---
title: "Deploy Astro with server rendering (SSR) over MCP with while.sh"
url: https://while.sh/en/guides/deploy-astro-ssr/
author: "Aloïs Oddon, co-founder of Nextmap"
updated: 2026-11-02
---

# Deploy a server-rendered Astro site from your AI agent, over MCP

Your Astro site renders some pages on demand. Connected to while over MCP, your AI agent deploys it in France with the Node adapter, without a Dockerfile, and you choose who can open it.

## Prerequisites

- An Astro site that renders pages on demand: your agent adds the Node adapter if it's missing.
- An AI agent that works in a terminal: Claude Code, Codex, Cursor or Gemini CLI.

## Step 1: Give your agent these instructions

Open your agent in your site's folder, and paste these instructions into it:

```text titre="Instructions"
Connect to while with my account (while.sh/agents), then deploy my app.
```

Without an account, your agent deploys your site as a trial, in one request. To keep it, open the link it gives you and create your account.

With your account, your agent adds while's MCP server itself. If it asks you to, restart it. On the first call to while, a page opens in your browser. In Claude Code, if it doesn't open, type /mcp, choose while, then Authenticate. On that page, choose your app, or "A new app", then click Authorize.

## Step 2: Open your site

Your agent gives you your site's address, for example `https://mon-site.while.cloud`, over HTTPS.

## What your agent does

It writes while.yaml at the root of your site:

```yaml titre="while.yaml"
apiVersion: while/v1
project: mon-site
services:
  - name: web
    port: 4321
    health:
      path: /
    env:
      HOST: 0.0.0.0
```

Your site is built, then started by Astro's standalone server, which reads `HOST` and the port it receives in `PORT` (source 1). Your agent also checks that the `start` script in your package.json runs `node ./dist/server/entry.mjs`, and not the development server.

## Restrict your site to your colleagues

> You, to your agent: Restrict the site to people in the company.

Your agent adds two lines to the service:

```yaml titre="while.yaml"
    access: internal
    email_domains: [acme.com]
```

Once your Google Workspace or Microsoft 365 is linked to while, on the Pro plan, your colleagues open it with their usual account, and your code receives their name and email address, with no sign-in page to write.

## Share with a customer, protected by a password

> You, to your agent: Open the site to our customer, with a password.

Your agent makes the app private, then, on the app's page in while, you create a link valid for 1, 7 or 30 days, with a password your agent will never see.

## Move to your own domain

> You, to your agent: Put the site on app.acme.com.

Your agent declares the domain, you add the DNS records it gives you, and the HTTPS certificate follows.

## See a new version before you deploy it

> You, to your agent: Show me the new version before you deploy it.

Your agent opens a preview, at its own address, with its own data. You look at it, then your agent puts it into production.

## Go back to the previous version

> You, to your agent: Go back to the previous version.

In the 30 minutes after a deployment, the previous version comes back in a second. After that, it takes a few seconds. Once the previous version is back, your agent reads what broke in while's logs, fixes it and deploys again.

## Next steps

- [Deploy a static site](/en/guides/deploy-static-site/)
- [Deploy a SvelteKit app](/en/guides/deploy-sveltekit/)
- [Put your app on your own domain](/en/guides/custom-domain/)

## Sources

1. [Astro, the Node adapter (standalone mode, HOST and PORT)](https://docs.astro.build/en/guides/integrations-guide/node/), 2026-11-02

## Questions

### Do I need to write a Dockerfile?

No. Astro with its Node adapter is recognized, built and started by its standalone server.

### What about a fully static Astro site?

It deploys like a static site: its dist folder is served with an HTTP cache.

### Where is my site hosted?

In France, by Nextmap, a French company.