I use Netlify for all my static sites and it's been amazing. All I have to do is push and they take care of everything else, I can't understate how much I love the product. If you want to check out a live deployment, my website https://www.stavros.io/ is on Netlify.
I especially like how they provide forms, lambdas and very easy testing by just pushing to another git branch. I don't see why anyone would use Github/Gitlab pages when Netlify exists.
I run destinysets.com, a companion site for the video game Destiny 2, and I cannot say how much of a life saver it has been for me. Not only are deploys as simple as a git push, but I also get next-level things like "preview environments" for pull requests _for free_.
The PR preview environments are super important to me because there's a lot of curated data that powers the site, as JSON files in the repo, and I accept user contributions. The Preview environments means I can check what it looks like without having to pull down and run it locally - I even preview, merge and deploy from my phone sometimes. It's amazing.
Hey, I'm a user at destinysets! I really love what you've done with the platform. The experience is a lot faster than some of the other tools out there.
I'm also a very happy Netlify user. Their product seems years ahead of other tools. My favorite thing is that you can now manage DNS and generate SSL for all domains with a single click. Perfect for static sites, SPAs, etc.
I love how Netlify allows you to use the benefits of static site technology (like distributed version control) while allowing for dynamic site functionality like forms. I looked at the documentation for forms https://www.netlify.com/docs/form-handling/#receiving-submis... and it looks very easy.
I don't like "+1" type comments, but this is a rare instance where I want to highly recommend Netlify. From support to performance, uptime and UI, they've been exceptional.
I found Netlify a few months ago and use them just for my blog currently. They are great though and would recommend them to anyone. It was trivial to get something setup with https with a Let's Encrypt certificate on my own domain, pushing to GitHub to update the site.
It's very simple to configure url rewriting and pre-rendering for SPAs. CxJS website (https://cxjs.io) and documentation is hosted on Netlify and it has been an amazing experience so far. We were on their single user $9 paid plan, but they switched us on the free tier with the pricing change some time ago.
I host my Jekyll blog (zeph.co) on Netlify and can confirm that you can do this.
Netlify connects to GitHub and rebuilds your site automatically when a change is made in the master branch. There's no technical setup – you just connect to your GitHub account with their UI.
I used to use GitHub Pages to host my blog, but Netlify provides more features and it's also free.
Funny enough I went from exactly that to gitlab+netlify setup.
You get loads out of the box, HTTPS being the big one.
In case you didn't get the reference, the other comment was the top comment for dropbox when it announced funding. In theory yes you can still roll your own dropbox, but we all have limited resources and dropbox and netlify make things so much easier that it's worth paying them money to do it right on the first try and not worry about maintenance.
The ability to be able to publish using a simple `git push` and let them do all the work (including assets minification and bundling) is nothing short but amazing. Their dashboard is also really cool. Having the possibility to test a merge request without disrupting the live site, lock a deploy to a specific commit, or see the deployment live. It's simply amazing.
And their customer support is also great. Just yesterday I had a problem with Hugo not compiling my SCSS on their hand and I had two people trying to help me super quickly.
Netlify is a service I can't stop praising because they're just great on all fronts.
Same. It's made my product design/prototyping/validation workflow insanely efficient. Really happy with it, and curious to explore some of the other features (like lambdas).
Couldn’t agree more. Started with hosting static sites directly on AWS with a combo of S3, CloudFront, Route51, etc. While it worked, Netlify is just so much nicer.
Git push done.
Now I use a combo or netlify plus aws lambda for functionality. Interested to see what they deliver next.
stavros.io is FAST. I'm sure Netlify deserves some credit but much of it belongs to your static approach and the decision not to load the page with 200 JS calls.
Thank you! Yes, I hate slow websites, I have removed as much as I could easily remove, mainly all the social crap. If you look closely, the social buttons are actually static images and links.
