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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, or Python
    • Plan: Select resource tier — Starter, Developer, or Professional
    • Region (optional): Pick a geographic region, or leave blank for auto-selection
    • SSH Key (optional): Paste a public SSH key for immediate access
  3. Click Create
Your pod will be ready in 1–2 seconds. You’ll be redirected to the pod detail page.

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From the CLI

instapod pods create my-app --preset nodejs --plan developer

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Available Flags

FlagDescriptionDefault
--presetPreset slug: static, php, nodejs, pythonRequired
--planPlan slug: starter, developer, professionalstarter
--regionRegion slug (e.g., singapore)Auto-select
--server-idSpecific server IDAuto-select
--cpuCPU cores overridePlan default
--memoryMemory override (e.g., 1GB)Plan default
--diskDisk override (e.g., 10GB)Plan default
--ssh-keyPath to SSH public key fileNone
-w, --waitWait for pod to be ready before returningfalse

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Examples

# Basic creation
instapod pods create my-site --preset static

# With specific plan and region
instapod pods create api-server --preset nodejs --plan professional --region singapore

# With SSH key and wait for ready
instapod pods create dev-env --preset python --ssh-key ~/.ssh/id_ed25519.pub --wait

# With resource overrides
instapod pods create heavy-app --preset php --cpu 4 --memory 4GB --disk 40GB

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From the API

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

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What Happens During Creation

  1. Server selection — The orchestrator picks the least-loaded server in your chosen region (or any region if unspecified)
  2. Container launch — An Incus 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}