Environment Variables

All production environment variables are managed through the Vercel Dashboard or the Vercel CLI. Variables are scoped per environment (Production, Preview, Development).

Required Variables

These variables must be set for production to function:

Database

DATABASE_URL="postgresql://..."              # Neon pooled connection string
DATABASE_URL_UNPOOLED="postgresql://..."      # Neon direct connection (for migrations)

Whitespace in Vercel

Copy/paste into the Vercel dashboard can introduce trailing whitespace or newlines. The Prisma client in lib/prisma.ts sanitizes these automatically, but double-check values if connections fail.

The Prisma client also supports fallback resolution:

DATABASE_URL (primary)
PRISMA_DATABASE_URL (fallback)
POSTGRES_URL (second fallback)

Authentication

NEXTAUTH_URL="https://www.josemadrid.net"    # Production domain
NEXTAUTH_SECRET="..."                         # 32+ char random string

Generate a secret: openssl rand -hex 32

Encryption

MASTER_KEY="..."         # AES-256 admin panel encryption (64 hex chars)
ENCRYPTION_KEY="..."     # Sensitive data encryption (SMTP passwords, etc.)

Generate with: node -e "console.log(require('crypto').randomBytes(64).toString('base64'))"

Payment Processing

STRIPE_PUBLISHABLE_KEY="pk_live_..."
STRIPE_SECRET_KEY="sk_live_..."
STRIPE_WEBHOOK_SECRET="whsec_..."

Live vs Test Keys

Use pk_live_ / sk_live_ prefixed keys for production. Test keys (pk_test_ / sk_test_) will silently fail to process real payments.

Email

RESEND_API_KEY="re_..."
FROM_EMAIL="orders@josemadridsalsa.com"

Google Services

NEXT_PUBLIC_GOOGLE_MAPS_API_KEY="AIza..."    # Client-side maps (billing enabled)
GOOGLE_PLACES_API_KEY="AIza..."               # Server-side places/reviews
GOOGLE_ANALYTICS_ID="G-HG4QV5GFKH"           # GA4 measurement ID
GOOGLE_CALENDAR_ID="..."                      # "Where is Jose" schedule
GOOGLE_SERVICE_ACCOUNT_EMAIL="..."            # Calendar API service account
GOOGLE_SERVICE_ACCOUNT_PRIVATE_KEY="..."      # Include \\n for newlines

Monitoring

NEXT_PUBLIC_SENTRY_DSN="https://...@sentry.io/..."
SENTRY_AUTH_TOKEN="..."
SENTRY_ORG="josemadridsalsa"
SENTRY_PROJECT="javascript-nextjs"
NEXT_PUBLIC_AMPLITUDE_API_KEY="..."

File Storage

UPLOADTHING_SECRET="..."
UPLOADTHING_APP_ID="..."

AI Services

ANTHROPIC_API_KEY="sk-ant-..."

Managing Variables

Via Vercel CLI

# Pull all production variables to local file
vercel env pull .env.vercel.production --environment=production --yes

# Add a variable
vercel env add VARIABLE_NAME production

# Remove a variable
vercel env rm VARIABLE_NAME production

Via Dashboard

Navigate to Project Settings > Environment Variables in the Vercel dashboard. Variables can be scoped to:

Production -- Applied to production deployments only
Preview -- Applied to preview deployments (PR branches)
Development -- Available when running vercel dev

Automated Setup

Run the interactive setup script:

npm run vercel:setup-env

This script guides you through setting all required variables and optionally triggers a redeployment.

NEXT_PUBLIC_ Prefix

Variables prefixed with NEXT_PUBLIC_ are inlined into the client-side JavaScript bundle at build time. Only use this prefix for values that are safe to expose publicly:

Safe for `NEXT_PUBLIC_`	Keep Server-Only
Google Maps API key	Stripe secret key
Amplitude API key	Database URL
Sentry DSN	NextAuth secret
Google Analytics ID	Encryption keys

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