Butterbase: Open-Source BaaS with Postgres, Auth, and AI Gateway

#opensource #backend #ai #postgres

Tired of juggling separate services for authentication, storage, and serverless functions? Meet Butterbase — an open-source backend-as-a-service that bundles Postgres, auth, file storage, serverless functions, an AI gateway, and even MCP support into one self-hostable platform.

What Problem Does It Solve?

Building a modern app often means piecing together Firebase, Supabase, AWS Lambda, and a vector database. Butterbase eliminates that complexity by providing a unified backend stack:

Postgres – your relational data, ready to query
Auth – built-in user management (email, OAuth, etc.)
Storage – file uploads and serving
Functions – serverless compute (Node.js, Python, etc.)
AI Gateway – proxy to OpenAI, Anthropic, or local models
MCP – Model Context Protocol for AI tooling

All open-source, all under your control.

Quick Start Example

Get up and running in minutes:

# Using Docker
curl -fsSL https://butterbase.io/install.sh | bash
# Or with Node.js
npx create-butterbase my-app

Then create your first endpoint:

// functions/hello.js
export default async (req, res) => {
  const { name } = req.body;
  return { message: `Hello ${name || 'world'}!` };
};

Deploy with butterbase deploy and you've got a live API with auth, database, and AI capabilities.

Why It’s Interesting

Open-source – no vendor lock-in, full data ownership
AI-native – built-in gateway means you can add LLM calls without extra SDKs
MCP support – integrate with AI agents and tools seamlessly
Self-host or cloud – deploy on your own server or use their managed service

Butterbase is perfect for indie hackers, startups, and teams who want a powerful backend without the overhead of stitching together multiple services.