Custom Infrastructure

Use this page for NocoDB deployments that the single-server installation wizard does not cover. These include managed databases, custom SSL certificates, private CAs, your own reverse proxy, multi-replica setups and Kubernetes.

Before you begin

NocoDB works with all actively maintained PostgreSQL releases (12 and later). Use the version that your managed provider offers. We recommend a current major version.

When to use this page

Use this page if one of these is true:

You use a managed Postgres (RDS, Azure, Cloud SQL) with public CA SSL.
You use a self-managed Postgres with a private or internal CA.
You already have a TLS certificate and want to pin it through Traefik.
You have nginx, Caddy or a load balancer in front, and want NocoDB on port 8080.
You deploy to Kubernetes and want a reference compose file to translate.

Option A: Clone the repo and run the wizard interactively

git clone https://github.com/nocodb/nocodb.git
cd nocodb/docker-compose
./setup.sh

setup.sh runs the same installation wizard as the Single-server install one-liner. It writes its output into the current working directory. Use this option to edit the generated files before you start the stack.

Option B: Copy a pre-built example

The docker-compose/examples/ directory contains a set of selected configurations.

Example	Postgres	Redis	Proxy	Best for
`quickstart-demo`	Bundled	Bundled	None (port 8080)	Local eval / "show me NocoDB"
`managed-postgres`	External managed (RDS/Azure/Cloud SQL)	External	None (port 8080)	Production behind your own LB
`external-postgres-and-redis`	External self-managed	External	None (port 8080)	Minimal Docker footprint
`traefik-custom-ssl`	External managed	External	Traefik + custom TLS cert	Production with your own SSL cert
`postgres-private-ca`	External (private CA)	External	Traefik + Let's Encrypt	On-prem / private cloud DB

To start quickly with an example:

git clone --depth 1 https://github.com/nocodb/nocodb.git
cp -r nocodb/docker-compose/examples/managed-postgres ./my-deployment
cd my-deployment
# Edit docker-compose.yml, docker.env, and nocodb/db.json: replace placeholders
docker compose up -d

Configuring SSL for an external Postgres with a private CA

SSL for an external Postgres with a private CA is the most complex external database setup. NocoDB reads its database connection from nocodb/db.json (knex format). In this file, you can put a CA certificate inline:

{
  "client": "pg",
  "connection": {
    "host": "your-private-db-host.internal",
    "port": "5432",
    "user": "nocodb",
    "password": "your-password",
    "database": "nocodb",
    "ssl": {
      "rejectUnauthorized": true,
      "ca": "-----BEGIN CERTIFICATE-----\nMIID...\n-----END CERTIFICATE-----"
    }
  }
}

The CA must be one string, with newlines escaped as \n. The postgres-private-ca example shows the full layout, with a Traefik proxy.

To change a multi-line PEM into the single-line JSON form, run:

awk 'NF {sub(/\r/, ""); printf "%s\\n", $0}' your-ca.pem

Multi-replica / scaling

NocoDB scales horizontally when you configure Redis. Redis is necessary for distributed coordination:

# In docker-compose.yml
nocodb:
  deploy:
    mode: replicated
    replicas: 3

For more than a few replicas, run NocoDB in Kubernetes. Translate one of the examples into a Deployment + Service + Ingress. Point the same env vars at managed Postgres and Redis.

Bringing your own reverse proxy

The managed-postgres and external-postgres-and-redis examples expose NocoDB on host port 8080, without Traefik.

Put your own nginx, Caddy or load balancer in front.
Forward HTTP traffic to port 8080.
Forward the X-Forwarded-Proto and Host headers. NocoDB needs them to make correct callback URLs.

Single-Server Install