> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://conto.finance/docs/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

# Deployment Models

> What Conto hosts, what customers operate, and which deployment paths are supported

# Deployment Models

Choose a deployment model before planning networking, secrets, data flows, and operational ownership.
The local repository setup is a development environment; it is not a packaged self-hosted production
distribution.

## Supported paths

| Model                            | Current status                                  | Conto operates                                                             | Your organization operates                                                                            |
| -------------------------------- | ----------------------------------------------- | -------------------------------------------------------------------------- | ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| **Hosted Conto**                 | Supported default                               | Application, database migrations, service monitoring, and platform updates | Users, agent credentials, wallets, policies, approvals, webhook consumers, and incident contacts      |
| **Dedicated tenant**             | Evaluated with Conto before implementation      | The agreed isolated Conto environment and platform updates                 | The same application-level responsibilities as hosted Conto, plus agreed network connectivity         |
| **Local development**            | Supported for evaluation and contribution       | Nothing in your local environment                                          | Node.js, PostgreSQL, secrets, email behavior, migrations, seed data, and all local operations         |
| **Customer-operated production** | Not currently offered as a turnkey distribution | None                                                                       | Everything; no supported Docker Compose, Helm, Kubernetes, or Terraform package is currently provided |

Do not infer production support from the ability to run the source repository locally. If your
architecture requires customer-operated infrastructure, confirm that requirement before designing
the integration.

## Hosted architecture boundary

The hosted product exposes the dashboard, REST/OpenAPI endpoints, SDK and MCP integration surfaces,
webhooks, and testnet workflows. Your organization retains control of:

* which people and agents receive credentials;
* wallet custody mode and funding;
* policy values, approval routing, and counterparty configuration;
* storage and rotation of API, SDK, webhook, and wallet secrets;
* webhook availability, replay handling, and downstream accounting or ERP integration;
* authorization to enable live funds.

Conto operates application deployment, schema migration, and the hosted service dependencies. A
customer integration should treat Conto as an external service and implement timeouts, idempotency,
retry limits, request-ID logging, and reconciliation.

For monitors and orchestrators, use `/api/livez` to check the process without dependencies and
`/api/readyz` to decide whether the instance should receive traffic. `/api/health` remains the
human-readable dependency summary.

## Local development prerequisites

* Node.js 20.19 or newer
* npm
* PostgreSQL with both pooled `DATABASE_URL` and direct `DIRECT_URL` connection strings
* an `ENCRYPTION_KEY` generated specifically for the environment
* email delivery configuration for real registration-verification and invitation flows

Use the repository [README](https://github.com/Conto-Finance/conto#quick-start) for the local commands. A
healthy local process without PostgreSQL is sufficient only for viewing public pages; dashboard and
onboarding workflows require the database.

## Operational questions to settle

Before implementation, record:

1. hosted or dedicated-tenant path;
2. regions and network egress requirements;
3. wallet custody and live-funding owner;
4. secret storage and rotation owner;
5. webhook destination, verification, replay, and recovery behavior;
6. backup and reconciliation requirements for your own downstream records;
7. incident contacts and rollback authority.

Continue with the [Production Readiness Checklist](/guides/production-readiness) after the sandbox
integration is working.