Environment Variables

RocketFuel applications use environment variables for configuration. This guide covers all available variables and how to set them up.

Getting Started

After creating a project, copy the example environment file:

cp .env.example .env

Variable	Required	Description
`DATABASE_URL`	Yes	PostgreSQL connection string

Example:

DATABASE_URL="postgresql://user:password@localhost:5432/myapp"

Required when Better Auth is enabled:

Variable	Required	Description
`BETTER_AUTH_SECRET`	Yes	Secret key for signing tokens
`BETTER_AUTH_URL`	Yes	Base URL of your application

Generate a secure secret:

openssl rand -base64 32

Example:

BETTER_AUTH_SECRET="your-generated-secret-here"
BETTER_AUTH_URL="http://localhost:3000"

Required when Stripe is enabled:

Variable	Required	Description
`STRIPE_SECRET_KEY`	Yes	Secret key from Stripe dashboard
`STRIPE_WEBHOOK_SECRET`	Yes	Webhook signing secret
`NEXT_PUBLIC_STRIPE_PUBLISHABLE_KEY`	Yes	Publishable key (client-safe)

Required when BullMQ is enabled:

Variable	Required	Description
`REDIS_URL`	Yes	Redis connection string

Example:

REDIS_URL="redis://localhost:6379"

Required when Resend is enabled:

Variable	Required	Description
`RESEND_API_KEY`	Yes	API key from Resend dashboard

Use local services and test credentials:

DATABASE_URL="postgresql://postgres:password@localhost:5432/myapp_dev"
BETTER_AUTH_URL="http://localhost:3000"

Use production services and secure credentials:

DATABASE_URL="postgresql://user:password@prod-db.example.com:5432/myapp"
BETTER_AUTH_URL="https://myapp.com"