Quick Start

From zero to a running server in five minutes. You'll install the CLI, connect to Hetzner, and forge your first VM.

Install Gibil

npm install -g gibil

Verify the installation:

gibil --version

Set up Hetzner

Gibil runs real VMs on Hetzner Cloud. You need an API token.

Create a Hetzner Cloud account at console.hetzner.cloud
Create a new project
Go to Security → API Tokens → Generate API Token
Set permissions to Read & Write
Copy the token

Save it locally:

gibil auth setup --token YOUR_HETZNER_TOKEN

Without a Gibil account, you pay Hetzner directly. A test VM costs ~~€0.007/hr (~~$0.002 for 15 minutes).

Forge your first server

gibil create --name my-first --ttl 15

This creates a fresh Ubuntu VM with Node.js and pnpm pre-installed. The --ttl 15 auto-destroys it after 15 minutes.

You'll see:

Creating instance "my-first"...
  Generating SSH keys...
  Uploading SSH key to Hetzner...
  Creating server...
  Waiting for server to be ready...
  Waiting for SSH...
  ✓ Instance "my-first" is ready at 49.13.xx.xx

Use it

SSH in and look around:

gibil ssh my-first

# You're on the VM now
node --version    # v20.x
docker --version  # Docker ready
exit

Or run commands remotely:

gibil run my-first "uname -a && node --version"

Burn it down

gibil destroy my-first

The VM is deleted, SSH keys are cleaned up, local metadata is removed. No trace.

Next: forge with a repo

The real power is cloning your project automatically:

gibil create --name test-run \
  --repo https://github.com/you/your-project \
  --ttl 20

gibil run test-run "cd /root/project && pnpm install && pnpm test"
gibil destroy test-run

Add a .gibil.yml to your repo to configure runtimes, services (Postgres, Redis), and post-clone tasks.

Next steps

Configuration — set up .gibil.yml for your project
Use with Claude Code — give Claude its own server
CLI Reference — all flags and options