What is Forge?

Forge lets you create AI agents and workflows visually on a canvas without writing framework code. You connect agents, tools, knowledge bases, and logic nodes, then deploy the result to an API, MCP server, email, or embeddable chat widget. The platform includes a visual agent builder with support for deep agents that can spawn sub-agents, a workflow builder with typed edges and a live playground, knowledge management with RAG and a search debugger, and generative UI components that render in sandboxed iframes. Observability is built in with span waterfalls showing latency, tokens, and cost per run. For local development it runs on SQLite and embedded Chroma with no external services; production swaps to Postgres with pgvector and Redis via config. Authentication supports built-in accounts, OAuth2, API keys, and MCP OAuth 2.1. The project is MIT-licensed with no proprietary dependencies.

Should you self-host Forge?

Forge scores 43/100 on selfhost.directory (how scoring works) and ranks #153 of 209 in AI Agents. It has 175 GitHub stars.

There was no stable release in the past 12 months, so check the repository's recent activity before you rely on it.

Setup is advanced: plan for several services and some ongoing maintenance. It is MIT-licensed and written mostly in Python.

Its closest alternative on selfhost.directory is Orca (91/100, 108 739 stars). It scores higher overall, so compare the two before you pick. See Forge vs Orca side by side.

Features

Auth Providers
Email channel
Embeddable web widget
Evaluations
Generative UI Components
Guardrails & Egress
Human in the Loop
Import / Export
Knowledge & RAG
MCP Server
Observability & Traces
Run API
Triggers
Visual Agent Builder
Visual Workflow Builder

How to configure Forge

ANTHROPIC_API_KEYAnthropic API key
Anthropic API key
values: sk-ant-...
FORGE_BOOTSTRAP_ADMIN_EMAILyou@forge.localBootstrap admin email
Bootstrap admin email
values: email address
FORGE_BOOTSTRAP_ADMIN_PASSWORDforge-adminBootstrap admin password
Bootstrap admin password
values: password
FORGE_CHECKPOINT_BACKENDCheckpoint backend for run durability
Checkpoint backend for run durability
values: sqlite, postgres
FORGE_CONNECTOR_OAUTH_APPSVendor OAuth app credentials for connectors
Vendor OAuth app credentials for connectors
values: JSON object
FORGE_DATABASE_URLDatabase connection URL
Database connection URL
values: postgresql+asyncpg://... or sqlite
FORGE_DEFAULT_MODELfake:echoDefault model for agent runs
Default model for agent runs
values: model identifier
FORGE_DEFAULT_TOKEN_CTX_KEYDeployment-wide fallback for per-user auth provider token context key
Deployment-wide fallback for per-user auth provider token context key
values: string
FORGE_ENVIRONMENTdevelopmentEnvironment mode (development or production)
Environment mode (development or production)
values: development, production
FORGE_JWT_SECRETdev-insecure-change-meJWT secret for authentication
JWT secret for authentication
values: strong random value
FORGE_MCP_OAUTH_ENABLEDtrueEnable MCP OAuth 2.1
Enable MCP OAuth 2.1
values: true, false
FORGE_PUBLIC_BASE_URLhttp://localhost:8000Public base URL for OAuth redirects and webhooks
Public base URL for OAuth redirects and webhooks
values: URL
FORGE_PUBLIC_CONSOLE_URLhttp://localhost:3000Public console URL
Public console URL
values: URL
FORGE_REDIS_URLRedis connection URL
Redis connection URL
values: redis://...
FORGE_SERVICE_API_TOKENStatic bearer token for server-to-server calls
Static bearer token for server-to-server calls
values: token
FORGE_VECTOR_BACKENDVector store backend
Vector store backend
values: chroma, pgvector
NEXT_PUBLIC_FORGE_API_URLhttp://localhost:8000Frontend API URL
Frontend API URL
values: URL
OPENAI_API_KEYOpenAI API key
OpenAI API key
values: sk-...
POSTGRES_PASSWORDforge-dev-pwPostgreSQL password
PostgreSQL password
values: password
RES_OPTIONSno-aaaaDNS resolver options (IPv6 suppression)
DNS resolver options (IPv6 suppression)
values: no-aaaa, empty