App vs Site — Which to Use

Published · Last updated: May 2026 · 2 min read

Who this is for

Users who are not sure whether to create an App or a Site in CloudAIPilot for their project.

The Short Answer

Use Site when...	Use App when...
You are deploying a traditional web app (WordPress, PHP, HTML)	You are deploying a Dockerized application
Your app runs directly on the server (PHP-FPM, Node via PM2)	Your app runs inside Docker containers
You want managed WordPress with a click	You have a `docker-compose.yml` or a Docker image
Your stack is LAMP/LEMP	Your app is Node.js, Python, Go, Ruby, or any language running in a container

What Is a Site?

A Site is a web application provisioned directly on the server using the server's installed stack (Nginx + PHP-FPM + MySQL, etc.). CloudAIPilot manages the Nginx vhost, database, and file permissions for you.

Sites are best for:

WordPress installations
PHP applications (Laravel, CodeIgniter)
Static HTML sites

Sites live in /var/www/ or a similar document root and are served directly by Nginx.

What Is an App?

An App is a workload running inside Docker on the server. CloudAIPilot manages Docker container lifecycles (pull, run, stop, restart), optionally behind an Nginx reverse proxy.

Apps support two kinds:

Container (appKind: container): a single Docker image
Compose (appKind: compose): a multi-container docker-compose.yml

And three sources:

Docker Hub / registry (source: docker): pull a pre-built image
Git (source: git): build from source code
Upload (source: upload): deploy from a local .tar.gz or .zip archive

Feature Comparison

Feature	Site	App
WordPress auto-install	Yes	No
PHP-FPM management	Yes	No (use PHP in Docker)
SSL (Let's Encrypt)	Yes	Yes
Custom domain	Yes	Yes
SFTP access	Yes	No
File Manager	Yes	No
Docker container management	No	Yes
Multi-container (Compose)	No	Yes
Git deploy with Dockerfile	No	Yes
Port mapping (host:container)	No	Yes
Resource limits (CPU/RAM)	No	Yes
Deployment history	Yes (via Plans)	Yes (via AppDeployments)

Can I Run Both on the Same Server?

Yes. Sites and Apps can coexist on the same server. Each has its own domain, Nginx vhost, and port allocation.