Deploy from a Prefab Template

A Prefab Template is a ready-made application — image, ports, volumes and environment variables already chosen — with a small form for the values only you can supply.

Using one#

Create application → Advanced → Prefab Template. Pick one, fill in the parameters, and start it.

Parameters are validated, and can be rendered into either environment variables or config files depending on what the underlying software expects. That's the point of a template: you don't have to know that a particular database wants POSTGRES_PASSWORD rather than DB_PASS, or which path its data directory lives at.

What you get#

The template chooses sensible defaults for the parts that are easy to get wrong — the data volume path in particular, which is the difference between a database that persists and one that resets on the next configuration change.

What it doesn't do is make decisions that depend on your situation. After it's running, you still own:

• Whether the port stays bound. Every binding is public. If only your own app connects, unbind it — see Networking.
• Backups. Nothing is backed up for you.
• Sizing. Start small and raise on evidence.
• Pruning. Volume growth counts against the account disk limit that stops every app when exceeded.

The catalogue is small#

There are only a handful of templates, so this is a shortcut for common cases rather than a marketplace. If what you want isn't there, Existing Image does the same job with a few more fields to fill in — and the Databases guides walk through the common ones explicitly.

Templates aren't managed services#

Worth being clear: a template deploys an ordinary application that you own and operate. There's no managed database here — upgrades, backups and failover are yours either way. The template just saves you the setup.

If you want someone else to run the database, use a hosted provider and connect to it over the internet.