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.env Template Generator

Generate a starter .env for the services you use, with conventional names and working local defaults.

Runs locally — input is never uploaded
IncludeConventional variables and local defaults
Application
Data stores
Authentication
Third party
Ready when you are

WHAT IT DOES

The variable names you were about to look up.

Choose the services a project uses and get a .env with the conventional variable names for each, defaulted to a local stack so the file runs unedited. Values that can only come from a provider are left empty with a comment saying where to find them. The same selection produces the same file, with one deliberate exception: filling the secret variables draws fresh random bytes, because a secret two people could both generate is not a secret.

Why use it?

Use it to assemble a starting configuration for a chosen stack when no existing .env file exists. It is different from sanitizing a real environment file for publication.

How to use this tool

  1. Select only the services your application uses and generate the template.
  2. Read provider-specific comments, replace placeholders, and check that your application actually reads the proposed variable names.
  3. Leave secret generation off for a reusable example; if you explicitly fill secrets, treat the result as a private .env. Localhost defaults still need the corresponding services to be running.

Details and limitations

  • Twelve service fragments across data stores, authentication, and third-party services, each carrying the names those libraries actually read.
  • Defaults point at localhost with conventional ports, so a file for PostgreSQL and Redis works against a local stack without being edited.
  • JWT_SECRET and SESSION_SECRET are left empty unless you ask for them to be filled, and then they are 32 bytes from the browser's cryptographic random source, hex encoded.
  • Comments carry the details that are easy to get wrong: 587 for STARTTLS against 465 for implicit TLS, path-style addressing for MinIO, the whsec_ prefix printed by stripe listen.
  • The file opens by saying what it is: a file holding real values, to be kept out of version control with a .env.example committed beside it.
  • A guard test reads every generated line back through the .env parser, so the file this writes is always one a dotenv loader can read.

COMMON QUESTIONS

.env Template questions

Should I commit the file this generates?
No. It is a .env, which means it holds real values, and generating secrets into it makes that more true rather than less. Commit a .env.example instead — the .env.example generator turns this file into one — and keep .env in .gitignore.
Why are some values empty?
Because no honest default exists for them. A Stripe key, an SMTP host, or an OAuth client secret comes from a provider's dashboard, and inventing a placeholder that looks like a real value is how a fake key ends up deployed. The comment above each empty line says where the real one comes from.
Is a generated secret strong enough for production?
Yes. Each one is 32 bytes — 256 bits — from crypto.getRandomValues(), the browser's cryptographically secure generator, which is the same class of source a server-side library uses. Use a different secret in every environment.