# Docs

Guides, tutorials, the REST API and the MCP server. Everything here is rendered from this deployment, so a figure or an address is never out of date with what actually runs.

## Getting started

Sign in, create an instance, connect. Every instance is a whole dedicated machine, not a namespace or a slice of a shared cluster; no other Lathe customer runs on it. Free is $0, with 1000 GB per month and no daily backups. No card or checkout. The machine is live about 5 minutes on average after creation or checkout, and its page carries the connection string and password for every engine on it. Plans and prices are on [the pricing page ](https://lathe.live/pricing). From there: choose guides for the engines you need. The app tutorial is one path; the API and MCP references expose the same operations to code and to an agent.

[Create an instance ](https://app.lathe.live/login)

## Your own machine

A dedicated virtual machine for one customer, not a namespace on a shared cluster.

What the boundary includes, what it isolates, and why we say "machine" but never "dedicated hardware".

[Read how the machine model works ](https://docs.lathe.live/machine)

## Guides

The bill you can compute, leaving a metered service, and how one machine runs it all.

Every guide on the site: what a flat price includes, leaving Supabase or Neon, moving a Postgres database, and hosting the app and its sign-in beside it.

[Read the guides ](https://docs.lathe.live/guides)

## Deploy a guestbook

One Next.js app with Postgres and Auth, through the portal, REST API or MCP.

Follow the same app from machine creation to sign-in, a Postgres-backed message, redeploy verification and clean-up. Pick the interface that fits your workflow.

[Open the guestbook guide ](https://docs.lathe.live/guestbook)

## Tutorials

Step by step, in the browser.

Hosting your own app beside its databases, deploying it from GitHub on every push - connect a repository and Lathe builds it, or keep the workflow you have - and switching on sign-in for it with the Auth engine.

[Read the tutorials ](https://docs.lathe.live/tutorials)

## Connect to Postgres

Connection strings, TLS, pooling and the allowlist.

[Open the Postgres quickstart ](https://docs.lathe.live/postgres)

## Limits and policies

Backups, regions, account limits and resizing.

[Read the limits ](https://docs.lathe.live/limits)

## Agent guide

A machine-readable contract for coding agents.

This guide is raw Markdown for an agent. For a human walkthrough, use the [tutorials ](https://docs.lathe.live/tutorials).

The image contract, every field an app takes and the deploy workflow, addressed to this deployment: what a coding agent reads with the app_guide tool or GET /guides/apps , open here with no key at all.

[Read the guide ](https://docs.lathe.live/guides/apps)

## API reference

The REST API, API keys and webhooks.

[Read the API reference ](https://docs.lathe.live/api)

## MCP reference

Connecting an agent, and every tool it gets.

[Read the MCP reference ](https://docs.lathe.live/mcp)[Next Deploy a Next.js guestbook ](https://docs.lathe.live/guestbook)

## Related

- [Postgres, Redis, NATS and S3 storage on one machine ](https://docs.lathe.live/guides/one-machine)

Any mix of Postgres 17, Redis 8, CouchDB 3, NATS 2 and SeaweedFS 4 on one Lathe instance, each on its own TLS port with its own credentials and memory budget.
- [Host a container beside its Postgres, flat price ](https://docs.lathe.live/guides/host-your-app)

Put the image of your app on the dedicated machine that runs its database: deploy from a push, your domain, TLS, nothing metered. From $15 a month.
- [Deploy from Claude Code, Cursor or ChatGPT ](https://docs.lathe.live/guides/deploy-from-ai-agent)

Copy-paste MCP setup for Claude Code, Cursor and ChatGPT, then create a machine, deploy an app and retrieve short-lived connection credentials.