May not be widely known, but a startup named Divshot launched what feels to me now like an identical service to Netlify, just a few years earlier. Existed ~2012-2015. They were acquired by Google and their product was converted into Firebase Hosting. I haven't tried it, though:
I love Firebase Hosting probably just as much as Netlify. Even more if you consider the various services besides hosting that Firebase offers. Thank you for making a great product! And if you're hiring, my email is in my profile :D
I loved using Divshot, and was sad when their service was shuttered.
I’ve been using Netlify ever since, though, and have launched 20+ web projects in the past 18 months. Easily my favorite hosting solution I’ve ever used.
I use Firebase hosting for a static site that gets between 100-400gb of traffic per month, and it works out a bit cheaper than Netlify ($15-$50/m vs. flat $45/m). I hardly ever use their web interface and just deal with their one line CLI.
My biggest concern with Firebase is if it's still going to be around in a year or two. That's why I'd be reluctant to use it for DB and auth stuff. I narrowly avoided jumping into Parse back in the day before that was shuttered so I'm wary.
It seems like more and more services are being moved under the Firebase umbrella (Crashlytics for example), signalling Google is committed long term to Firebase. It is a considerable form of cloud lock-in if you get your data into Firebase (firestore) and a competitive advantage over AWS, so there is good reason to believe this is long term strategy as well.
FYI to any readers: Firebase Hosting has nothing to do with the other Firebase stuff. In fact, I personally dislike their live database quite a bit.
If you want to host a simple static site with HTTPS, Firebase Hosting really makes it incredibly easy. My only complaint is that they don't let you view access logs. Here's the official response [0] from the Firebase team as to why that's the case.
Once you have to do anything more complex I think it's better to use a different service. If you don't want to host anything yourself I've heard positive things about Zeit [1], although I haven't personally used it.
FWIW providing access logs is something we're exploring (though it's still a ways out).
I certainly hope that you don't feel the need to move to something else when your application scales / gets more complex -- our whole mission is to make it so you don't have to. Feel free to reach out to me on Twitter (@mbleigh) if you have specific questions/concerns.
Firebase is just awesome. I have deployed several minor apps on the platform. With out-of-the-box auth management and the db, I can have a static client-side only app that is relatively featured. I used to actually "code server side" to manage data, and that seems so redundant now with firebase. Thanks!
So much praising so little talk about its limits. I consider myself to be kinda stick in a Rails way of thinking. But most projects I touch heavily depend on a backend, database, or raw computing power.
Everything that doesn't fall in those categories is something I create static (ex nanoc.) i just build out locally push to my git and let a post-commit hook do the Copy pasta. My static Web server runs without attention for 5 plus years now.
I see it makes stuff easier, but i fail to see why it would be so much better than any other git deployment method.
A traditional MVC app process has a start up time and a memory cost so you either have a bad experience while a user waits for it to start up, or you have to rent (or own) some amount of RAM 24/7.
Static site + API Gateway + async processing by a Function-as-a-service type pattern (or its abstracted productified form) allows for something between your two categories here -- mostly content that is pre-rendered but supporting some write-type features where people can still post comments or subscribe to newsletters or something like that.
Ok, I'm a web dev and I hate having to deal with web servers, configs, CI, etc. The idea sounds great, but I can't understand how this works from this post.
Can someone explain how this works exactly? Are they basically offering a way to prebuild apps to static assets and host them on CDNs? How do server-side only things will happen then?
It's because most of it is marketing speak. I suppose they don't want to call it a better GitHub pages with awesome UX, but rather invent a new category term. In the tech sector if it sticks then it's pure gold.
I've set up a landing page recently and it was flawless on Netlify. You provide a Git repo, connect it to their CI then give some build commands and they will handle the rest.
They still host it on regular servers obviously, but you don't have to do anything to manage it. They have a DNS server which is also pretty neat.
Think Heroku but just for deploying static assets. You can do something as simple as have a git repo of assets, push it, and you're up and running with SSL, etc, straight away.
How do you get dynamic? Well, they support a build process so static sites or assets can be built at their end, if that's how you roll. But if you want fully dynamic sites, well, no, you can use their AWS Lambda-powered functions service to help build this out, but you won't be deploying something like a PHP or Rails app to Netlify :-) This limitation opens up a lot of other opportunities to simplify deployment, however.
