No always-on machine? Use a small VPS

brnrd runs as a background daemon on hardware you own. If your laptop sleeps when you close the lid, the daemon sleeps with it — there is no “always on” without a machine that stays on. A Mac mini or a home server both work; so does the smallest tier of any VPS provider, usually $4–6/month (Hetzner, DigitalOcean, Vultr, and similar all sell one — check current pricing, it moves). This page is the same install as Install, run over SSH instead of a local terminal, plus the two steps that are specific to a headless box.

Nothing below is a brnrd-specific product — it’s a normal small Linux VPS running brnrd the same way it would run any other daemon.

1. Get a box and SSH in

Any small Ubuntu or Debian instance works. brnrd itself only needs git and Python 3.10+ (the npm and uv install routes provision Python for you if it’s missing — see Install → “The Python part”). A stock Ubuntu image already has both, or close enough that the installer’s fallback handles the gap.

ssh you@your-vps-ip

2. Install a coding-agent CLI, and authenticate it

brnrd drives Claude Code, Codex, or Grok — it doesn’t replace them, so one has to be on the box first, authenticated with your own subscription or API key.

Headless auth is CLI-specific — not fully verified here

Each CLI’s normal login flow opens a browser on the same machine. A VPS has no browser. As of this writing, each vendor has some path around that — pasting a printed login URL into a browser on your phone or laptop, or an API-key environment variable — but the exact flag and prompts change between CLI versions. Run claude --help, codex --help, or grok --help on the box and follow its own headless-login instructions; this guide doesn’t reproduce them because they weren’t re-verified for this page.

3. Install brnrd

curl -LsSf https://hugimuni-labs.github.io/brnrd/install.sh | sh
# or: uv tool install brnrd
# or: npm install -g brnrd     # if you have Node
brnrd --version

4. Run the loom

brnrd loom install                      # a systemd --user unit; ends with a receipt
brnrd setup --home ~/brnrd              # pair a channel, e.g. Telegram

The unit runs python -m brr.loom.runtime loom --home ~/brnrd with the Python brnrd is installed in, under the PATH of the shell you installed it from. With body unset, install picks the first of claude and codex that answers with quota left and writes it to ~/brnrd/loom/config.toml. brnrd loom logs follows its output. On a box you log out of, keep the user manager alive past logout with sudo loginctl enable-linger $USER. uv tool upgrade brnrd upgrades it; the loom re-execs itself on the new files. More in Install → “Run the loom”.

The daemon instead

The earlier runtime still works: bare brnrd is its guided setup. It pairs this VPS with your brnrd account and prints a pairing link. Open that link on your phone or laptop; it is a link you approve, not a localhost callback. Prefer no account? brnrd gate setup telegram && brnrd daemon install wires a self-hosted Telegram gate directly (see Connect). Run the loom or the daemon, not both.

What you don’t need to open

Self-hosted Telegram polls Telegram for updates (getUpdates) instead of receiving a webhook, so it needs outbound internet access only — no inbound firewall rule or open port to configure for that gate. (Other gates may differ; this guide only checks the one most people reach for first.)

Next

Send your first task — from the VPS this works exactly like it does anywhere else; the daemon doesn’t know or care that its machine happens to be rented by the hour.