Environment variables

All variables are validated at startup by using Zod, so a misconfiguration fails fast with a clear message instead of a runtime crash. Import the typed env object instead of reading process.env directly.

Copy .env.example to .env and fill in the values.

Reference

Variable	Required	Description
`NEXT_PUBLIC_APP_URL`	–	Public base URL. Defaults to `http://localhost:3000`.
`DB_POSTGRES_PORT`	–	Host port for the docker-compose database. Defaults to `5432`.
`DATABASE_URL`	yes	PostgreSQL connection string.
`BETTER_AUTH_SECRET`	yes	Secret for signing sessions. Generate with `openssl rand -base64 32`.
`GOOGLE_CLIENT_ID` / `GOOGLE_CLIENT_SECRET`	–	Enables Google OAuth when both are set.
`GITHUB_CLIENT_ID` / `GITHUB_CLIENT_SECRET`	–	Enables GitHub OAuth when both are set.
`OPENAI_API_KEY`	–	Enables OpenAI models.
`ANTHROPIC_API_KEY`	–	Enables Anthropic Claude models.
`GOOGLE_GENERATIVE_AI_API_KEY`	–	Enables Google Gemini models (free tier available).
`STRIPE_SECRET_KEY`	–	Enables billing.
`STRIPE_WEBHOOK_SECRET`	–	Verifies incoming Stripe webhooks.
`STRIPE_PRICE_ID_PRO` / `STRIPE_PRICE_ID_BUSINESS`	–	Recurring price ids. Generate with `npm run stripe:setup`.
`NEXT_PUBLIC_STRIPE_PUBLISHABLE_KEY`	–	Stripe publishable key (client).

"Required" variables must be present for the app to boot. Optional variables light up their feature when set — the template runs with just a database and one AI key.

Notes

Empty strings ("") are treated as unset.
Set SKIP_ENV_VALIDATION=1 to bypass validation (used in the Docker build step and CI lint).
Client-exposed variables must be prefixed with NEXT_PUBLIC_.