CapRover Has a Free PaaS With a Web UI That Makes Deployment Actually Fun

#caprover #deployment #selfhosted #devops

Dokku is great but terminal-only. CapRover gives you the same git push deploys plus a beautiful web dashboard — like having your own Heroku control panel.

CapRover vs Dokku vs Coolify

Feature	Dokku	CapRover	Coolify
Web UI	No (CLI only)	Yes (full dashboard)	Yes (modern UI)
One-click apps	No	100+ apps	Growing
Cluster mode	No	Yes (Docker Swarm)	Yes
SSL	Plugin	Built-in	Built-in
Learning curve	Medium	Easy	Easy
Resource usage	~100MB	~200MB	~500MB

Setup (10 Minutes)

# On a VPS with Docker installed
docker run -p 80:80 -p 443:443 -p 3000:3000 \
  -v /var/run/docker.sock:/var/run/docker.sock \
  -v /captain:/captain \
  caprover/caprover

Open http://your-ip:3000, set your password, point *.captain.yourdomain.com to your server, and you are done.

Deploy via Web UI

Click "Create New App"
Choose deployment method:
- Git push (like Heroku)
- Dockerfile (any Docker image)
- Captain Definition (CapRover's config file)
- Docker image (from any registry)
App is live with HTTPS

One-Click Apps (100+)

Deploy popular software in seconds:

WordPress, Ghost, Strapi, Directus, Appwrite,
PostgreSQL, MySQL, MongoDB, Redis, RabbitMQ,
Gitea, Drone CI, Grafana, Prometheus, MinIO,
Nextcloud, Plausible, Umami, Matomo, n8n,
Ghost, Discourse, Mattermost, Rocket.Chat...

Click → Configure → Deploy. No Dockerfiles needed.

Captain Definition File

{
  "schemaVersion": 2,
  "dockerfileLines": [
    "FROM node:20-alpine",
    "WORKDIR /app",
    "COPY package*.json ./",
    "RUN npm ci --production",
    "COPY . .",
    "EXPOSE 3000",
    "CMD [\"node\", \"server.js\"]"
  ]
}

Or use a Dockerfile directly — CapRover supports both.

CLI Deployment

npm install -g caprover
caprover login
# Enter your CapRover URL and password

caprover deploy
# Select app, deploy from current directory

Cluster Mode (Scale Horizontally)

CapRover uses Docker Swarm under the hood:

# Add worker nodes
caprover cluster:join --host worker1.example.com
caprover cluster:join --host worker2.example.com

# Scale your app across nodes
# Set instance count in the web UI

Real Cost Comparison

Setup	Apps	Monthly Cost
Heroku (3 apps + addons)	3	$50-100
Railway (3 apps)	3	$15-30
CapRover on Hetzner CX22	10+	$4.5

One cheap VPS hosts your entire side-project portfolio.

Want to automate your deployment pipeline? I build custom DevOps solutions and data tools. Contact spinov001@gmail.com or browse my Apify tools.

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