit. The price is trust: for a few minutes Appflare's hosted installer holds a token that can do everything Appflare can. What the installer sees and keeps explains it.
• Cloudflare's Deploy button suits you if no Appflare service should touch your account and you have a GitHub or GitLab account. You clean up a repository copy afterwards. Appflare starts on workers.dev; setup's Where should Appflare live? step can move it to your domain, and you then sign in again there.
• The command line is for the rare case where neither works.

Whichever you pick, you can change how Appflare connects to Cloudflare later; see Appflare's Cloudflare connection.

Advanced: install from the command lineCopy Anchor Link

npx create-appflare

git clone https://github.com/appflare/appflare
cd appflare
pnpm install
pnpm --filter "create-appflare..." build
node packages/cli/bin/appflare.js

The setup wizardCopy Anchor Link

Open the manager's address. Until setup is finished, every page of the manager leads to the setup wizard: one page with three steps (four when the account has an active domain), each shown in place of the one before.

After an install from your browser, the page that installed Appflare does step 1 for you and opens Appflare at step 2. Anyone who opens that Appflare in another browser first sees Finish where you installed Appflare, with Connect with an API token instead as the way to do step 1 here.

1. Connect CloudflareCopy Anchor Link

The manager needs a Cloudflare API token to create and update apps in your account. Cloudflare does not let a Worker or wrangler create one, so this step happens in the dashboard:

1. Select Create token. The dashboard opens an account-owned token form named Appflare, with the permissions below already selected; you do not pick any. Choose your account, scroll down, choose Review token, then Create token, and copy it. If you are not a Super Administrator, use Create a user token instead. What the token can do on the setup page lists each permission and the feature that uses it.
2. Paste the token.
3. Select Continue. In one step the manager checks that the token is active, can manage Workers, and belongs to the account the manager runs in (it looks for the version of itself that is serving the page in the token's account), then saves it and shows the account it connected to. It warns about permissions it cannot confirm, and a refused token shows why in place.

The token is the only thing that guards setup. Anyone who can create a token for your account already controls it, so there is no separate setup password. A token for another account is refused with a message that names the account it belongs to. The page allows 20 tries per network address in 10 minutes.

2. Create the owner accountCopy Anchor Link

Enter a name, an email, and a password of at least 12 characters. This first user is the owner: an admin who is also the only one who can change roles, delete users, or hand ownership over. You are signed in right away.

When the account has an active domain, a step comes next that asks Where should Appflare live?: keep the workers.dev address, or move Appflare to a name in one of your domains. Later skips it. See Give Appflare its own address.

Only the browser that saved the token can do this step, for 30 minutes. Anyone else who opens the manager in the meantime sees only step 1, and once the owner exists they see the sign-in page. If you close the browser before this step, open the manager again after 30 minutes and paste the token again. After an install from your browser, the browser the deploy page brought here holds the step instead; if its link ran out, see Create the owner account.

3. Check your accountCopy Anchor Link

The manager reads what your Cloudflare account has that apps rely on. A bar shows how many things are ready, out of those your plan can have. Each row names one thing, says why apps need it, and shows its state:

• Ready: the account has it.
• Needs action: it is off, and an app you installed (or are installing) needs it.
• Not set up: it is off, and none of your apps needs it yet. Turn it on when an app you want needs it.
• Paid plan only: only Workers Paid includes it.
• Could not check: Appflare could not read it. Select Check again.

A row that is off has one button: Turn on in Cloudflare opens the right page of the Cloudflare dashboard, Edit token in Cloudflare opens the token's page, Choose plan lets you say which Workers plan the account is on when Appflare cannot read it, and Set up opens Settings > Building apps > Build in your account. Details shows what Appflare found, when it checked, what went wrong if it could not tell, and how many catalog apps use it.

On a new account most rows read Not set up; that is expected. Only Needs action rows stand in the way of something you have installed.

Select Check again after changing something in the dashboard. Select Finish to go to the manager. The same list stays in Settings > Your account > What this account can run.

The token template requests:

The permissions marked "Only for" are optional: you can remove them from the form if you will not use that feature, and everything else works without them.

Where the token livesCopy Anchor Link

The manager stores the token as an encrypted secret, CF_API_TOKEN, on its own Worker, through the Cloudflare API. Saving it redeploys the manager, which takes a few seconds. The token is never shown again, never written to the database, and never included in logs. See Security model.

To replace the token later, open Settings > Your account > Cloudflare connection, select Change how Appflare connects, and choose Use a new API token. The new token must be for the same account. Revoke the old one in the Cloudflare dashboard afterwards. The same choice can switch Appflare to Cloudflare sign-in, which grants every permission Appflare uses except Billing, all at once. See Appflare's Cloudflare connection.

NextCopy Anchor Link

Browse the catalog and install an app.