Deploying a Next.js Standalone App on OpenShift

Deploying a Next.js Standalone App on OpenShift

This is Part 3 of the series: Self-Hosting Next.js in Kubernetes (Without Vercel).

In the previous posts, we:

• Built a Next.js app in standalone mode
• Created a minimal, production-ready Docker image

Now we’ll deploy that image into OpenShift using standard Kubernetes resources: Deployment, Service, and Route.

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Assumptions

This guide assumes:

• Your image is already built and pushed to an internal registry
• The container listens on PORT=3000
• The app runs using Next.js standalone server.js

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1️⃣ Deployment

The Deployment runs the Next.js standalone server as a stateless container.

apiVersion: apps/v1
kind: Deployment
metadata:
  name: example-nextjs
spec:
  replicas: 2
  selector:
    matchLabels:
      app: example-nextjs
  template:
    metadata:
      labels:
        app: example-nextjs
    spec:
      containers:
        - name: web
          image: image-registry.openshift-image-registry.svc:5000/internal/example-nextjs:latest
          ports:
            - containerPort: 3000
          env:
            - name: NODE_ENV
              value: "production"
            - name: PORT
              value: "3000"
          readinessProbe:
            httpGet:
              path: /
              port: 3000
            initialDelaySeconds: 10
            periodSeconds: 5
          livenessProbe:
            httpGet:
              path: /
              port: 3000
            initialDelaySeconds: 30
            periodSeconds: 10

Key points:

• No persistent storage required
• Stateless and horizontally scalable
• Probes use /, which Next.js handles naturally

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2️⃣ Service

The Service exposes the Deployment internally inside the cluster.

apiVersion: v1
kind: Service
metadata:
  name: example-nextjs
spec:
  selector:
    app: example-nextjs
  ports:
    - name: http
      port: 80
      targetPort: 3000

The Service:

• Maps port 80 → container port 3000
• Provides stable networking for the Route

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3️⃣ Route (OpenShift)

OpenShift Routes expose the app externally.

apiVersion: route.openshift.io/v1
kind: Route
metadata:
  name: example-nextjs
spec:
  to:
    kind: Service
    name: example-nextjs
  port:
    targetPort: http
  tls:
    termination: edge

With this Route:

• TLS is terminated at the router
• No HTTPS configuration is required in the app
• The app runs as plain HTTP internally

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Common OpenShift Gotchas

• Ensure the container runs as a non-root user
• Do not rely on writable root filesystem
• Do not bind to privileged ports (<1024)

The standalone Next.js setup fits OpenShift security constraints well when built correctly.

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Series Progress

Self-Hosting Next.js in Kubernetes (Without Vercel)

• ✅ Part 1: Standalone Deployment
• ✅ Part 2: Minimal Docker Images
• ✅ Part 3: OpenShift Deployment
• ⏭ Part 4: Fixing Static Asset 404s
• ⏭ Part 5: Runtime Config & Secrets
• ⏭ Part 6: Health Checks & Scaling

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Final Thoughts

Once you treat Next.js as a normal Node.js server, deployment becomes straightforward.

In the next post, we’ll deep-dive into one of the most common problems: 404 errors for _next/static in standalone deployments.

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