#Vercel Deployment

The vercel build target generates a Vercel-compatible output with serverless function entry point and routing configuration.

#Build

alepha build --target=vercel

This forces the node runtime. You cannot combine --target=vercel with --runtime=bun or --runtime=workerd.

#Environment Variables

Required for deployment:

#Deploy

alepha deploy detects the vercel.json in dist/ and runs the Vercel CLI:

alepha build --target=vercel
alepha deploy

For production deployment:

alepha deploy --mode production

If the Vercel CLI is not installed, the deploy command installs it automatically as a dev dependency.

#Generated Output

The build produces:

• dist/vercel.json -- Route rewrites and build configuration
• dist/api/index.js -- Serverless function entry point
• dist/public/ -- Static client assets (if React frontend exists)
• dist/.vercel/project.json -- Project linking (if VERCEL_ORG_ID and VERCEL_PROJECT_ID are set)

The vercel.json rewrites all routes to the serverless function:

1{2  "rewrites": [{ "source": "/(.*)", "destination": "/api/index.js" }],3  "buildCommand": "",4  "installCommand": "",5  "outputDirectory": "public"6}

#Configuration

 1import { defineConfig } from "alepha/cli"; 2  3export default defineConfig({ 4  build: { 5    target: "vercel", 6    vercel: { 7      projectName: "my-app", 8      orgId: "team_abc123", 9      projectId: "prj_abc123",10      config: {11        crons: [12          { path: "/api/cron", schedule: "0 * * * *" },13        ],14      },15    },16  },17});

The orgId and projectId can also be set via environment variables (VERCEL_ORG_ID, VERCEL_PROJECT_ID), which take precedence over config values.

#Limitations

Vercel serverless functions have constraints that affect some Alepha features:

• Queue ($queue) is not supported
• Cron ($scheduler) has limited support -- must be configured manually via the vercel config crons option
• Cold starts -- serverless functions have startup latency on the first request
• Execution time limits -- Vercel imposes per-request timeouts depending on your plan

#Recommendation

If serverless is a goal, prefer Cloudflare Workers with --target=cloudflare. Cloudflare Workers have:

• Lower cold start latency
• Native cron trigger support via $scheduler
• D1 database integration
• Lower cost at scale

Use Vercel when you have existing infrastructure on the platform or need specific Vercel features (preview deployments, analytics, etc.).