Used For

• +**You're building your third OAuth login system this year** → Drop in Appwrite's auth, supports Google/GitHub/email in 15 minutes
• +**Your serverless functions are scattered across three platforms** → Write once in Python/Node, auto-deploy from Git, handles 600k executions daily
• +**Manual database setup eating your weekend** → Smart column detection auto-fills sample data, suggests field types from your content
• +Self-host everything on your own servers - no vendor lock-in or surprise billing when you scale
• +Functions run in isolated containers with 30+ runtimes - debug locally, deploy globally

Best For

• >Side project stuck at 60% done because writing auth code after work is soul-crushing
• >Your startup hit product-market fit but your duct-taped backend is falling apart
• >Fed up with Firebase lock-in but need something that just works

Not For

• -Non-technical teams or anyone allergic to Docker — you'll need actual dev skills to set this up
• -Companies under 5 developers — you're adding complexity when Firebase's simplicity would serve you better
• -Enterprise teams with 500+ users hitting scaling limits — you'll outgrow this without heavy customization

Pairs With

• *Vue.js or React (for your frontend that connects to Appwrite's APIs)
• *Docker Compose (because self-hosting means you're managing containers now)
• *Linode or DigitalOcean (cheap VPS hosting for your Appwrite instance)
• *Stripe (for payments since Appwrite handles the backend but not billing)
• *SendGrid (for transactional emails because running your own SMTP is painful)
• *GitHub (where your serverless functions auto-deploy from)
• *PostgreSQL (the actual database engine under Appwrite's document storage)

The Catch

• !Permissions block everything by default — you'll spend your first hour figuring out why your API calls fail
• !Self-hosting means you're now running a mail server (SMTP setup required) and managing Docker updates
• !The 'free' part is just the software — you still pay for servers, and a decent setup runs $50-200/month

Bottom Line

Backend boilerplate that actually works — prototype in hours instead of weeks, then scale without rewriting everything.