Databases are, in general, the next obvious question for a dynamic app on Netlify. Some solutions can use lambdas, but since a straight-up database is always going to be necessary for certain things, it makes me wonder if they'd roll out a paid database at some point... though that sort of conflicts with their "JAM" "no backend! well somebody else's backend maybe?" selling point
And if your main dynamic features are things like handling forms or an occasional db call on the backend, this isn't a bad approach. It's cheaper and less maintenance generally for a lot of simple cases, but obviously won't apply to all cases equally well.
> How do server-side only things will happen then?
By calling a service from JavaScript. What you're probably getting at is, how do I dynamically generate web pages?
That's different. As a web developer you're probably used to generating the presentation tier on the server at least some of the time. You query a database and spit out some HTML. The so-called "static" approach here means:
1. Generate more stuff up front with build tools that you previously would do at request time. For example, why write server code to generate and cache a blog on every request when you can just build it whenever you write a new blog post?
2. In many cases this greatly narrows down the dynamic stuff that might need to happen. See if you can use JavaScript to fill in the rest. Instead of inserting that ad banner with server code, write a JavaScript function to fetch it from a service (like Lambda) and update the DOM.
3. You can be as dynamic as you want to be by expanding on what you do with JavaScript and services. This is sometimes called writing a single page app. It's maybe more complicated but on the plus side, it's how you write mobile apps and you may be able to share the same backend.
You can keep a static site with something like Hugo in a git repo and have Netlify automatically build it and make it available on changes. You can also just toss an HTML and CSS file in (like I do on https://unstuckdev.com/) and their robots put it up.
You can do more with it, and that's what costs money, but it takes a small but tedious hurdle out of putting some HTML on the web.
> Are they basically offering a way to prebuild apps to static assets and host them on CDNs?
Yes. Pretty much. They're a more dev friendly CloudFront. Supports deploying from a git repo out-of-the-box, where there's a separate service for this with CloudFront. More expensive than CloudFront, though.
> How do server-side only things will happen then?
This isn't the main problem they're solving. They expect that you'll have an API somewhere to talk to. But they do have a "functions" feature, which is based on AWS Lambda, so you could use that for things that would otherwise fall under server-side. They also have a simple "forms" feature for basic data collection.
Their main offering is 0 config static hosting. They also added a CI service to build your frontend for you and then deploy it.
Then they have myriad other value added features, one of which is cloud functions. You can use that for your server side requirements, or you can use your own server.
It’s not what they do that’s special, it’s how easy/magical they make the process (as well as the very generous free tier).
Not seeing any bandwidth, storage or other costs so I wonder what their soft/hard limits are for those things. I see their forms have really low limits for the price 1000 submissions and 1GB file upload limits, 2m functions on the $45 plan [1].
We started out bootstrapping and were profitable before our first round of funding. However, we always strongly believed that the larger vision of what we wanted to build would be impossible to achieve without outside funding.
How did you decide when it was time to stop bootstrapping and raise a round? Was there a magic number traction-wise (total users, MRR, etc) or was it motivated by the desire to staff up a team and execute on your product vision?
One of the things I love about Netlify is that I have never asked my clients to flush their cache after updating their sites... everything is invalidated and refreshed almost by magic. I suddenly realised this after months of using it, sometimes multiple pushes to live each day and it never skipped a beat, no issues with clients getting edgy because their site hasn’t been updated or because something doesn’t look right (css not refreshed but html has) etc.
Built vote by mail website for Florida (https://www.stampthevote.com) using a single JSON file with 1500 zip codes and Gatsby.js and deployed with Netlify.
Great to be in the future and not have to worry about hosting a server for such a simple site.
Readit News
I especially like how they provide forms, lambdas and very easy testing by just pushing to another git branch. I don't see why anyone would use Github/Gitlab pages when Netlify exists.
