Instant

Instant provides a real-time backend designed for AI-driven apps, offering auth, permissions, storage, presence, and streams to enable developers to ship apps with real-time capabilities directly from the terminal. It emphasizes a CLI-first workflow, no dashboards, and tight integration with AI models and LLMs for schema, permissions, and transactions.

Instant exposes a real-time backend that can be spun up via a CLI, creating a database, pushing schema, and building from the terminal. It includes end-to-end type safety with predefined types for schema, permissions, queries, and transactions, and aims to simplify developer workflows by reducing UI interactions. Features highlighted include authentication (multiple providers), a permissions system inspired by Zanzibar, declarative data models, real-time updates and offline support, built-in storage, and built-in undo for destructive actions. It also supports monetization integration (Stripe) for one-time purchases, subscriptions, or usage-based billing, and emphasizes AI-friendly data modeling and code generation for LLMS.

Who it’s for: AI-powered apps and developers building real-time frontends or agents that require a backend with real-time data, auth, storage, and permissions; teams prioritizing CLI-driven backends and AI-assisted development.

Backed by notable investors and YC-affiliated support; mentions of traction through developer testimonials and open-source/open-style ecosystem; growth signals include 1,000+ concurrent connections and discussions of real-time performance.