Secrets management for serverless & edge functions

End-to-end encrypted environment variables for Lambda, Cloud Functions, Workers, and any edge runtime, without committing a .env file.

Serverless and edge functions need secrets at runtime but have no persistent disk and no place to keep a .env file. Envless solves this by encrypting variable values client-side before they ever reach the server, then delivering them to your functions through a CLI, REST API, or a typed SDK for TypeScript, Node, Bun, and Deno, plus a REST API for every other language. You manage one source of truth per environment, local, staging, production, CI, with versioning, an attributed change history on every variable, and role-based access control. Pull secrets at deploy time or load them at cold start, and keep plaintext off the server entirely.

Where Serverless & Edge secrets get painful

  • Serverless platforms have no disk to store a .env file, so secrets get pasted into provider dashboards or hardcoded into deploy scripts.
  • Edge runtimes (Workers, Deno Deploy, Vercel/Netlify Edge) run a constrained JS environment where Node-only secrets tooling often does not work.
  • Cold starts and short-lived containers mean every function instance must fetch and decrypt secrets quickly, without a long-running agent.
  • Spreading config across function-level environment variables makes rotation, auditing, and keeping staging in sync with production error-prone.

Manage secrets for Serverless & Edge with Envless

  1. 1

    Create an environment and add encrypted variables

    Define a project and separate environments (local, staging, production, CI). Values are encrypted on your device before upload, so the server only ever stores ciphertext and decryption needs a passphrase it never holds. 

    envless pull --env production
  2. 2

    Inject secrets at deploy or build time

    For platforms that bake env vars at deploy, pull decrypted values in your build/deploy step and hand them to the provider. Nothing plaintext is committed to the repo or stored at rest in Envless. 

    envless run -- npm run deploy
  3. 3

    Load secrets at runtime with a typed SDK

    For Node, Bun, and Deno functions, load variables at cold start with the SDK for your runtime. Use the REST API with a Bearer key from edge runtimes where an SDK is not available. 

    import "@goenvless/env/register";
import { env } from "@goenvless/env/server";
  4. 4

    Scope access with roles and scoped keys

    Give CI a read-only API key limited to the projects it builds, and let workspace roles decide what each teammate can read or change. Private products stay visible only to the members you grant, and sign-in is passwordless, so there is no reusable password to leak.

  5. 5

    Rotate and track changes from one source of truth

    Update a value once and re-sync your functions. Versioning and the attributed per-variable history record every change, and each change can be delivered to your own systems as a signed webhook, so rotations and incident reviews are traceable.

Serverless & Edge secrets FAQ

Common questions about using Envless with this stack.

Yes. Use the typed SDKs for Node, Bun, and Deno where supported, and the REST API at api.envless.cloud with a Bearer API key from constrained edge runtimes. You can also pull and inject values at deploy time so functions read them from the platform's own environment.

Variable values are encrypted client-side on your device before upload, so the server stores only ciphertext and never sees plaintext. Traffic is encrypted with TLS in transit, decryption needs the workspace passphrase the server never holds, and encrypted copies are stored redundantly for durability.

Keep each as a separate environment under one project. Every environment and teammate reads from the same encrypted source of truth, so the next sync or run picks up a new value, and workspace roles control who can read or change variables. Versioning and the attributed per-variable history track every change.

Yes. Pull values with the CLI during your deploy step, or load them at cold start through an SDK or the REST API. Envless becomes the single source of truth instead of per-function dashboard fields, which makes rotation and auditing far simpler.

Get Started

Ship secrets, not chaos.

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