---
title: 'AWS Lambda'
description: 'Run bknd inside AWS Lambda'
---
import InstallBknd from '/snippets/install-bknd.mdx';

## Installation
To get started with AWS Lambda and bknd you can either install the package manually and follow the descriptions below, or use the CLI starter:

<Tabs>
   <Tab title="CLI Starter">
      Create a new Bun CLI starter project by running the following command:

      ```sh
      npx bknd create -i aws
      ```
   </Tab>
   <Tab title="Manual">
      Create a new AWS Lambda project and then install bknd as a dependency:

      <InstallBknd />
   </Tab>
</Tabs>

## Serve the API
To serve the API, you can use the `serveLambda` function of the AWS Lambda adapter.

```tsx index.mjs
import { serveLambda } from "bknd/adapter/aws";

export const handler = serveLambda({
   connection: {
      url: process.env.DB_URL!,
      authToken: process.env.DB_AUTH_TOKEN!
   }
});
```
Although the runtime would support database as a file, we don't recommend it. You'd need to also bundle the native dependencies which increases the deployment size and cold start time. Instead, we recommend you to use [LibSQL on Turso](/usage/database#sqlite-using-libsql-on-turso).

## Serve the Admin UI
Lambda functions should be as small as possible. Therefore, the static files for the admin panel should not be served from node_modules like with the Node adapter.

Instead, we recommend to copy the static files and bundle them with the lambda function. To copy the static files, you can use the `copy-assets` command:

```bash
npx bknd copy-assets --out static
```

This will copy the static files to the `static` directory and then serve them from there:

```tsx index.mjs {8-11}
import { serveLambda } from "bknd/adapter/aws";

export const handler = serveLambda({
   connection: {
      url: process.env.DB_URL!,
      authToken: process.env.DB_AUTH_TOKEN!
   },
   assets: {
      mode: "local",
      root: "./static"
   }
});
```

## Deployment
To deploy a lambda function, you could follow these steps:

1. Create an IAM role with a trust policy that allows lambda to assume the role.
2. Attach the `AWSLambdaBasicExecutionRole` policy to the role.
3. Bundle the lambda function with the static files (e.g. using esbuild)
4. Create a zip file with the bundled lambda function
5. Create a lambda function 
6. Create a function URL for the lambda function & make it publicly accessible (optional)

Depending on your use case, you may want to skip step 6 and use the AWS API Gateway to serve the lambda function. Here is an [example deployment script](https://github.com/bknd-io/bknd/blob/main/examples/aws-lambda/deploy.sh) which creates the AWS resources described above, bundles the lambda function and uploads it.


### Using the CLI starter
The CLI starter example includes a basic build script that creates the required AWS resources, copies the static files, bundles the lambda function and uploads it. To deploy the lambda function, you can run:

```bash
npm run deploy
```

To make adjustments to the lambda function created (e.g. architecture, memory, timeout, etc.) you can edit the head section of the `deploy.sh` script.

```sh deploy.sh
# cat deploy.sh | head -12
FUNCTION_NAME="bknd-lambda"
ROLE_NAME="bknd-lambda-execution-role"
RUNTIME="nodejs22.x"
HANDLER="index.handler"
ARCHITECTURE="arm64" # or "x86_64"
MEMORY="1024" # in MB, 128 is the minimum
TIMEOUT="30"
ENTRY_FILE="index.mjs"
ZIP_FILE="lambda.zip"
# ...
```

To clean up AWS resources created by the deployment script, you can run:

```bash
npm run clean
```