Deploy and Host Paperclip on Railway

Paperclip is a self-hosted platform for building and running AI-powered companies. Create hierarchical organizations of autonomous agents — CEOs, engineers, designers — that collaborate on tasks, delegate work, and ship real output using Claude, GPT, Codex, and other LLMs. Think of it as an operating system for AI teams.

About Hosting Paperclip

Paperclip runs as a single Node.js server backed by PostgreSQL. The server handles the web UI, agent orchestration, task management, and all API endpoints. Agents run as child processes inside the container using pre-installed CLI tools (Claude Code, Codex, OpenCode). Hosting requires a persistent volume for agent workspaces and data, plus a Postgres database. This Railway template bundles both services — the Paperclip server and a Postgres instance — with sensible defaults. The only configuration needed is your LLM API keys, which can be added during deployment or later through the UI.

Common Use Cases

• AI dev teams — Stand up an engineering organization with a CTO, senior engineers, and junior devs that autonomously build, review, and ship code
• Content & marketing agencies — Create agent teams that research, write, edit, and publish content with human-in-the-loop approval workflows
• Research & analysis — Deploy analyst agents that investigate topics, synthesize findings, and produce structured reports with governance controls

Dependencies for Paperclip Hosting

• PostgreSQL — Stores companies, agents, tasks, and all application state (included in this template)
• LLM API key — At least one of: Anthropic API key (for Claude adapter) or OpenAI API key (for Codex/GPT adapter)

Deployment Dependencies

• Anthropic API Console — Get an API key for the Claude adapter
• OpenAI API Platform — Get an API key for the Codex/GPT adapter
• Paperclip Documentation — Setup guides and configuration reference
• Paperclip GitHub — Source code and issue tracker

Post-Deployment Setup

After deployment completes, Paperclip automatically generates a one-time admin invite URL on first boot. To find it:

1. Open the Railway dashboard → your project → paperclip-server service
2. Click the latest deployment → Deploy Logs tab
3. Look for the FIRST-TIME SETUP block containing the invite URL:

FIRST-TIME SETUP
No admin account exists yet. Open this URL to create the first admin:
https://your-app.up.railway.app/invite/pcp_bootstrap_...
This link expires in 72 hours.

4. Open that URL in your browser to register the first admin account

No CLI or SSH access required. If the link expires, install the Railway CLI and run:

railway ssh -s paperclip-server -- "yes | pnpm paperclipai auth bootstrap-ceo --force"

Why Deploy Paperclip on Railway?

Railway is a singular platform to deploy your infrastructure stack. Railway will host your infrastructure so you don't have to deal with configuration, while allowing you to vertically and horizontally scale it.

By deploying Paperclip on Railway, you are one step closer to supporting a complete full-stack application with minimal burden. Host your servers, databases, AI agents, and more on Railway.