porter apply

Prerequisites

• You’ve logged in to the Porter CLI after running porter auth login
• You’re connected to the correct project by running porter config set-project
• You’re connected to the correct cluster by running porter config set-cluster

porter apply

The porter apply command creates or updates applications by either applying a porter.yaml configuration file or rebuilding existing applications with their current configuration.

Usage Patterns

# Apply a porter.yaml configuration file
porter apply -f porter.yaml

# Rebuild existing app without a configuration file
porter apply --app my-app

# Use environment variables (useful in CI/CD)
export PORTER_APP_NAME=my-app
porter apply

By default, the command runs from a git repository and uses the current commit SHA as the image tag.

Configuration Precedence

Configuration values are resolved in the following order (highest priority first):

1. Command-line flags
2. Environment variables
3. Values in porter.yaml

Key Environment Variables:

• PORTER_APP_NAME or PORTER_STACK_NAME - Application name (replaces --app flag)
• PORTER_PROJECT - Project ID
• PORTER_CLUSTER - Cluster ID
• PORTER_NAMESPACE - Kubernetes namespace
• PORTER_TAG - Image tag (defaults to git commit SHA)

Common Flags

Build Control:

• --build-method [docker|pack] - Build method
• --build-context PATH - Build context directory
• --dockerfile PATH - Dockerfile path (for docker builds)
• --builder NAME - Builder for pack builds
• --attach-buildpacks LIST - Buildpacks for pack builds
• --no-build - Skip building a new image
• --tag TAG - Override image tag

Configuration:

• --variables KEY=VALUE,... - Set environment variables
• --secrets KEY=VALUE,... - Set secret environment variables
• --attach-env-groups LIST - Attach environment groups
• --helm-overrides-file PATH - Helm value overrides file

Deployment:

• --target NAME - Deployment target
• --preview - Deploy as preview environment
• --wait - Wait for deployment completion
• --exact - Apply exact configuration (don’t merge with existing)
• --predeploy - Run predeploy job

Validation:

• --validate - Validate porter.yaml without deploying
• --dry-run - Server-side validation without building/deploying