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Installing on Debian Based Distributions

Packaged (OTP) installation vs Manual (from-source) installations

There is multiple ways to install Pleroma.

Distro-provided packages
This is the recommended method, where you can get the strongest compatibility guarantees and the best dependency-management
Pleroma-provided OTP binaries
Intended as fallback for Alpine/Debian-compatible systems lacking a proper Pleroma package, they are heavier than proper distro packages as they also contain Erlang/Elixir and can break after system updates
Manual from-source installation
Needs build-dependencies to be installed and manual updates+rebuilds. Allows for easier source-customisations.

This guide covers a manual from-source installation. To install using OTP releases, please check for the presence of a distro package, failing that you can use Pleroma-provided OTP binaries.

Installation

This guide will assume you are on Debian 12 (“bookworm”) or later. This guide should also work with Ubuntu 22.04 (“jammy”) and later. It also assumes that you have administrative rights, either as root or a user with sudo permissions. If you want to run this guide with root, ignore the sudo at the beginning of the lines, unless it calls a user like sudo -Hu pleroma; in this case, use su <username> -s $SHELL -c 'command' instead.

Required dependencies

  • PostgreSQL >=9.6
  • Elixir >=1.11.0 <1.15
  • Erlang OTP >=22.2.0 <26
  • git
  • file / libmagic
  • gcc or clang
  • GNU make
  • CMake

Optional dependencies

  • ImageMagick
  • FFmpeg
  • exiftool

Prepare the system

  • First update the system, if not already done:
sudo apt update
sudo apt full-upgrade
  • Install some of the above mentioned programs:
sudo apt install git build-essential postgresql postgresql-contrib cmake libmagic-dev

Install Elixir and Erlang

  • Install Elixir and Erlang (you might need to use backports or asdf on old systems):
sudo apt update
sudo apt install elixir erlang-dev erlang-nox

Optional packages: docs/installation/optional/media_graphics_packages.md

sudo apt install imagemagick ffmpeg libimage-exiftool-perl

Install PleromaBE

  • Add a new system user for the Pleroma service:
sudo useradd -r -s /bin/false -m -d /var/lib/pleroma -U pleroma

Note: To execute a single command as the Pleroma system user, use sudo -Hu pleroma command. You can also switch to a shell by using sudo -Hu pleroma $SHELL. If you don’t have and want sudo on your system, you can use su as root user (UID 0) for a single command by using su -l pleroma -s $SHELL -c 'command' and su -l pleroma -s $SHELL for starting a shell.

  • Git clone the PleromaBE repository and make the Pleroma user the owner of the directory:
sudo mkdir -p /opt/pleroma
sudo chown -R pleroma:pleroma /opt/pleroma
sudo -Hu pleroma git clone -b stable https://git.pleroma.social/pleroma/pleroma /opt/pleroma
  • Change to the new directory:
cd /opt/pleroma
  • Install the dependencies for Pleroma and answer with yes if it asks you to install Hex:
sudo -Hu pleroma mix deps.get
  • Generate the configuration: sudo -Hu pleroma MIX_ENV=prod mix pleroma.instance gen
  • Answer with yes if it asks you to install rebar3.
  • This may take some time, because parts of pleroma get compiled first.

  • After that it will ask you a few questions about your instance and generates a configuration file in config/generated_config.exs.

  • Check the configuration and if all looks right, rename it, so Pleroma will load it (prod.secret.exs for productive instance, dev.secret.exs for development instances):

sudo -Hu pleroma mv config/{generated_config.exs,prod.secret.exs}
  • The previous command creates also the file config/setup_db.psql, with which you can create the database:
sudo -Hu postgres psql -f config/setup_db.psql
  • Now run the database migration:
sudo -Hu pleroma MIX_ENV=prod mix ecto.migrate
  • Now you can start Pleroma already
sudo -Hu pleroma MIX_ENV=prod mix phx.server

Finalize installation

If you want to open your newly installed instance to the world, you should run nginx or some other webserver/proxy in front of Pleroma and you should consider to create a systemd service file for Pleroma.

Nginx

  • Install nginx, if not already done:
sudo apt install nginx
  • Setup your SSL cert, using your method of choice or certbot. If using certbot, first install it:
sudo apt install certbot

and then set it up:

sudo mkdir -p /var/lib/letsencrypt/
sudo certbot certonly --email <your@emailaddress> -d <yourdomain> --standalone

If that doesn’t work, make sure, that nginx is not already running. If it still doesn’t work, try setting up nginx first (change ssl “on” to “off” and try again).

  • Copy the example nginx configuration and activate it:
sudo cp /opt/pleroma/installation/pleroma.nginx /etc/nginx/sites-available/pleroma.nginx
sudo ln -s /etc/nginx/sites-available/pleroma.nginx /etc/nginx/sites-enabled/pleroma.nginx

  • Before starting nginx edit the configuration and change it to your needs (e.g. change servername, change cert paths)

  • (Strongly recommended) serve media on another domain

Refer to the Hardening your instance document on how to serve media on another domain. We STRONGLY RECOMMEND you to do this to minimize attack vectors.

  • Enable and start nginx:
sudo systemctl enable --now nginx.service

If you need to renew the certificate in the future, uncomment the relevant location block in the nginx config and run:

sudo certbot certonly --email <your@emailaddress> -d <yourdomain> --webroot -w /var/lib/letsencrypt/

Other webserver/proxies

You can find example configurations for them in /opt/pleroma/installation/.

Systemd service

  • Copy example service file
sudo cp /opt/pleroma/installation/pleroma.service /etc/systemd/system/pleroma.service
  • Edit the service file and make sure that all paths fit your installation
  • Enable and start pleroma.service:
sudo systemctl enable --now pleroma.service

Create your first user

If your instance is up and running, you can create your first user with administrative rights with the following task:

sudo -Hu pleroma MIX_ENV=prod mix pleroma.user new <username> <your@emailaddress> --admin

Further reading

Questions

Questions about the installation or didn’t it work as it should be, ask in #pleroma:libera.chat via Matrix or #pleroma on libera.chat via IRC.