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Next.js + Encore TS Web App Starter

This is an Encore + Next.js project starter. It's a great way to learn how to combine Encore's backend capabilities with a modern web framework — perfect for building a web app.

Clone this example

Go through the following steps to clone this starter:

  1. When you have installed Encore, clone this repo:
git clone --depth=1 https://github.com/encoredev/nextjs-starter.git
  1. Install backend dependencies and create a new Encore application:
cd nextjs-starter/backend
npm install      # Install dependencies
encore app init  # Create a new Encore application. Take note of the App ID
  1. Run your Encore application (keep it running):
encore run # Inside the backend directory

  1. In the frontend/package.json, replace {{ENCORE_APP_ID}} with the ID of your Encore application. You can see the app id in the encore.app file.

  2. Open a new terminal window and generate a new request client:

npm run gen # Inside the frontend directory

Running locally

Run your Encore backend:

encore run # Inside the backend directory

In a different terminal window, run the Next.js frontend:

cd frontend
npm install
npm run dev

Open http://localhost:3000 in your browser to see the result.

Encore's Local Development Dashboard

While encore run is running, open http://localhost:9400 to view Encore's local developer dashboard. Here you can see the request you just made and a view a trace of the response.

Generating a request client

Keep the contract between the backend and frontend in sync by regenerating the request client whenever you make a change to an Encore endpoint.

In the gen npm scripts, replace next-js-test-ts-9wvi with the ID of your Encore application.

npm run gen # Will create a new request client frontend/app/lib/client.ts

Deployment

Encore

Follow these steps to deploy your backend to a staging environment in Encore's free development cloud.

  1. Create a GitHub repo, commit and push the app.
  2. Open your app in the Encore Cloud Dashboard.
  3. Go to your app settings and set the "Root Directory" to backend. We need to do this because the encore.app file is not in the repo root.
  4. In the settings as well, link your app to GitHub and select the repo you just created.
  5. Commit and push a change (can be anything) to GitHub to trigger a deploy.

You can follow the deploy in the Cloud Dashboard. When the deploy is complete, your app will be available in the cloud.

Next.js on Vercel

  1. Create a repo and push the project to GitHub.
  2. Create a new project on Vercel and point it to your GitHup repo.
  3. Select frontend as the root directory for the Vercel project.

CORS configuration

If you are running into CORS issues when calling your Encore API from your frontend then you may need to specify which origins are allowed to access your API (via browsers). You do this by specifying the global_cors key in the encore.app file, which has the following structure:

global_cors: {
  // allow_origins_without_credentials specifies the allowed origins for requests
  // that don't include credentials. If nil it defaults to allowing all domains
  // (equivalent to ["*"]).
  "allow_origins_without_credentials": [
    "<ORIGIN-GOES-HERE>"
  ],
        
  // allow_origins_with_credentials specifies the allowed origins for requests
  // that include credentials. If a request is made from an Origin in this list
  // Encore responds with Access-Control-Allow-Origin: <Origin>.
  //
  // The URLs in this list may include wildcards (e.g. "https://*.example.com"
  // or "https://*-myapp.example.com").
  "allow_origins_with_credentials": [
    "<DOMAIN-GOES-HERE>"
  ]
}

More information on CORS configuration can be found here: https://encore.dev/docs/develop/cors

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