Three years ago, we launched Firebase Hosting to make it easier for developers to deliver fast, engaging experiences on the web. Two months ago, we launched the beta of Cloud Functions for Firebase to let developers write custom backend logic without having to worry about servers or infrastructure. More recently at Google I/O, we brought Firebase Hosting and Cloud Functions together to provide a flexible set of tools to build Progressive Web Apps with world-class scale and performance.
You can connect an HTTPS Cloud Function to your Firebase Hosting app by adding a rewrite to the firebase.json configuration for your project:
{
"hosting": {
"rewrites": [
{"source": "/function/**", "function":"myFunction"}
]
}
}
Once connected, matching requests seamlessly proxy to your Cloud Function (in the example above, a function named myFunction). This one-line change enables exciting new capabilities for Firebase Hosting users including:
- Server-Side Rendering. Until now, Firebase Hosting has only served static content. Now you can serve dynamic content using industry-standard libraries like Express, while still leveraging a lightning-fast global CDN cache.
- Custom APIs. With Cloud Functions and Firebase Hosting, you can create custom API endpoints on your own domain, avoiding the overhead of cross-origin requests. Plus, with a few extra lines of code you can authorize your endpoints through Firebase Auth.
- User-Generated Web Content. For the first time, Firebase Hosting can generate content compatible with AMP, Twitter Cards, and more without requiring a deploy. This means your Firebase Hosting apps can be more shareable and more searchable than ever before.
For Cloud Functions users, you can now run functions on an SSL-secured custom domain and get powerful caching to avoid unnecessary executions.
To get started using Cloud Functions on Firebase Hosting for your own Firebase project, take a look at our documentation. You can also learn more in our I/O session: Building Fast Web Experiences with Firebase Hosting.
