Creating a Pod

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From the Dashboard

1. Navigate to the Dashboard and click Create Pod
2. Fill in the creation form:
   • Name: A unique name for your pod. Must be lowercase alphanumeric with hyphens (e.g., my-app, staging-api). This becomes your subdomain.
   • Preset: Choose your development stack - Static, PHP, Node.js, Python, or Go
   • Version (optional): For PHP, Node.js, Python, and Go, pick a runtime version (e.g., Node.js 22, PHP 8.4). Defaults to the latest stable.
   • Plan: Select a resource tier - Launch, Build, Grow, Scale, or Turbo. Every preset starts on Launch ($3/mo) unless you change it
   • Region: Pick where the pod runs, or leave it on the suggested one
   • SSH Key (optional): Paste a public SSH key for immediate access
3. Click Create

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Choosing a Region

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From the CLI

instapods pods create my-app -p nodejs --plan build

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Available Flags

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Examples

# Basic creation
instapods pods create my-site -p static

# With specific plan and region
instapods pods create api-server -p nodejs --plan scale -r us-east

# With SSH key
instapods pods create dev-env -p python --ssh-key ~/.ssh/id_ed25519.pub

# With a specific runtime version
instapods pods create my-app -p nodejs --version 22

# Wait until pod is fully running
instapods pods create my-site -p static -w

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From the API

curl -X POST https://app.instapods.com/api/pods \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer YOUR_TOKEN" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{
    "name": "my-app",
    "preset": "nodejs",
    "plan_slug": "build",
    "region": "us-east",
    "ssh_key": "ssh-ed25519 AAAA... user@host"
  }'

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What Happens During Creation

1. Server selection — The orchestrator picks the best server in your chosen region (or the closest region if unspecified)
2. Container launch — A container is created from the pre-built image for your preset
3. Network setup — A unique SSH port is allocated and the proxy route is configured
4. DNS — Your pod’s subdomain is immediately available via wildcard DNS

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Pod Naming Rules

• Lowercase letters, numbers, and hyphens only
• Must start with a letter
• 3-40 characters long
• Must be unique within the platform
• The name becomes your subdomain: {name}.{server-domain}