How to Use Cleavr: The Beginner’s Guide to Push-to-Deploy Server Management

CodexFuse Team · 2026-11-02T07:43:57.296Z · 15 min read min read

Cleavr (cleavr.io) is a cloud-hosted server management platform for PHP and NodeJS stacks: this beginner guide covers setup, first server, first site, push-to-deploy, free SSL, backups, and pricing.

How to Use Cleavr: The Beginner's Guide to Push-to-Deploy Server Management

Learning how to use Cleavr is the shortcut for developers who want a real VPS they fully control without learning sysadmin from scratch. Let's clear up the confusion first: this cleavr tutorial is about Cleavr (cleavr.io), the cloud-hosted server and deployment management platform — not the kitchen cleaver knife, not the "Cleaver" static site generator, not the Clever classroom app, and not the Klever crypto wallet. Search results for "how to use cleavr" are dominated by knife how-tos, which is exactly why there is almost no unified beginner guide for the actual product. Cleavr describes itself as "your all-in-one server and deployment management platform for your composable PHP and NodeJS stack" — you bring your own VPS at DigitalOcean, Hetzner, Vultr, Linode, AWS, or UpCloud, and Cleavr provisions, secures, deploys, monitors, and backs it up from its own dashboard. This guide runs the full arc: account setup, first server connection, first site, the deployment-workflow lesson, push-to-deploy, free SSL, backups, pricing, and the honest comparisons. If you want the other side of the fence — a panel you install on your own server — our 1Panel beginner guide covers that; 1Panel lives on your server, Cleavr lives in the cloud and manages your servers remotely. And if "what kind of server am I managing?" is still fuzzy, read what is VPS hosting first.

What Is Cleavr, Exactly?

Cleavr is a cloud-hosted (SaaS) server and deployment management platform for PHP and NodeJS stacks that automates provisioning, deployments, monitoring, and backups on VPS servers you bring yourself. The product's own one-liner is that it "takes the headaches out of server and deployment management so that you can focus on making game-changing websites and apps." The business model is Bring Your Own Server (BYOS): Cleavr's pricing FAQ states it plainly — "Cleavr integrates with multiple hosting providers such as DigitalOcean, Hetzner, Vultr, Linode, and AWS." You pay the cloud provider for the VPS and Cleavr for the management layer. Nothing gets installed on your own computer or on a Cleavr-owned server; Cleavr's control plane reaches out to your VPS, installs the stack (PHP, Node.js, databases, web server), and then manages deployments and server health from its dashboard. Deployments are atomic and zero-downtime: the home page promises "Deploy with zero-downtime — Click to deploy or automate with push-to-deploy," and the deployment-hooks docs expose a {{ releasePath }} variable, which is the telltale of symlink-switched release folders — the new release is prepared in full, then the "current" symlink is flipped to it, so visitors never see a half-written deploy.

What Does Cleavr Cost?

Cleavr offers a 5-day free trial of the Pro plan with no credit card required, then three paid plans: Lite at $5.50/month, Pro at $15/month, and Business at $30/month. Prices move — verify the current numbers on cleavr.io/pricing before you commit; the figures below are what the pricing page showed when this guide was written. Here is the full plan comparison:

Two pricing rules shape every buying decision. First, the free trial is the Pro plan for 5 days and needs no credit card — you can genuinely test push-to-deploy on a real server before paying. Second, backups are not in Lite — the plan comparison shows backups as Pro-only, so if your site cannot afford to lose data (it can't), the real entry price is Pro at $15/month, on top of whatever your VPS costs at your cloud provider. Yearly billing discounts all three plans, and the API is only available on Business, which matters if you want to script server management.

How Do You Set Up Cleavr and Connect Your First Server?

