Deploy and Host SiYuan on Railway

SiYuan is a privacy-first personal knowledge management system with block-level references, Markdown WYSIWYG editing and notebooks. This template deploys the official b3log/siyuan image (pinned to v3.8.5) with a persistent workspace volume. Unofficial template.

About Hosting SiYuan

The template runs one service from the official image with a volume mounted at /siyuan/workspace, which holds all your notes. Your lock-screen password is the auto-generated SIYUAN_ACCESS_AUTH_CODE variable: find it in the service Variables tab after deploying, then open the generated domain and enter it. Docker hosting is browser-only: no desktop or mobile app connection, no PDF/HTML/Word export and no Markdown file import. Run a single instance only; never mount the same workspace in two instances.

Common Use Cases

Private, self-hosted notes and personal wiki
Block-based knowledge base with bidirectional links
Browser-accessible notebooks you own

Dependencies for SiYuan Hosting

b3log/siyuan Docker image (v3.8.5)
Persistent volume at /siyuan/workspace

Security notes

Lock screen on by default: the template generates a random 24-character access code (SIYUAN_ACCESS_AUTH_CODE) at deploy, so your instance is not open to anyone with the URL. The template never sets SIYUAN_ACCESS_AUTH_CODE_BYPASS; do not add it, as it lets anyone access your data.
HTTPS: Railway terminates TLS at its edge for generated *.up.railway.app domains and custom domains (certificates are provisioned automatically), and redirects plain HTTP GET requests to HTTPS. This is Railway's platform behaviour, not a SiYuan feature, and this template makes no claim about encryption inside Railway's network or about the security of SiYuan itself.

FAQ / Troubleshooting

Where is my password? In the service's Variables tab: SIYUAN_ACCESS_AUTH_CODE. Enter it on the lock screen. To use a different one, change it there and redeploy.
Blank page or "unauthorized". Hard-refresh and use the Railway domain over https. If the lock screen never appears, check the deploy logs for the kernel starting on port 6806.
Permission errors or workspace not saving. Set RAILWAY_RUN_UID=0 on the service and redeploy (Railway volumes are root-owned).
Can I connect the SiYuan desktop or phone app? Not to a Docker-hosted instance; use the browser. Docker also lacks PDF/HTML/Word export and Markdown file import (upstream README).
Is my data safe on redeploy? It lives on the /siyuan/workspace volume and survives redeploys; expect brief downtime while redeploying. Never run two instances on the same workspace.
How do I upgrade? Change the image tag to a newer b3log/siyuan version; check that the tag exists on Docker Hub first (releases can appear on GitHub before the image).

Why Deploy SiYuan 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 SiYuan 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.