localhost (desktop, laptop)

If you just want to test out SilverBullet, you can install it on your local machine first before proceeding to a “proper” server deployment. Alternatively, you may be interested in the Install/Desktop version.

Steps:

Install SilverBullet following the instructions of one of these options:
- Install/Server Binary — a single self-contained binary
- Install/Docker — a docker container
Follow Getting Started to learn the basics

Is that working out for you? Great, then proceed to deploy SilverBullet properly on a server so you can also access it from other devices (like your phone).

Self-hosted server

You can self host SilverBullet on essentially any Intel-compatible 64-bit or ARM 64-bit machine you have terminal access to. The server needs very limited resources (a few hundred megabytes of RAM is sufficient), so even a Raspberry Pi works.

There are three things to take care of, in this order:

Install SilverBullet:
- Install/Server Binary — a single self-contained binary
- Install/Docker — a docker container
Deploy a TLS layer in front of SilverBullet for encrypted connections and the full feature set. Plain LAN http:// also works (mostly) but only in online-only mode, see TLS#LAN HTTP (no TLS) for limitations.
Follow Getting Started to learn the basics of using SilverBullet itself.

Cloud

While Self Hosted is the intended path, you can also get PikaPods to host an instance for you. For a small fee (about $2 per month), you can run your instance there. PikaPods handles deployment, upgrades and backups, and exposes SilverBullet securely via TLS.

PikaPods contributes a part of their revenue back to the projects they host, so it’s a source of Funding for SilverBullet itself.

Notes on file systems

Case insensitive file systems (Mac and Windows)

It is highly discouraged to run SilverBullet (in real use) on a case insensitive file system. SilverBullet assumes your file system is case sensitive and acts accordingly.

note Note This only applies to where the SilverBullet server runs, not the clients you connect to it (via your browser).

While SilverBullet will run on a case insensitive file system, and everything may generally seem fine, issues start to arise when:

You edit pages via page names that do not match (case-wise) with their file names on disk.
When you try to create or edit pages that already exist on disk with different casing.

If you’re deploying Linux, you’re likely using a file system that is case sensitive. This is the recommended deployment operating system.

macOS’s default file system (APFS) is case insensitive by default as well. However, if you insist on running SilverBullet on macOS, you can create a new APFS Volume for which you enable case sensitivity. You can then use this new volume with SilverBullet.

Windows’ native NTFS file system is case insensitive by default, however there are apparently ways to mark specific folders as case sensitive. Still, this makes deploying SilverBullet on Windows not recommended.

NAS, sync engines, experimental file systems

While using a NAS to store your space files should be fine, if you encounter issues (unreliable saving, sync issues) it is worth switching to a local file system to see if this resolves those issues. The same goes for synchronizing your files from your server elsewhere, e.g. using tools like SyncThing. They should work fine, but if you run into Sync issues, disable everything, switch to a local file system and see if the issues persist to Troubleshooting.

SilverBullet’s sync engine relies on reliably persisting last modified timestamps for your files, and those timestamps only being touched when actual changes to those file occur. If your file system (or NAS) does not persist these consistently, or you have some external sync process that updates them — this may lead to problems.