The PR preview environments are super important to me because there's a lot of curated data that powers the site, as JSON files in the repo, and I accept user contributions. The Preview environments means I can check what it looks like without having to pull down and run it locally - I even preview, merge and deploy from my phone sometimes. It's amazing.
I'm also a very happy Netlify user. Their product seems years ahead of other tools. My favorite thing is that you can now manage DNS and generate SSL for all domains with a single click. Perfect for static sites, SPAs, etc.
I can see how people would use Netlify over GitLab. By the way, in GitLab we allow you to test a branch with a review app. In fact for 11.5 we're planning to show you a direct link to the page that changes https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab-ce/issues/33418 and someone contributed the option to make the static site that is generate with pages private https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab-ce/issues/33422
This is critical for me since I edit using my Android Jekyll-optimized tool Teddy Hyde (https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.EditorHyde...).
Netlify connects to GitHub and rebuilds your site automatically when a change is made in the master branch. There's no technical setup – you just connect to your GitHub account with their UI.
I used to use GitHub Pages to host my blog, but Netlify provides more features and it's also free.
The ability to be able to publish using a simple `git push` and let them do all the work (including assets minification and bundling) is nothing short but amazing. Their dashboard is also really cool. Having the possibility to test a merge request without disrupting the live site, lock a deploy to a specific commit, or see the deployment live. It's simply amazing.
And their customer support is also great. Just yesterday I had a problem with Hugo not compiling my SCSS on their hand and I had two people trying to help me super quickly.
Netlify is a service I can't stop praising because they're just great on all fronts.
Netlify is one of those few products that feels like it Just Works(TM) which is rare to find!
Git push done.
Now I use a combo or netlify plus aws lambda for functionality. Interested to see what they deliver next.
stavros.io is FAST. I'm sure Netlify deserves some credit but much of it belongs to your static approach and the decision not to load the page with 200 JS calls.
I’ve put a few small paying clients on their platform.
I hope they succeed!
https://firebase.google.com/docs/hosting/
I’ve been using Netlify ever since, though, and have launched 20+ web projects in the past 18 months. Easily my favorite hosting solution I’ve ever used.
Deleted Comment
My biggest concern with Firebase is if it's still going to be around in a year or two. That's why I'd be reluctant to use it for DB and auth stuff. I narrowly avoided jumping into Parse back in the day before that was shuttered so I'm wary.
That's interesting , why Firebase would go away ?
It's just back end on top of GCloud.
Actually , everytime you do something in Firebase , it create a ressources in your GCloud account.
Firebase may not be super popular for SaaS but for Mobile , it's the king and by far , you can use it with no doubt.
FYI to any readers: Firebase Hosting has nothing to do with the other Firebase stuff. In fact, I personally dislike their live database quite a bit.
If you want to host a simple static site with HTTPS, Firebase Hosting really makes it incredibly easy. My only complaint is that they don't let you view access logs. Here's the official response [0] from the Firebase team as to why that's the case.
Once you have to do anything more complex I think it's better to use a different service. If you don't want to host anything yourself I've heard positive things about Zeit [1], although I haven't personally used it.
[0] https://stackoverflow.com/questions/29669725/can-i-access-w3...
[1] https://zeit.co/
I certainly hope that you don't feel the need to move to something else when your application scales / gets more complex -- our whole mission is to make it so you don't have to. Feel free to reach out to me on Twitter (@mbleigh) if you have specific questions/concerns.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Firebase
Everything that doesn't fall in those categories is something I create static (ex nanoc.) i just build out locally push to my git and let a post-commit hook do the Copy pasta. My static Web server runs without attention for 5 plus years now.
I see it makes stuff easier, but i fail to see why it would be so much better than any other git deployment method.
- the "static webserver"
- the sandbox for commit hooks
- instant CDN & cache-busting
- 1-click domain setup
- 1-click SSL setup
- git-branch powered a/b testing
- git-branch powered deploy previews
- Functions-as-a-service deployment and routing
and that's the free tier
Static site + API Gateway + async processing by a Function-as-a-service type pattern (or its abstracted productified form) allows for something between your two categories here -- mostly content that is pre-rendered but supporting some write-type features where people can still post comments or subscribe to newsletters or something like that.