Create a Cleavr account, start the 5-day Pro trial, then connect your first server by linking a cloud-provider API key or provisioning a custom VPS. This is the cleavr server management core: Cleavr never hosts your servers; it connects to them. Follow this arc:

1. Sign up at cleavr.io: the trial gives you 5 days of Pro with no credit card — start here, not on a paid plan, so you learn on Cleavr's dime.
2. Connect your cloud provider: add API credentials for DigitalOcean, Hetzner, Vultr, Linode, AWS, or UpCloud, and Cleavr can spin up and manage servers directly through that provider's API. (A launch-era Product Hunt blurb also mentioned an Oracle connector; its current status could not be verified, so don't count on it.)
3. Or bring a custom server: pick the Custom option and point Cleavr at a VPS you already own anywhere — Cleavr provisions it the same way. This is the BYOS promise: any VPS can become a managed server.
4. Let Cleavr provision the stack: Cleavr connects to the server and installs the web server, PHP or Node.js, databases (MySQL, PostgreSQL, MariaDB), and its management agent automatically — this takes several minutes, not seconds, on first setup.
5. Name the server clearly: something like prod-web-01, because the server list gets confusing fast once you manage two or three.

The provider-connection lesson is the whole product: pick the provider you already pay, paste the API key once, and every future server is a few clicks instead of a weekend of terminal work. Our what is VPS hosting guide explains the server underneath if the cloud-console vocabulary is new to you.

How Do You Add Your First Site on Cleavr?

Add a site on a provisioned server, pick the app type, and Cleavr installs the full stack for that framework at the click of a button. The pricing page lists every supported app type in one breath, and it's worth quoting in full because the coverage is the point: Nuxt, Next, AdonisJS, Laravel, Alpas, WordPress, Strapi, Directus, Soketi, PHP, phpMyAdmin, NodeJS, and static HTML. Databases available are MySQL, PostgreSQL, and MariaDB. The flow is:

1. Open your server and choose "Add site": pick the app type that matches your project — Laravel for a Laravel app, Nuxt for a Nuxt app, WordPress for a WordPress site, NodeJS for anything custom, static HTML for the simple stuff.
2. Attach the domain: enter the domain now, but read the SSL section below before you expect HTTPS to just work.
3. Add a database if the app needs one: WordPress, Laravel, and most CMS apps need MySQL; pick it here so Cleavr wires the connection.
4. Connect the code repository: Cleavr pulls your project code from GitHub, Bitbucket, or GitLab — connect your VCS account once, then pick the repo and branch per site. This is the input the whole deployment pipeline eats.

If your code lives on GitHub, the VCS connection step is the one place the GitHub beginner guide vocabulary (repos, branches, access tokens) actually matters — you are authorizing Cleavr to read your repos, not handing it your password.

How Does the Cleavr Deployment Workflow Work?

The Cleavr deployment workflow is: code repository → environment variables → deployment hooks → atomic release switch, triggered manually or automatically on push. This is the single lesson that separates "I deployed my app" from "I understand my deployments," so say each piece once and mean it. The docs define deployment hooks verbatim as "actions, or steps, in the deployment process" that "use bash scripts. Honestly, you can essentially do whatever you want with a custom deployment hook." Hooks are reorderable and can be assigned per server, and the docs' {{ releasePath }} variable — "to point to what will become the current directory" — proves the atomic model: Cleavr builds the release in a fresh folder, runs your hooks (install dependencies, run migrations, compile assets), then flips the live symlink. A failed hook means the symlink never flips, so a bad deploy leaves the old release running instead of a broken site. Environment variables are managed in Cleavr's Environment section, which "works with .env files that you may add to your app" — set secrets once per site and stop committing .env files to your repo. Push-to-deploy is the docs' verbatim switch: "Enable Push to Deploy if you'd like to have your web app automatically deploy when changes are committed to the repo / branch." Rollbacks exist too — the old forum release notes confirm "you can choose a previous deployment to rollback to," so every deploy is a reversible event, not a one-way trip.

How Do You Run Your First Push-to-Deploy?

