simstudioai/sim

Build and deploy AI agent workflows in minutes.

Quickstart

Cloud-hosted: sim.ai

Self-hosted: NPM Package

npx simstudio

→ http://localhost:3000

Note

Docker must be installed and running on your machine.

Options

Flag	Description
-p, --port <port>	Port to run Sim on (default 3000)
--no-pull	Skip pulling latest Docker images

Self-hosted: Docker Compose

# Clone the repository
git clone https://github.com/simstudioai/sim.git

# Navigate to the project directory
cd sim

# Start Sim
docker compose -f docker-compose.prod.yml up -d

Access the application at http://localhost:3000/

Using Local Models with Ollama

Run Sim with local AI models using Ollama - no external APIs required:

# Start with GPU support (automatically downloads gemma3:4b model)
docker compose -f docker-compose.ollama.yml --profile setup up -d

# For CPU-only systems:
docker compose -f docker-compose.ollama.yml --profile cpu --profile setup up -d

Wait for the model to download, then visit http://localhost:3000. Add more models with:

docker compose -f docker-compose.ollama.yml exec ollama ollama pull llama3.1:8b

Self-hosted: Dev Containers

1. Open VS Code with the Remote - Containers extension
2. Open the project and click "Reopen in Container" when prompted
3. Run bun run dev:full in the terminal or use the sim-start alias
   • This starts both the main application and the realtime socket server

Self-hosted: Manual Setup

Requirements:

• Bun runtime
• PostgreSQL 12+ with pgvector extension (required for AI embeddings)

Note: Sim uses vector embeddings for AI features like knowledge bases and semantic search, which requires the pgvector PostgreSQL extension.

1. Clone and install dependencies:

git clone https://github.com/simstudioai/sim.git
cd sim
bun install

2. Set up PostgreSQL with pgvector:

You need PostgreSQL with the vector extension for embedding support. Choose one option:

Option A: Using Docker (Recommended)

# Start PostgreSQL with pgvector extension
docker run --name simstudio-db \
  -e POSTGRES_PASSWORD=your_password \
  -e POSTGRES_DB=simstudio \
  -p 5432:5432 -d \
  pgvector/pgvector:pg17

Option B: Manual Installation

• Install PostgreSQL 12+ and the pgvector extension
• See pgvector installation guide

3. Set up environment:

cd apps/sim
cp .env.example .env  # Configure with required variables (DATABASE_URL, BETTER_AUTH_SECRET, BETTER_AUTH_URL)

Update your .env file with the database URL:

DATABASE_URL="postgresql://postgres:your_password@localhost:5432/simstudio"

4. Set up the database:

bunx drizzle-kit migrate 

5. Start the development servers:

Recommended approach - run both servers together (from project root):

bun run dev:full

This starts both the main Next.js application and the realtime socket server required for full functionality.

Alternative - run servers separately:

Next.js app (from project root):

bun run dev

Realtime socket server (from apps/sim directory in a separate terminal):

cd apps/sim
bun run dev:sockets

Copilot API Keys

Copilot is a Sim-managed service. To use Copilot on a self-hosted instance:

• Go to https://sim.ai → Settings → Copilot and generate a Copilot API key
• Set COPILOT_API_KEY in your self-hosted environment to that value
• Host Sim on a publicly available DNS and set NEXT_PUBLIC_APP_URL and BETTER_AUTH_URL to that value (ngrok)

Tech Stack

• Framework: Next.js (App Router)
• Runtime: Bun
• Database: PostgreSQL with Drizzle ORM
• Authentication: Better Auth
• UI: Shadcn, Tailwind CSS
• State Management: Zustand
• Flow Editor: ReactFlow
• Docs: Fumadocs
• Monorepo: Turborepo
• Realtime: Socket.io
• Background Jobs: Trigger.dev

Contributing

We welcome contributions! Please see our Contributing Guide for details.

License

This project is licensed under the Apache License 2.0 - see the LICENSE file for details.

Made with ❤️ by the Sim Team