README.md

Run and scale realtime applications
Rivet Actors have built-in RPC, state, and events — the easiest way to build modern applications.

Features

Rivet Actors

• Remote Procedure Calls: Create cross-application function calls with minimal code overhead.
• State: Automatically manage and persist your data with built-in state handling.
• Events: Manage real-time state changes using integrated pub/sub messaging.
• Scaling & Concurrency: Actors scale automatically to cover regions and process needs.
• Edge Networking: Automatically distribute your applications to global edge locations.

Learn more about actors here.

Infrastructure

• Runs globally near your users: Minimize latency with actors created in regions closest to your users.
• Scales to zero: Handle millions of connections with low latency and high-throughput writes while saving costs through instant actor sleep/wake cycles.
• Built-in monitoring: Includes monitoring out of the box.
• Supports data localization: Store data in designated locations to meet data localization compliance requirements.
• Powered by V8 isolates & Deno runtime: Faster, cheaper, and more lightweight than lambda functions & containers.
• Supports both isolates & containers: Run your code on V8 isolates or run things like Godot/Unity game servers or video encoding in containers.
• Built with technologies you can trust: Rust, FoundationDB, the Rivet workflow engine, and Rivet orchestrator make Rivet delightfully boring to use.

Use cases

• Collaborative applications
• Local-first apps
• AI agents
• Discord Activities
• Game Servers
• Chat Apps
• Yjs Sync & Storage
• Run Untrusted User Code

Quickstart

Install CLI

Install the CLI on your machine in order to create & deploy Rivet Actors.

macOS & Linux & WSL

curl -fsSL https://releases.rivet.gg/rivet/latest/install.sh | sh

Next, follow the setup guide.

Windows (cmd)

powershell -Command "iwr https://releases.rivet.gg/rivet/latest/install.ps1 -useb | iex"

Next, follow the setup guide.

Windows (PowerShell)

iwr https://releases.rivet.gg/rivet/latest/install.ps1 -useb | iex

Next, follow the setup guide.

Build from source (cargo build)

git clone https://github.com/rivet-gg/rivet
cargo build --bin rivet

The executable will be available at target/debug/rivet.

Next, follow the setup guide.

Single-node cluster

Run a single-node Rivet instance for developing your applications locally.

docker run

Start a Rivet cluster:

docker run --name rivet -v "$(pwd)/rivet-data:/data" -p 8080:8080 -p 9000:9000 -p 7080:7080 -p 7443:7443 --platform linux/amd64 rivetgg/rivet

Next, follow the setup guide.

docker run with TCP & UDP

Start a Rivet cluster with TCP & UDP enabled:

docker run --name rivet -v "$(pwd)/rivet-data:/data" -p 8080:8080 -p 9000:9000 -p 7080:7080 -p 7443:7443 -p 7500-7599:7500-7599 -p 7600-7699:7600-7699 --platform linux/amd64 rivetgg/rivet

Next, follow the setup guide.

Integrate in to your Docker Compose

Integrate in to an your existing project's Docker Compose with:

services:
  rivet:
    image: rivetgg/rivet
    platform: linux/amd64
    volumes:
      - rivet-data:/data
    ports:
      - "8080:8080"
      - "9000:9000"
      - "7080:7080"
      - "7443:7443"
      # Optional: Rivet Guard TCP & UDP
      - "7500-7599:7500-7599"
      # Optional: Host networking TCP & UDP
      - "7600-7699:7600-7699"

volumes:
  rivet-data:

Next, follow the setup guide.

Developing Rivet

Compile Rivet from scratch and start a full cluster.

Docker Compose

Build & start the cluster with:

docker compose -f docker/dev-full/docker-compose.yml up -d

Then visit http://localhost:8080 in your browser.

Self-hosting & manual deployment

Read our self-hosting documentation.

Rivet Cloud

Rivet Cloud is the fastest, most affordable, and most reliable way to deploy Rivet Actors with zero infrastructure maintenance. Get started at hub.rivet.gg.

Rivet Enterprise

Get a demo, tailored pricing to fit your needs, or have your questions answered about Rivet. Contact us here.

Documentation

• Overview

  • Overview

• Getting Started

  • Initial Setup
  • What Are Actors?
  • Actor SDK (external)
  • Client SDKs
    • JavaScript & TypeScript

• Build with Rivet

  • Remote Procedure Calls
  • State
  • Events
  • Scaling & Concurrency
  • Edge Networking
  • More
    • Lifecycle
    • Connections
    • Authentication
    • Fault Tolerance
    • Logging

• Resources

  • Configuration
  • Troubleshooting
  • Self-Hosting
    • Overview
    • Docker Compose
    • Manual Deployment
    • Server Config
    • Client Config
  • More
    • Available Regions
    • Limitations
    • Advanced
      • Rescheduling
      • Networking
      • Internals
        • Design Decisions
        • Actor Runtime

• Platform API

Community & Support

• Join our Discord
• Follow us on X
• Follow us on Bluesky
• File bug reports in GitHub Issues
• Post questions & ideas in GitHub Discussions

Architecture

Core technologies

• Rust
• V8 & Deno: Actor isolate runtime
• FoundationDB: Actor state
• CockroachDB: OLTP
• ClickHouse: Developer-facing monitoring
• Valkey: Caching
• NATS: Pub/sub
• Traefik: Load balancers & tunnels

Diagram

Project layout

docker/                      Docker-related files
    client/                  Client image
    dev-full/                Full development environment setup
    monolith/                Monolithic Docker setup
    server/                  Server image
docs/                        Documentation
docs-internal/               Internal documentation
examples/                    Example projects
packages/                    Project packages
    api/                     API package
    common/                  Common utilities
    infra/                   Infrastructure-related code
    services/                Service implementations
    toolchain/               Toolchain-related code
resources/                   Resource files
scripts/                     Scripts for various tasks
sdks/                        SDKs
    actor/                   Actor SDK
    api/                     API SDK

License

Apache 2.0