Set up Kiln

From "static files on your laptop" to "a site your client edits in the browser."

⏱ About 10 minutes. Everything below is free. You'll need a GitHub account and a Cloudflare account (both free to create).

The easy way — one command. Run this in your site's folder and the wizard does every scriptable step itself, opening the right page and waiting whenever a platform requires a human click (there are exactly three):

npx github:erikkurtu/kiln

Already set up? Health-check everything with npx github:erikkurtu/kiln doctor. The steps below are the same thing, by hand.

1Put your site on GitHub + Cloudflare Pages

Push your static site (plain HTML/CSS/JS — hand-written or AI-generated) to a GitHub repository.
In the Cloudflare dashboard: Workers & Pages → Create → Pages → Connect to Git → pick your repo → leave build command empty, output directory / → Deploy.
Your site is now live at yourproject.pages.dev, and every Git commit auto-deploys. That auto-deploy is Kiln's publish button.

Hosting note: use Cloudflare Pages (or GitHub Pages) for business sites. Vercel's free Hobby tier prohibits commercial use in its terms.

2Free or Cloud? (same editor either way)

Kiln Open Source — free forever. You self-host the small auth engine: one free Cloudflare Worker of your own plus a one-click GitHub App. That's what this guide (and the wizard) sets up. The price of free is these ten minutes; you trust no one but yourself.

Kiln Cloud — hosted, paid (invite-only beta). We run the engine; you skip the rest of this step entirely. Your content still lives in your repo and your hosting, so you can switch to self-hosting whenever you like. Request a beta invite.

git clone https://github.com/erikkurtu/kiln && cd kiln
npm install
cd worker
npx wrangler kv namespace create KILN   # paste the printed id into wrangler.toml
npx wrangler deploy

Note the worker URL it prints (like https://kiln-auth.yourname.workers.dev).

3Register your GitHub App — one click

Open https://YOUR-WORKER.workers.dev/setup and press the button. The app is registered under your account and the worker captures its credentials automatically — you never copy a secret.
On the page that follows, click Install, choose Only select repositories, and pick your site's repo. This is the security model: Kiln can only ever touch repos you explicitly select.

4Allow your site's origin

In worker/wrangler.toml, add your site URL to ALLOWED_ORIGINS (comma-separated), then run npx wrangler deploy again.

5Make your site editable

Create /assets/kiln-config.js in your site:

window.KILN = {
  repo:   'you/your-site-repo',
  branch: 'main',
  worker: 'https://kiln-auth.yourname.workers.dev',
  styles: [ { label: 'Accent', class: 'accent' } ],  // optional editor style palette
};

Copy dist/kiln.js and dist/kiln-editor.js from the Kiln repo into your site's /assets/, then add two script tags at the end of <body> on every page:

<script src="/assets/kiln-config.js"></script>
<script src="/assets/kiln.js" defer></script>

Then annotate what's editable:

<h1 data-cms="headline">Welcome</h1>
<img data-cms="hero" data-cms-attr="src" src="/img/hero.jpg">
<div class="cards" data-cms-repeat="services"> …repeatable blocks… </div>
<div class="nav-links" data-cms-menu="main"> …site menu… </div>

Using AI? Skip the manual work: paste KILN_PROMPT.md into Claude / v0 / Lovable along with your site, and it wires all of this — annotations, blog templates, the members area — for you.

6Sign in and edit

Push everything. After the deploy, visit yoursite.com/#edit — that's the secret knock. No edit buttons clutter your site for normal visitors.
Choose Continue with GitHub (you're the owner), click any outlined text, type, and hit Publish on the floating Kiln button. ~A minute later it's live.

Optional: editors & members with Google sign-in

Let your client, team, or community in — no GitHub accounts:

Create a Google OAuth client (console.cloud.google.com → Credentials → OAuth client ID → Web application) with redirect URI https://YOUR-WORKER.workers.dev/google/callback.
printf 'ID' | npx wrangler secret put GOOGLE_CLIENT_ID and same for GOOGLE_CLIENT_SECRET (run in worker/).
In your Kiln menu → People & access: add their Gmail, pick Editor or Member, set how many days access lasts (1–360). They sign in with Google. Done.

Optional: members-only area with gated documents

Copy the demo/functions/ folder and demo/members-login.html from the Kiln repo into your site.

Set two secrets on your Pages project:

openssl rand -hex 32 | npx wrangler pages secret put KILN_MEMBER_SECRET --project-name YOUR_PROJECT
printf 'you/your-repo' | npx wrangler pages secret put KILN_REPO --project-name YOUR_PROJECT
printf 'https://YOUR-WORKER.workers.dev' | npx wrangler pages secret put KILN_WORKER --project-name YOUR_PROJECT

Everything under /members/ — pages and files, PDFs included — is now invite-only.

Optional: blog & new pages

Add three small template files and Kiln's ＋ New button does the rest — see the README section or let KILN_PROMPT.md generate them.

That's the whole stack.

A GitHub repo, a free static host, one tiny worker — and a site that edits itself. No database to patch, no monthly bill, no platform that owns your content. Questions or stuck? Open an issue.