---
title: "Self-host"
description: "Deploying and operating your own Notarium instance."
---

# Self-host

How to deploy and operate your own instance. Notarium is a single self-contained container: the engine runs inside it, with no external services, and all state lives in one `/data` volume. Zero-config is all you need to get started.

## In this section

- **Installation** — the container, the `/data` volume, first run.
- **Configuration** — environment variables.
- **Authentication** — password / none modes.
- **Enabling semantic search** — vector search.
- **Database** — SQLite or Postgres, schema migrations.
- **Production** — reverse proxy, trusting the client IP, limits.
- **Backup and restore** — online backup, verification, restoring into a clean volume.
- **Image CLI** — the `start`, `backup`, `restore`, `admin`, `healthcheck`, and `version` commands.