The instant-deploy, HTTPS-included polish of Vercel — but full-stack, on infrastructure you own, driven by AI agents over MCP, with no per-seat or usage bills. Long-running services, background jobs, persistent data, any language. One command to install. AGPL-3.0. Your infra, your data, your keys.
Vercel is superb for what it was built for: shipping frontends and serverless functions with preview URLs and a great DX. The friction shows up when the app grows a real backend — a long-running server, a database you control, background workers, a WebSocket — or when the bill starts scaling per seat and per invocation instead of per box. And through all of it, your code and secrets live on Vercel's cloud.
AppCrane keeps the deploy-and-it's-live feel but runs full-stack apps in Docker containers on your Ubuntu server. Persistent /data volumes, scheduled cron, sandbox and production environments, auto-HTTPS via Caddy, zero-downtime promotes, whole-system backup, and Nixpacks builds for any language. Cost is flat because it's your hardware — no per-seat multiplier, no usage overage surprise.
# one command on your Ubuntu server curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/gitayg/appCrane/main/install.sh | sudo bash
AppCrane exposes 35 appcrane_* tools over the Model Context Protocol, so Claude Code, Cursor, or Codex can build an app and deploy it — to sandbox, then production — in plain language. Because it's self-hosted, the code the agent writes and the secrets it sets never leave your infrastructure. A middleware-enforced secret hard-wall keeps app env vars unreadable even to the operator, so your model API keys stay yours. Full walkthrough: Deploy from Claude & Cursor.
| AppCrane | Vercel | |
|---|---|---|
| Hosting model | Self-hosted, your box | Vercel cloud |
| Pricing | Flat — your server | Per-seat + usage |
| Full-stack / long-running services | ✓ | ~ |
| Persistent /data volumes | ✓ | ✗ |
| Scheduled cron jobs | ✓ | ✓ |
| Agent / MCP control | ✓ | ✗ |
| Auto-HTTPS + custom domains | ✓ | ✓ |
| Secret hard-wall | ✓ | ✗ |
| Enterprise SSO + RBAC + audit | ✓ | ~ |
| Open source | AGPL-3.0 | ✗ |
| On-prem / air-gap friendly | ✓ | ✗ |
| No vendor lock-in | ✓ | ✗ |
Long-running services, workers, and databases — not just static frontends or functions.
Your hardware, your bill. No per-seat multiplier, no usage overage surprises.
Caddy handles TLS for every app and custom domain, provisioned and renewed automatically.
Env vars stay encrypted and unreadable even to the operator. Your keys never leave your box.
Whole-system backup plus scheduled off-site S3 backups for disaster recovery.
SAML/OIDC/SCIM SSO, four-role RBAC, and per-user token-bound audit, included.
Yes — full-stack apps on your own server with auto-HTTPS, dual environments, persistent volumes, cron, and Nixpacks builds, minus the per-seat and usage bills.
Vercel is hosted and optimized for frontend/serverless, billed per seat and usage. AppCrane self-hosts, runs full-stack long-running services at flat cost, and is agent-first over MCP.
Yes — it's open source and runs on hardware you already pay for.
Yes — Docker containers with persistent volumes, background cron, and any Nixpacks-supported language.