Terraform Next.js module for AWS

A zero-config Terraform module for self-hosting Next.js sites serverless on AWS Lambda.

Features

Some features are still under development, here is a list of features that are currently supported and what we plan to bring with the next releases:

• ✅  Next.js v9.5+ (older Versions might work but are not actively supported)
• ✅  Terraform v0.13+
• ✅  Static, SSG, Lambda and API pages (with dynamic routes)
• ✅  Automatic expiration of old static assets
• ✅  Rewrites & Redirects
• ✅  Image Component & Image Optimization support
• 🚧  Incremental Static Regeneration
• 🚧  AWS CodeDeploy

Architecture

The Next.js Terraform module is designed as a full stack AWS app. It relies on multiple AWS services and connects them to work as a single application:

• I. CloudFront

  This is the main CloudFront distribution which handles all incoming traffic to the Next.js application. Static assets with the prefix /_next/static/* (e.g. JavaScript, CSS, images) are identified here and served directly from a static content S3 bucket (II). Other requests are delegated to the proxy handler Lambda@Edge function (III).

• II. S3 bucket for static content

  This bucket contains the pre-rendered static HTML sites from the Next.js build and the static assets (JavaScript, CSS, images, etc.).

• III. Lambda@Edge proxy handler

  The proxy handler analyzes the incoming requests and determines from which source a request should be served. Static generated sites are fetched from the S3 bucket (II) and dynamic content is served from the Next.js Lambdas (V).

• IV. API Gateway

  The HTTP API Gateway distributes the incoming traffic on the existing Next.js Lambdas (V). It uses a cost efficient HTTP API for this.

• V. Shared Next.js Lambda functions

  These are the Next.js Lambdas which are doing the server-side rendering. They are composed, so a single lambda can serve multiple SSR-pages.

• Terraform Next.js Image Optimization

  The image optimization is triggered by routes with the prefix /_next/image/*. It is a serverless task provided by our Terraform Next.js Image Optimization module for AWS.

• Static Content Deployment

  This flow is only triggered when a Terraform apply runs to update the application. It consists of a dedicated S3 bucket and a single Lambda function. The bucket is only used by Terraform to upload the static content from the tf-next build command as a zip archive. The upload then triggers the Lambda which unzips the content and deploys it to the static content S3 bucket (II). Static assets from previous deployments are then marked to be expired in a certain amount of days (default 30, configurable via expire_static_assets variable). After the successful deployment a CloudFront invalidation is created to propagate the route changes to every edge location.

• Proxy Config Distribution

  This is a second CloudFront distribution that serves a special JSON file that the Proxy (III) fetches as configuration (Contains information about routes).

Usage

Add to your Next.js project

First add our custom builder to your Next.js project. It uses the same builder under the hood as Vercel does:

npm i -D tf-next     # npm or
yarn add -D tf-next  # yarn

Then you should add a new script to your package.json (Make sure it is not named build):

{
  ...
  "scripts": {
    "dev": "next",
    "build": "next build",
    "start": "next start",
+   "tf-next": "tf-next build"
  }
  ...
}

tf-next build runs in a temporary directory and puts its output in a .next-tf directory in the same directory where your package.json is. The output in the .next-tf directory is all what the Terraform module needs in the next step.

Setup the Next.js Terraform module

Note: Make sure that the AWS_ACCESS_KEY_ID & AWS_SECRET_ACCESS_KEY environment variables are set when running the Terraform commands. How to create AWS Access Keys?

Adding Terraform to your existing Next.js installation is easy. Simply create a new main.tf file in the root of your Next.js project and add the following content:

# main.tf

terraform {
  required_providers {
    aws = {
      source  = "hashicorp/aws"
      version = "~> 3.0"
    }
  }
}

# Main region where the resources should be created in
provider "aws" {
  region = "us-east-1"
}

module "tf_next" {
  source = "dealmore/next-js/aws"
}

output "cloudfront_domain_name" {
  value = module.tf_next.cloudfront_domain_name
}

To deploy your app to AWS simply run the following commands:

npm run tf-next   # Build the Next.js app
yarn tf-next      # Same command when using yarn

# Expose your AWS Access Keys to the current terminal session
# Only needed when running Terraform commands
export AWS_ACCESS_KEY_ID=AKIAIOSFODNN7EXAMPLE
export AWS_SECRET_ACCESS_KEY=wJalrXUtnFEMI/K7MDENG/bPxRfiCYEXAMPLEKEY

terraform init    # Only needed on the first time running Terraform

terraform plan    # (Optional) See what resources Terraform will create
terraform apply   # Deploy the Next.js app to your AWS account

> Apply complete!
>
> Outputs:
>
> cloudfront_domain_name = "xxxxxxxxxxxxxx.cloudfront.net"

After the successful deployment your Next.js app is publicly available at the CloudFront subdomain from the cloudfront_domain_name output.

