Firebase Hosting Basics

# hosting-basics

This skill provides instructions and references for working with Firebase Hosting, a fast and secure hosting service for your web app, static and dynamic content, and microservices.

## Overview

Firebase Hosting provides production-grade web content hosting for developers. With a single command, you can deploy web apps and serve both static and dynamic content to a global CDN (content delivery network).

**Key Features:**

- **Fast Content Delivery:** Files are cached on SSDs at CDN edges around the world. - **Secure by Default:** Zero-configuration SSL is built-in. - **Preview Channels:** View and test changes on temporary preview URLs before deploying live. - **GitHub Integration:** Automate previews and deploys with GitHub Actions. - **Dynamic Content:** Serve dynamic content and microservices using Cloud Functions or Cloud Run.

## Hosting vs App Hosting

**Choose Firebase Hosting if:**

- You are deploying a static site (HTML/CSS/JS). - You are deploying a simple SPA (React, Vue, etc. without SSR). - You want full control over the build and deploy process via CLI.

**Choose Firebase App Hosting if:**

- You are using a supported full-stack framework like Next.js or Angular. - You need Server-Side Rendering (SSR) or ISR. - You want an automated "git push to deploy" workflow with zero configuration.

## Instructions

### 1. Configuration (`firebase.json`)

For details on configuring Hosting behavior, including public directories, redirects, rewrites, and headers, see [configuration.md](references/configuration.md).

### 2. Deploying

For instructions on deploying your site, using preview channels, and managing releases, see [deploying.md](references/deploying.md).

### 3. Emulation

To test your app locally:

```bash npx -y firebase-tools@latest emulators:start --only hosting ```

This serves your app at `http://localhost:5000` by default.