Building your app
Localhost vs live
Localhost is your app running only on your own computer, while live means it runs on a server that anyone on the internet can reach.
Also called local server, 127.0.0.1
Looking this up for a class, a job, or something you want to build? If it is the last one, nommi reads your idea before you spend months on it.
The word localhost is the name a computer uses for itself. A link that starts with localhost works for you and for nobody else. Send that link to a user or an investor and they see an error, not your app.
When this shows up
Example, not a real founder: you paste a link to your demo into an email to a possible customer. They reply that the page will not load. The link started with localhost, so it pointed at your laptop instead of the internet.
What to do next
Before you share any link, open it on your phone with wifi turned off. If it does not load there, deploy the app and share the live address instead.
Questions founders ask
What is the difference between localhost and live? Localhost runs only on your own computer, so a localhost link opens nothing on anyone else's. Live means the app runs on a server, so anyone with the address can reach it.
What is localhost in simple terms? Your own computer, talking to itself. When you run an app on your laptop, localhost is the address that opens it there and nowhere else. To share your app, deploy it and send the live address.
Go deeper
My app works on my laptop but not for my friends. Why?
One set of tools you can build your app with and run on your own, one for each layer, each with a reason.
Read the guideOr go straight to the tool