Portals
How Portals expose Pod servers to the outside world
A Portal is BrowserPod’s controlled networking feature that exposes services running inside a Pod through secure, shareable URLs.
When code inside the Pod starts listening on a port, BrowserPod automatically creates a public URL that forwards traffic to that internal server. This unlocks powerful use cases that would traditionally require provisioning dedicated backend infrastructure for each session.
What Portals enable
Portals unlock use cases that typically require backend infrastructure:
- Live previews: Run a dev server in the browser and share the preview URL with teammates or stakeholders. Changes update in real-time without deploying to staging environments.
- Interactive demos: Let users interact with working applications directly in documentation or product tours, without standing up demo infrastructure.
- Collaborative workflows: Enable pair programming, troubleshooting sessions, or live code reviews by sharing a running environment via a simple URL.
- Shareable environments: Create “click-to-open” demos where anyone with the link can access a fully functional application running in someone else’s browser.
- Testing across devices: Scan a QR code on your phone to test the server running on your laptop’s browser, with changes reflected instantly.
What a Portal is
A Portal is not a separate server. It is a routing layer that connects a public URL to a process running in the user’s browser. The server still lives inside the Pod; the Portal simply makes it reachable.
How Portals are created
Portals are created automatically when a process inside the Pod binds to a port. BrowserPod detects the listening port and generates a URL that maps to it. If multiple ports are opened, multiple Portals can be created.
What the URL represents
The Portal URL is the address other people can open to reach the server running inside the browser. The port value that triggers the Portal is the internal port the server is listening on inside the Pod.
What Portals imply for your app
- Your server is truly client‑side. The app logic is running in the user’s browser, not on your infrastructure.
- The URL is the access point. Anyone with the Portal URL can reach the server (within the limits of your app).
- Ports map to Portals. Each listening port can create its own Portal URL.
If you want the setup steps or code examples, see Set up a Portal.