Deployment

VPS with Node.js and PM2 (recommended)

You need a Linux server with Node.js 20.19 or newer (22 LTS recommended) and access to MongoDB. Upload the inner chatcart folder (without node_modules and .next), then:

cd /var/www/chatcart          # the folder with package.json
node -v                        # v20.19.0 or newer
nano .env.local                # MONGODB_URI, JWT_SECRET, APP_URL=https://shop.example.com, UPLOAD_DIR
npm ci
npm run build
npm run create-admin           # once, for your owner account
npm install -g pm2
pm2 start "npm run start" --name chatcart
pm2 save

• npm ci installs exactly the versions in package-lock.json, so your server runs what we tested.
• Set UPLOAD_DIR to a folder outside the app, for example /var/chatcart/uploads, so uploaded images survive updates.
• Sign-in needs HTTPS in production (see Sign-in does nothing on a server).
• To update: upload the new files, then npm ci, npm run build and pm2 restart chatcart.

Nginx in front of ChatCart

server {
    server_name shop.example.com;
    client_max_body_size 6m;

    location / {
        proxy_pass http://127.0.0.1:3000;
        proxy_set_header Host $host;
        proxy_set_header X-Forwarded-For $proxy_add_x_forwarded_for;
        proxy_set_header X-Forwarded-Proto $scheme;
    }
}

Then get a free HTTPS certificate with Certbot: sudo certbot --nginx -d shop.example.com. With Caddy, HTTPS is automatic:

shop.example.com {
    reverse_proxy 127.0.0.1:3000
}

Add each custom domain under Admin, Stores as well (see Stores and domains).

Vercel and other serverless hosts

Import the project, add the environment variables, and deploy. Storefront and admin pages are dynamic, so no database is needed during the build. Run npm run create-admin (or npm run seed) once from your own computer with the production MONGODB_URI in .env.local.