Requirements.

Server requirements for running VoxelSite. Any standard PHP hosting works.

Feb 21, 2026

Requirements

VoxelSite runs on standard PHP hosting. No exotic dependencies.

Server requirements

Requirement	Minimum
PHP	8.2 or higher
Database	SQLite 3 (included with PHP — no setup needed)
Web server	Apache (recommended) · Nginx works with manual configuration
Disk space	100 MB for VoxelSite Studio

Required PHP extensions

These extensions are checked during installation. All are standard on modern PHP hosting:

Extension	Purpose
PDO SQLite	Database storage
OpenSSL	API key encryption
JSON	Data parsing
cURL	AI provider communication
mbstring	Text processing
fileinfo	File type detection
GD or Imagick	Image handling
Zip Archive	Updates, snapshots, and exports

Recommended PHP settings

Setting	Recommended
`memory_limit`	128M or higher
`upload_max_filesize`	50M or higher

PHP execution timeout (recommended)

AI site generation takes 2–4 minutes. VoxelSite handles this automatically — if the connection drops during generation, the Studio seamlessly switches to polling mode and waits for the server to finish. No files are lost.

However, for the best experience — live streaming of the AI response with real-time file updates — increase the PHP execution timeout so the connection stays open throughout generation.

What happens at different timeout levels

Timeout	What you see
600s (recommended)	Live streaming — tokens appear in real time, files update as they're written
30–120s (typical default)	Streaming starts, connection drops after 30–120s, Studio shows "Server is still generating..." and polls until complete. All files are written correctly.

How to increase the timeout

Three settings may control the timeout depending on your server:

Setting	Where	Recommended
`max_execution_time`	`php.ini` or `.user.ini`	`600`
`request_terminate_timeout`	PHP-FPM pool config	`600`
`fastcgi_read_timeout`	Nginx site config	`600`

VoxelSite ships a .user.ini that sets max_execution_time = 600 automatically. The other two settings depend on your server type.

On shared hosting, you typically can't change request_terminate_timeout or fastcgi_read_timeout — and that's fine. VoxelSite's polling fallback ensures the full site is generated regardless.

Laravel Forge

Forge controls all three settings through a single option:

Go to Server → PHP tab
Set Max Execution Time to 600
Forge automatically updates php.ini, PHP-FPM, and Nginx

Nginx (manual)

In your site’s Nginx config:

location ~ \.php$ {
    fastcgi_read_timeout 600;
    # ... other fastcgi settings
}

In your PHP-FPM pool config (e.g. /etc/php/8.2/fpm/pool.d/www.conf):

request_terminate_timeout = 600

Restart PHP-FPM after changes: sudo systemctl restart php8.2-fpm

Apache

Apache with mod_php respects max_execution_time from php.ini:

max_execution_time = 600

With mod_fcgid, also set:

FcgidIOTimeout 600

Plesk / cPanel

Look for the PHP settings panel under your domain’s configuration. Set max_execution_time to 600. If you can't change it, VoxelSite will still work — the Studio polls for completion automatically.

Writable directories

The web server must be able to write to these directories:

_studio/data — database and configuration
_studio/preview — AI workspace
_studio/revisions — undo/redo history
_studio/snapshots — site snapshots
_studio/logs — application logs
assets — website assets (images, CSS, JS)
_data — form submissions (created automatically on first form submission)

AI API key

VoxelSite uses external AI providers to generate websites. You need an API key from at least one of:

Anthropic — recommended
OpenAI
Google
DeepSeek
Any OpenAI-compatible provider

You enter your API key during installation or in Settings. VoxelSite encrypts it at rest.

Recommended hosting

VoxelSite works on shared hosting, VPS, or any cloud server that meets the requirements above.

Shared hosting — Any cPanel or Plesk host with PHP 8.2+ (Hostinger, Namecheap, A2 Hosting)
VPS — DigitalOcean, Hetzner, Vultr, Linode
Managed — Laravel Forge, Ploi, RunCloud

Performance note: On shared hosting with short timeouts, the live connection may drop during generation. VoxelSite automatically switches to polling — the server continues generating in the background, and the Studio shows progress until it's done. For the fastest experience, set max_execution_time to 600 in your hosting's PHP settings.

What about the generated websites?

The websites VoxelSite generates have even simpler requirements. They are HTML/CSS/PHP files that work on literally any web hosting with PHP support. No database needed for the generated site — unless you use forms (which store submissions in SQLite, included in every PHP installation).

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