Your First Workflow

Register your first task and trigger its first run.

Render Workflows is in public beta.

During the beta, bugs or changes in API/SDK behavior are possible as we continue refining the product. We welcome any and all feedback at workflows-feedback@render.com.

Welcome to Render Workflows! Follow these steps to register your first task and trigger its first run.

1. Copy a starter template

Workflows currently support TypeScript and Python for defining tasks.

SDKs for additional languages are planned for future releases.

As part of creating a workflow, you'll link a GitHub/GitLab/Bitbucket repo that contains your task definitions.

To get started quickly, copy one of our basic templates on GitHub:

On the template page, click Use this template > Create a new repository to create your own repo with the template's contents.

The anatomy of a workflow

The following excerpts from the basic templates illustrate the bare minimum syntax for defining a workflow:

index.ts

typescript

import { task } from '@renderinc/sdk/workflows'

// Minimal task definition
const calculateSquare = task(
  { name: 'calculateSquare' },
  function calculateSquare(a: number): number {
    return a * a
  }
)

You import task from the Render SDK for TypeScript, which is the template's only dependency aside from TypeScript itself.
You define tasks by calling task(...) once for each, providing options and a function definition.
No additional initialization is required when using the TypeScript SDK.

main.py

python

from render_sdk import Workflows

app = Workflows()

# Minimal task definition
@app.task
def calculate_square(a: int) -> int:
  return a * a

if __name__ == "__main__":
  app.start() # Workflow entry point

You define a task by first initializing a Workflows app, then applying the @app.task decorator to any function.
You call app.start() on startup to initiate both task registration and run execution on Render.
The Workflows class is imported from the Render SDK for Python, which is the template's only dependency.

2. Create a workflow service

In the Render Dashboard, click New > Workflow:

The workflow creation form appears.
Link the GitHub/GitLab/Bitbucket repo with your workflow's task definitions.

Complete the remainder of the creation form. See guidance for important fields:

Field	Description
Language	Set to Node if you're using the TypeScript SDK. Set to Python 3 if you're using the Python SDK. Support for other languages is planned for future releases.
Region	Your workflow's task runs will execute in the specified region. This determines which of your other Render services they can reach over your private network.
Build Command	If you're using a Render-provided template, this is the following: bash npm install bash pip install -r requirements.txt Otherwise, provide the command that Render should use to install dependencies and build your code.
Start Command	If you're using a Render-provided template, this is the following: bash npm start bash python main.py Otherwise, provide the command that Render should use to start your workflow.

Click Deploy Workflow. Render kicks off your workflow's first build, which includes registering your tasks.

That's it! After the build completes, your tasks are officially registered. You can view them from your workflow's Tasks page in the Render Dashboard:

Viewing a registered task in the Render Dashboard

3. Trigger a task run

Now that we've registered a task, let's run it! The quickest way to trigger our first run is in the Render Dashboard:

From your workflow's Tasks page, click a task to open its Runs page.
Click Start Task in the top-right corner of the page:

A dialog appears for providing the task's input arguments:
Provide the task's input arguments as a JSON array (e.g., [5] for a task that takes a single integer argument, or [] for a task that takes zero arguments).
Click Start task.

Your new task run appears at the top of the Runs table.

Next steps

Congratulations! You've registered your first workflow task and triggered its first run. Now it's time to start designing your own tasks and triggering runs from application code:

Define advanced tasks with retries, chaining, and more.
Run your registered tasks from application code.
Test task runs locally for faster development.