Deployment with Terraform Cloud

When using this module together with Terraform Cloud make sure that you also upload the build output from the tf-next task. You can create a .terraformignore in the root of your project and add the following line:

# .terraformignore
+  !**/.next-tf/**

Examples

• Complete - Complete example with SSR, API and static pages.
• Static - Example that uses static pages only (No SSR).
• Custom Domain - Demonstrates how to use the module with a custom domain from Route 53.

Requirements

Name	Version
terraform	>= 0.13
aws	>= 3.0
random	>= 2.3.0

Providers

Name	Version
aws	>= 3.0
random	>= 2.3.0

Inputs

Name	Description	Type	Default	Required
cloudfront_custom_behaviors	n/a	list(any)	null	no
cloudfront_minimum_protocol_version	Minimum version of the SSL protocol that you want CloudFront to use for HTTPS connections. One of SSLv3, TLSv1, TLSv1_2016, TLSv1.1_2016, TLSv1.2_2018 or TLSv1.2_2019.	string	"TLSv1.2_2019"	no
cloudfront_origins	n/a	list(any)	null	no
cloudfront_price_class	Price class for the CloudFront distributions (main & proxy config). One of PriceClass_All, PriceClass_200, PriceClass_100.	string	"PriceClass_100"	no
cloudfront_viewer_certificate_arn	n/a	string	null	no
create_domain_name_records	Controls whether Route 53 records for the for the domain_names should be created.	bool	true	no
create_image_optimization	Controls whether resources for image optimization support should be created or not.	bool	true	no
debug_use_local_packages	Use locally built packages rather than download them from npm.	bool	false	no
deployment_name	Identifier for the deployment group (alphanumeric characters, underscores, hyphens, slashes, hash signs and dots are allowed).	string	"tf-next"	no
domain_names	Alternative domain names for the CloudFront distribution.	list(string)	[]	no
domain_zone_names	n/a	list(string)	[]	no
expire_static_assets	Number of days after which static assets from previous deployments should be removed from S3. Set to -1 to disable expiration.	number	30	no
lambda_environment_variables	Map that defines environment variables for the Lambda Functions in Next.js.	map(string)	{}	no
lambda_memory_size	Amount of memory in MB a Lambda Function can use at runtime. Valid value between 128 MB to 10,240 MB, in 1 MB increments.	number	1024	no
lambda_policy_json	Additional policy document as JSON to attach to the Lambda Function role	string	null	no
lambda_role_permissions_boundary	ARN of IAM policy that scopes aws_iam_role access for the lambda	string	null	no
lambda_runtime	Lambda Function runtime	string	"nodejs12.x"	no
lambda_timeout	Max amount of time a Lambda Function has to return a response in seconds. Should not be more than 30 (Limited by API Gateway).	number	10	no
next_tf_dir	Relative path to the .next-tf dir.	string	"./.next-tf"	no
tags	Tag metadata to label AWS resources that support tags.	map(string)	{}	no

Outputs

Name	Description
cloudfront_domain_name	The domain of the main CloudFront distribution.
cloudfront_hosted_zone_id	The zone id of the main CloudFront distribution.
static_upload_bucket_id	n/a

Known issues

Under the hood this module uses a lot of Vercel's build pipeline. So issues that exist on Vercel are likely to occur on this project too.

• Stack deletion (terraform destroy) fails on first run (terraform-provider-aws#1721)

  This is intentional because we cannot delete a Lambda@Edge function (Used by proxy module) in a synchronous way. It can take up to an hour for AWS to unbind a Lambda@Edge function from it's CloudFront distribution even when the distribution is already destroyed.

  Workaround:

  After running the initial terraform destroy command (that failed) wait ~1 hour and run the command again. This time it should run successfully and delete the rest of the stack.

License

Apache-2.0 - see LICENSE for details.

Note: All sample projects in examples/* are licensed as MIT to comply with the official Next.js examples.