# What is Resta

> Resta is an open-source, self-hosted server for many small SQL databases, one per user, tenant or agent, queried with the Turso client libraries.

Source: https://resta.dev/docs/introduction · Updated 2026-11-01

**Resta is an open-source server you host yourself that runs many small SQL databases side by side.** Your backend creates a database per user, tenant, agent or task through an HTTP API, gets a URL and a token for it, and your app queries it with the official Turso client libraries. Resta is MIT-licensed and runs from one Docker Compose file, on any server with Docker or on Coolify.

## When to use it

Resta fits when your data splits naturally into many independent pieces:

- **A database per customer** in a B2B app, so one customer's data never sits in another's tables, and you can back up, restore or delete one customer at a time.
- **A database per end user** for local-first or per-user apps.
- **A database per AI agent or task**, created when the agent starts and dropped when it is done.
- **Throwaway databases** for previews, tests or demos.

It is less suited to one large shared database with heavy cross-tenant queries. Use Postgres for that.

## How it works

| Piece | What it does |
|---|---|
| **API** | Creates and deletes databases, issues tokens, manages API keys and backups |
| **Node** | Stores every database as its own SQLite-format file and answers SQL over HTTP |
| **Dashboard** | A web UI for the same things, with a SQL console |
| **Gateway** | Serves all of the above on one domain |
| **Postgres** | Holds metadata: the account, API keys and the database list |

A database costs a directory on disk until it is first written. It opens on the first query and closes after 5 minutes idle, so a server can hold many more databases than it has memory for.

## What it is built on

Resta uses [Turso](https://github.com/tursodatabase/turso), an SQLite-compatible database engine written in Rust. Databases use the SQLite dialect and file format, and the server speaks Turso's "SQL over HTTP" protocol. The official `@tursodatabase/serverless` JavaScript client is tested against it.

## What it is not

- **Not a hosted service.** You run it. There is no Resta cloud.
- **Not multi-user.** Each server has one account (the super user) plus API keys. There are no roles or teams.
- **Not replicated.** One node on one machine. Backups protect your data; there is no failover.

## Status

Resta is early. The engine is pre-1.0, and the project has not had a public release yet. Install instructions will appear here when it does.

Next: [Quickstart](https://resta.dev/docs/quickstart).