Your first push-to-deploy runs in seven steps: site created, repo connected, env set, hooks ordered, test deploy, push-to-deploy on, push code. This is the cleavr push to deploy arc end to end:

1. Create the site on your provisioned server with the right app type (previous section).
2. Connect the repo (GitHub, GitLab, or Bitbucket), pick the branch — use a staging branch first, not production.
3. Set environment variables in the site's Environment section before the first deploy, not after the first 500 error.
4. Order your deployment hooks: the typical beginner chain is Install dependencies → Build assets → Run migrations → Clear caches. Keep custom bash minimal on the first deploy.
5. Click deploy once manually: watch the log output; this is your dress rehearsal and your first chance to catch a missing env var.
6. Enable Push to Deploy in the workflow settings once the manual deploy is green.
7. Push a small commit — a text change, not a schema migration — and watch Cleavr deploy it automatically with zero downtime.

Deploy like this for a week before turning on push-to-deploy on your production branch. Automatic deploys multiply both your speed and your mistakes, and the beginner who tests hooks on a staging site first is the one who never learns the rollback flow the hard way.

How Do You Get Free SSL on a Cleavr Site?

Cleavr provisions free SSL certificates through Let's Encrypt (and ZeroSSL), with custom certificates supported for paid certs you already own. The docs add three non-obvious rules that cause most beginner SSL failures. First, the domain's DNS must be fully propagated before you add the site with SSL — Cleavr runs a pre-check, but Let's Encrypt does the actual verification, and it will fail against a domain that doesn't resolve to your server yet. Second, ports 80 and 443 must be open on the server (Cleavr handles this on provider-provisioned servers, but check it on custom setups). Third, if the domain sits behind Cloudflare, disable the 'proxied' (orange-cloud) setting until the certificate is applied, then re-enable it — Let's Encrypt cannot verify through Cloudflare's proxy. The correct order is: point DNS at the server IP → wait for propagation (check with a DNS lookup) → add the site in Cleavr with SSL enabled → verify the certificate in the site's SSL tab → then enable Cloudflare proxying if you use it.

How Do Cleavr Backups Work?

Cleavr backups are scheduled, profile-based database and filesystem backups to off-server storage — available on Pro and Business only, not Lite. The home page describes it as "Backup files and databases — Automatic backups keep your records safe. Supports AWS S3, Wasabi, BackBlaze, DO Spaces, SFTP, and local server storage." The docs add the mechanics: you first create a Backup Provider (one of those destinations), then build backup profiles that pick what to back up (databases, files, or both), where it goes, on what cron schedule, with exclude paths for the stuff you don't need (caches, logs), and optional success/failure notifications. The two rules beginners break: back up off the server — "local server storage" keeps the backup on the same machine, which is useless when the machine dies — and test a restore before you need one, because an untested backup is a hope, not a backup. Set the profile, get the first successful run, then restore a database dump into a scratch site once to prove the whole chain works.

Cleavr vs RunCloud vs Ploi vs 1Panel: Which Server Panel Should You Pick?

All three of Cleavr, RunCloud, and Ploi are SaaS server-management platforms with the same BYOS shape — the practical difference beginners feel is the app-type coverage, while 1Panel is a different category entirely because it is self-hosted software you install on your own server. Here is the honest cleavr vs runcloud and cleavr vs ploi framing, plus the 1Panel line drawn once:

The SaaS trio differ in packaging, not in kind: you pay a subscription, they manage your VPS. 1Panel differs in kind: nothing is cloud-hosted, so nothing bills you monthly, but security updates for the panel itself are your job. Choose the SaaS trio when you want someone else's dashboard and support on call; choose 1Panel when you want zero subscription and accept the maintenance.

What Are Cleavr Flash Deployments?

