Vercel-grade previews, for backend apps.
If you ship Django, Rails, Laravel, FastAPI — or Next.js, Nuxt, SvelteKit, or anything in between — every Git branch deserves a live HTTPS URL the way Next.js devs get one on Vercel. We auto-detect your framework (or use your Dockerfile if you have one). PR comments, build logs, password protection, auto-expiry. No Kubernetes, no per-seat bill, no YAML.
Demo runs in under 60s. No signup, no credit card.
Quick Invoice App
acme/quick-invoice · main
feat: add webhook signature verification
Already using something else?
When PreviewDrop wins — and when it doesn't
Honest comparisons against the tools you're already paying for. If you ship Next.js to Vercel and never touch a Dockerfile, you probably don't need this. If your backend is Django, Rails, Laravel or anything FROM-python-based, read on.
Built by backend devs who got tired of docker-compose up on every PR review.
What you actually get
Specs & pricing, no spelunking required
Flat per-workspace pricing. No per-seat fees, no surprise overages, no “contact sales” wall. Same container, same build pipeline on every plan — what changes is concurrency, TTL, memory, and seats.
| Plan | Free | Starter | Pro | Team |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Price (monthly) | $0 | $19 | $79 | $149 |
| Concurrent previews | 2 | 5 | 20 | 40 |
| Container memory | 256 MB | 512 MB | 1 GB | 2 GB |
| Preview TTL | 1 h | 4 h | 8 h | 16 h |
| Projects | 3 | 10 | Unlimited | Unlimited |
| Team seats | 1 | 3 | 10 | 25 |
| Password-protected URLs | — | — | ✓ | ✓ |
| REST API + CLI | — | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| MCP server for AI agents | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Deploys / month | Unlimited | Unlimited | Unlimited | Unlimited |
Median build time
~60s
Demo public-repo build
Runtime
Container
Auto-detect or Dockerfile
Network
HTTPS + auto-TLS
Issued per preview
Regions
EU
Multi-region, low latency
Why we built this
Vercel solved this in 2018. The rest of us got “use staging”.
Next.js devs have had “every PR gets a live URL” for years. Django, Rails, Laravel, FastAPI — you got “ssh into staging”, “ngrok the dev box”, or a 600-line GitHub Actions file that breaks the first time someone pushes a binary asset.
We built PreviewDrop because we wanted what Vercel ships, on the stack we actually work on. A real container, a real HTTPS URL, a real PR comment, in under a minute. No Kubernetes. No per-seat pricing. No terraform apply just to review a feature.
We're opinionated about the stack: flat workspace pricing because per-seat pricing punishes you for growing a team; auto-expiry by defaultbecause nobody should be paying for a preview that's been zombie-running for three weeks; MCP-native from day one because the next generation of devs will deploy from Claude or Cursor, not from a dashboard.
If your backend is Docker-shaped and your CI/CD is held together with cron jobs and YAML, this is for you.
No configuration files needed
The deployment pipeline you deserve, working in three simple steps.
Pick your repository
Sign in with GitHub and select any repo. Django, Rails, Laravel, Next.js — if it has a Dockerfile or a standard build process, we handle the rest automatically.
Get a live preview URL
Push to any tracked branch, or open a pull request. We build a live container automatically — and if it's a PR, drop the URL as a GitHub comment with a commit-status check. No CI setup needed.
Share with clients or QA
Share a password-protected, auto-expiring HTTPS URL. No user accounts, no VPN, no zombie containers — it self-destructs after your TTL.
Every PR gets a live preview link, automatically.
Open a pull request and PreviewDrop posts a bot comment with the preview URL, build status, branch, and commit — before your reviewer even clicks through.
What you actually get
One project page per repo. Every deployment with its commit, status, preview URL, and full build log streamed live over WebSocket — searchable, copyable, downloadable.
All your repos at a glance — live status, branch, last deploy.
Done! Your preview is live:
Status: ready · Built in 47s
Let your AI agent deploy, inspect, and destroy previews.
The official PreviewDrop MCP server gives Claude, Cursor, and any MCP-compatible AI agent full control over your preview environments — no copy-pasting URLs, no tab-switching.
11 tools your agent can call
previewdrop in the MCP Servers panel — one-click install.npx previewdrop mcpPassword-protected, auto-expiring, QR-ready share URLs.
Every branch preview — and every PR preview — gets a password-protectable HTTPS URL with a built-in QR code and a TTL. Hand a client or QA a single link without spinning up a staging server or leaving ngrok open all night.
Send clients a password-protected link that self-destructs after their review. No staging servers, no ngrok tunnel open all night, no leftover URLs indexed by Google.
Test on device
Scan to open the preview on your phone. Great for checking responsive layouts without a Ngrok-style tunnel.
Also included on every plan
Wire up CI/CD
in minutes
Once you have a PreviewDrop account, run one command from your project root. Our setup script detects your repo, writes the GitHub Actions workflow, and prints the secret to add. Done.
Works with your actual stack
Not just Next.js. PreviewDrop previews any app that runs in a container — the backends Vercel and Netlify can't touch.
Any language. Any framework. If it builds, PreviewDrop previews it.