Can someone explain how this works exactly? Are they basically offering a way to prebuild apps to static assets and host them on CDNs? How do server-side only things will happen then?
I've set up a landing page recently and it was flawless on Netlify. You provide a Git repo, connect it to their CI then give some build commands and they will handle the rest.
They still host it on regular servers obviously, but you don't have to do anything to manage it. They have a DNS server which is also pretty neat.
How do you get dynamic? Well, they support a build process so static sites or assets can be built at their end, if that's how you roll. But if you want fully dynamic sites, well, no, you can use their AWS Lambda-powered functions service to help build this out, but you won't be deploying something like a PHP or Rails app to Netlify :-) This limitation opens up a lot of other opportunities to simplify deployment, however.
By calling a service from JavaScript. What you're probably getting at is, how do I dynamically generate web pages?
That's different. As a web developer you're probably used to generating the presentation tier on the server at least some of the time. You query a database and spit out some HTML. The so-called "static" approach here means:
1. Generate more stuff up front with build tools that you previously would do at request time. For example, why write server code to generate and cache a blog on every request when you can just build it whenever you write a new blog post?
2. In many cases this greatly narrows down the dynamic stuff that might need to happen. See if you can use JavaScript to fill in the rest. Instead of inserting that ad banner with server code, write a JavaScript function to fetch it from a service (like Lambda) and update the DOM.
3. You can be as dynamic as you want to be by expanding on what you do with JavaScript and services. This is sometimes called writing a single page app. It's maybe more complicated but on the plus side, it's how you write mobile apps and you may be able to share the same backend.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Application_delivery_network
You can keep a static site with something like Hugo in a git repo and have Netlify automatically build it and make it available on changes. You can also just toss an HTML and CSS file in (like I do on https://unstuckdev.com/) and their robots put it up.
You can do more with it, and that's what costs money, but it takes a small but tedious hurdle out of putting some HTML on the web.
If you're a ruby guy, you can do Jekyll and Middleman for example.
So my toolchain (using middleman) for my company website is:
1. Make change locally
2. Push to Bitbucket
3. Netlify notices the change to the master branch
4. Netlify pulls it to it's container, builds it
5. Newly built files are put in a CDN and HTTPS...all for free
One of my favorite services right now.
EDIT: To give more context this is what I did before:
1. Did the build using middleman to create static assets
2. Uploaded those static assets via FTP to AWS S3
Yes. Pretty much. They're a more dev friendly CloudFront. Supports deploying from a git repo out-of-the-box, where there's a separate service for this with CloudFront. More expensive than CloudFront, though.
> How do server-side only things will happen then?
This isn't the main problem they're solving. They expect that you'll have an API somewhere to talk to. But they do have a "functions" feature, which is based on AWS Lambda, so you could use that for things that would otherwise fall under server-side. They also have a simple "forms" feature for basic data collection.
Then they have myriad other value added features, one of which is cloud functions. You can use that for your server side requirements, or you can use your own server.
It’s not what they do that’s special, it’s how easy/magical they make the process (as well as the very generous free tier).
Setting up a few scripts and S3/Cloudfront to do this on your own takes a bit of work. With Netlify you just press the button it seems.
[1] https://www.netlify.com/pricing/
https://www.netlify.com/tos/
For paid accounts:
- Network bandwidth: 1TB/month - Soft
- Storage: 1TB - Soft
- API requests: 500 requests/minute, 3 deploys/minute* - Hard
For free accounts:
- Network Bandwidth: 100GB/month - Soft
- Storage: 100GB - Soft
- API requests: 500 requests/minute, 3 deploys/minute* - Hard
I wonder if they do overages, or just a hard cut-off, no mention. They probably nudge users that go over soft limits to the enterprise column.
It just works. Every time.
Great to be in the future and not have to worry about hosting a server for such a simple site.
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