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Pinchy

Deploy Pinchy on DigitalOcean

DigitalOcean is a solid choice for running Pinchy — straightforward interface, predictable pricing, and data centers on multiple continents. If your team is distributed or you want to keep your AI agents close to your users, DigitalOcean’s global footprint makes that easy.

Why DigitalOcean for self-hosted AI agents?

Section titled “Why DigitalOcean for self-hosted AI agents?”
  • Global data centers — New York, San Francisco, London, Amsterdam, Frankfurt, Singapore, Bangalore, Sydney, and more. Pick the region closest to your team.
  • Simple pricing — A Droplet with 4 GB RAM starts at around $24/month with predictable costs.
  • Team accounts — Built-in team management for sharing infrastructure access.

What you’ll need

Section titled “What you’ll need”
  • A DigitalOcean account (free to create, pay-as-you-go)
  • A domain name (optional for testing, required for production HTTPS)
  • An LLM provider API key (Anthropic, OpenAI, or Google) — you’ll enter this in Pinchy’s setup wizard

Create your Droplet

Section titled “Create your Droplet”

A “Droplet” is DigitalOcean’s name for a virtual server.

  1. Log in to the DigitalOcean Control Panel

    Click Create → Droplets.

  2. Choose a region

    Pick the datacenter closest to you or your users. Pinchy works in any region.

  3. Choose an image

    Select Ubuntu and keep the default version (24.04 LTS x64).

  4. Choose a size

    Under Droplet Type, keep Basic (Shared CPU). Under CPU options, Regular (SSD) is fine. Pick the $24/mo plan (4 GB RAM, 2 CPUs).

  5. Choose authentication

    Select SSH Key or Password. Either works for the automated setup below — you’ll need SSH access later for production hardening.

  6. Paste the setup script

    Expand Advanced Options and check Add Initialization scripts (free). Paste the following script into the text field. It automatically installs Docker, deploys Pinchy, sets up a firewall, and adds swap.

    #cloud-config
    runcmd:
      - mkdir -p /opt/pinchy-loading
      - curl -fsSL https://github.com/heypinchy/pinchy/releases/download/v0.3.0/installing.html -o /opt/pinchy-loading/index.html
      - sed -i "s/INSTALL_START_TIME/$(date +%s)000/" /opt/pinchy-loading/index.html
      - cd /opt/pinchy-loading && python3 -m http.server 80 &
      - echo $! > /tmp/loading-server.pid
      - apt-get update -qq
      - apt-get install -y -qq docker.io docker-compose-v2 git ufw
      - echo iptables-persistent iptables-persistent/autosave_v4 boolean true | debconf-set-selections
      - echo iptables-persistent iptables-persistent/autosave_v6 boolean true | debconf-set-selections
      - apt-get install -y -qq iptables-persistent
      - ufw allow OpenSSH
      - ufw allow 80/tcp
      - ufw allow 443/tcp
      - ufw allow 7777/tcp
      - ufw --force enable
      - systemctl enable docker
      - systemctl start docker
      - fallocate -l 2G /swapfile
      - chmod 600 /swapfile
      - mkswap /swapfile
      - swapon /swapfile
      - echo '/swapfile none swap sw 0 0' >> /etc/fstab
      - git clone https://github.com/heypinchy/pinchy.git /opt/pinchy
      - cd /opt/pinchy && git checkout v0.3.0
      - cd /opt/pinchy && docker compose up --build -d
      - for i in $(seq 1 90); do curl -sf http://localhost:7777/api/health > /dev/null 2>&1 && break; sleep 2; done
      - kill $(cat /tmp/loading-server.pid) 2>/dev/null || true
      - rm -rf /opt/pinchy-loading /tmp/loading-server.pid
      - iptables -t nat -A PREROUTING -p tcp --dport 80 -j REDIRECT --to-ports 7777
      - iptables -t nat -A OUTPUT -p tcp -o lo --dport 80 -j REDIRECT --to-ports 7777
      - netfilter-persistent save

  7. Set the hostname and create the Droplet

    Under Finalize Details, change the hostname to pinchy (or whatever you prefer) and click Create Droplet. It’ll be ready in about 30 seconds, but the setup script needs another 5–8 minutes to finish installing everything (DigitalOcean builds tend to be a bit slower than other providers).

  8. Note the IP address

    The Droplet’s IPv4 address appears on the dashboard (e.g., 164.90.x.x).

  9. Open Pinchy

    Visit http://<your-droplet-ip> in your browser. You’ll see a loading page that tracks the installation progress. Once the build finishes (typically 5–8 minutes on DigitalOcean), it automatically redirects to the Pinchy setup wizard.

    The setup wizard will guide you through creating your admin account and configuring your first LLM provider.

Production setup

Section titled “Production setup”

The steps above get Pinchy running over plain HTTP. For production use, you should add HTTPS and pin your secrets. Follow the VPS Deployment Guide — Production setup for:

  • HTTPS with Caddy — automatic SSL certificates for your domain
  • Pinning secrets — so your encryption keys don’t depend on Docker volumes
  • Removing the iptables redirect — once Caddy is running, remove the port 80→7777 redirect
How do I connect to my Droplet to run these commands?

You’ll need to use SSH (Secure Shell) — a way to run commands on a remote server from your terminal.

If you chose password authentication when creating the Droplet:

Terminal window
ssh root@<your-droplet-ip>

Enter the password you set (or check your email for the one DigitalOcean generated).

If you chose SSH key authentication, make sure you have the key on your machine, then:

Terminal window
ssh root@<your-droplet-ip>

Where do I find the terminal?

  • Mac — Open Terminal (search for it in Spotlight with ⌘+Space)
  • Windows — Open PowerShell (search in Start menu) or install Windows Terminal
  • Linux — Open your terminal app (usually Ctrl+Alt+T)

While connected, every command you type runs on your Droplet. Type exit to disconnect.

Section titled “Point your domain (optional but recommended)”

To use HTTPS, you need a domain pointing to your Droplet. Add a DNS record at your domain registrar (the service where you registered your domain):

TypeNameValue
Apinchy (or your preferred subdomain)Your Droplet’s IP address
What’s an A record?

An A record is a DNS entry that maps a domain name (like pinchy.example.com) to an IP address (like 164.90.1.23). When someone visits your domain, their browser looks up the A record to find your server.

Look for “DNS records” or “DNS settings” in your domain registrar’s dashboard.

You can also manage DNS directly in DigitalOcean under Networking → Domains.

DigitalOcean-specific tips

Section titled “DigitalOcean-specific tips”

Enable backups

Section titled “Enable backups”

DigitalOcean offers automated weekly backups for 20% of the Droplet cost. Enable this under Droplet → Backups — it’s the easiest disaster recovery option.

Cloud firewall

Section titled “Cloud firewall”

DigitalOcean offers Cloud Firewalls under Networking → Firewalls. For defense in depth, configure the cloud firewall to only allow ports 22, 80, and 443 — in addition to the host firewall (ufw) that the setup script already configured.

Volumes for persistent data

Section titled “Volumes for persistent data”

For larger Knowledge Base deployments, attach a DigitalOcean Volume (up to 16 TB) and mount it as a data directory. See Mount Data Directories for details.

Scaling up

Section titled “Scaling up”

If you outgrow the 4 GB Droplet, you can resize it in the control panel. Pinchy’s data lives in Docker volumes, so it survives Droplet resizes. Power off the Droplet first, resize, then power back on — downtime is typically under 2 minutes.