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This guide covers the complete deployment process for a Vue.js or React SPA — building, transferring, configuring Nginx with proper routing support, and adding SSL.

Prerequisites

• Node.js installed on your build machine (local or CI)
• Nginx installed on your VPS

Step 1 — Build the Application

For Vite-based projects (both Vue and React commonly use this):

npm install
npm run build

Produces a dist directory with optimized, bundled static files.

Step 2 — Test the Production Build Locally

npm run preview

Verify everything works correctly before deploying — catches issues specific to the production build that might not appear in development mode.

Step 3 — Transfer the Build to Your VPS

rsync -avz --delete ./dist/ deploy@YOUR_SERVER_IP:/var/www/myapp/dist/

Step 4 — Configure Nginx with SPA Routing Support

server {
    listen 80;
    server_name myapp.example.com;
    root /var/www/myapp/dist;
    index index.html;

    location / {
        try_files $uri $uri/ /index.html;
    }

    location ~* \.(js|css|woff2|png|jpg|svg)$ {
        expires 1y;
        add_header Cache-Control "public, immutable";
    }

    location = /index.html {
        add_header Cache-Control "no-cache";
    }
}

See How to Configure Nginx for Single Page Applications (SPA Routing) for the reasoning behind this configuration.

Step 5 — Enable the Site and Test

sudo ln -s /etc/nginx/sites-available/myapp /etc/nginx/sites-enabled/
sudo nginx -t && sudo systemctl reload nginx

Step 6 — Add HTTPS

sudo certbot --nginx -d myapp.example.com

Connecting to a Backend API

If your SPA calls a separate backend API, either configure CORS on the API to allow requests from your SPA's domain, or proxy API requests through the same Nginx server to avoid CORS entirely:

location /api/ {
    proxy_pass http://127.0.0.1:3000;
    proxy_set_header Host $host;
}

Environment-Specific Configuration

Build-time environment variables (Vite: VITE_-prefixed, Create React App: REACT_APP_-prefixed) must be set before running npm run build — they're baked into the static output, not read at runtime:

VITE_API_URL=https://api.yourdomain.com npm run build

Setting Up Automated Deployment

See How to Set Up Automatic Static Site Deployment from Git to automate this entire process on every push.

Adding a Loading Splash Screen (Improves Perceived Performance)

Since SPAs typically show a blank page until JavaScript loads and renders, consider adding minimal static loading content directly in index.html that's replaced once the app mounts — improves perceived load time, especially on slower connections.

Common Errors

Blank white page in production, works in development — check the browser console for errors; often caused by an incorrect base path configuration if the app isn't served from the domain root.

404 on refresh for any non-root route — missing the try_files fallback to index.html; see How to Configure Nginx for Single Page Applications (SPA Routing).

Best Practices

• Always test the production build locally before deploying
• Set environment variables before building, not expecting runtime configuration for build-time variables
• Configure proper caching for hashed assets while keeping index.html fresh

Continue Reading

• How to Configure Nginx for Single Page Applications (SPA Routing)
• How to Minify and Bundle Frontend Assets for Production
• How to Set Up Automatic Static Site Deployment from Git

Browse more articles in Static Site Hosting & Frontend Deployment.