Flash Deployments was a Cleavr feature that provisioned a server, installed dependencies, created the site, and deployed it in one fell swoop — but its present-day availability could not be verified. The only detailed description found is a 2021 forum post saying Flash deploy "in fell-swoop, will — Provision a new server / Install app dependencies / Create new site / Deploy the site." Current docs and the main site make no prominent mention of it, so do not plan your workflow around it. Treat it as history unless the Cleavr team announces its return: the standard flow today is provision server first, then add the site, then deploy — which is what this guide teaches.

What Are the 7 Beginner Mistakes With Cleavr?

The seven mistakes below are all preventable, and every one of them comes from skipping a step this guide already covered. They are original to this guide:

Sources

1. Cleavr home — verbatim product descriptions, app-type list, zero-downtime deploy line, backup destinations (https://cleavr.io)
2. Cleavr pricing — 5-day Pro trial terms, plan prices, per-plan feature comparison, BYOS FAQ (https://cleavr.io/pricing/)
3. Cleavr integrations — repo providers GitHub/Bitbucket/GitLab (https://cleavr.io/integrations/)
4. Cleavr startups page — provider mentions (https://cleavr.io/startups/)
5. docs.cleavr.io: deployment hooks — verbatim hooks definition, {{ releasePath }} variable (https://docs.cleavr.io/deployment-hooks/)
6. docs.cleavr.io: workflow settings — verbatim push-to-deploy wording (https://docs.cleavr.io/workflow-settings/)
7. docs.cleavr.io: Let's Encrypt — DNS propagation rule, ports 80/443, Cloudflare proxy caveat (https://docs.cleavr.io/lets-encrypt/)
8. docs.cleavr.io: backups — backup providers, profiles, cron schedules, notifications (https://docs.cleavr.io/backups/)
9. docs.cleavr.io: Remix guide — Environment section verbatim (https://docs.cleavr.io/guides/remix/)
10. docs.cleavr.io: Next.js guide (https://docs.cleavr.io/guides/next/)
11. Cleavr forum — deployment rollbacks (https://forum.cleavr.io/t/new-updates-released-over-last-couple-of-days/120)
12. Cleavr forum — Flash Deployments 2021 description (https://forum.cleavr.io/t/deploy-statamic-cms-using-cleavr/160)
13. Product Hunt — Cleavr launch blurb, provider mentions (https://www.producthunt.com/products/cleavr-io)

Frequently Asked Questions

Is Cleavr free?

Cleavr offers a 5-day free trial of the Pro plan with no credit card required, then paid plans start at $5.50/month (Lite, one server). There is no permanent free tier — and backups require Pro ($15/month) or higher, so budget accordingly. Prices change; verify on cleavr.io/pricing.

What is the difference between Cleavr and 1Panel?

Cleavr is a cloud-hosted SaaS: it manages your servers remotely and bills you a subscription. 1Panel is self-hosted panel software you install on your own server — no subscription, but you maintain the panel yourself. Pick Cleavr when you want a managed control plane; pick 1Panel when you want zero subscription and full ownership.

Which cloud providers work with Cleavr?

DigitalOcean, Hetzner, Vultr, Linode, AWS, and UpCloud can be connected through their APIs, plus a Custom option for any VPS you already own anywhere. A launch-era mention of an Oracle connector exists, but its current status could not be verified.

Can Cleavr deploy a WordPress site?

Yes — WordPress is one of Cleavr's one-click app types, alongside Laravel, Nuxt, Next, AdonisJS, Strapi, Directus, PHP, NodeJS, and static HTML. Cleavr provisions the server, installs the stack, adds the site, and can attach a database (MySQL, PostgreSQL, or MariaDB) and free SSL.

Does Cleavr offer zero-downtime deployments?

Yes. Cleavr builds each release in a fresh folder and flips the live symlink only after your deployment hooks succeed — the {{ releasePath }} variable in the docs confirms the atomic model. Failed hooks leave the previous release running, and past deployments can be rolled back from the dashboard.