Deploy Your First App: Hello World on Cloud Run & App Engine

Ready to deploy your first app on Google Cloud Platform? In this tutorial, we’ll guide you through deploying a basic “Hello World” web app using two powerful GCP services: Cloud Run and App Engine. Both options are serverless and ideal for beginners.

1. Prerequisites

• A GCP project with billing enabled
• gcloud CLI installed and initialized
• Docker installed (for Cloud Run)
• A simple app (we’ll use Python Flask as an example)

2. Hello World with Cloud Run

Step 1: Create Your App

# main.py
from flask import Flask
app = Flask(__name__)

@app.route('/')
def hello():
    return "Hello from Cloud Run!"

# requirements.txt
flask

Step 2: Create a Dockerfile

# Dockerfile
FROM python:3.11-slim
WORKDIR /app
COPY . .
RUN pip install -r requirements.txt
CMD ["python", "main.py"]

Step 3: Build and Deploy

gcloud builds submit --tag gcr.io/YOUR_PROJECT_ID/hello-app
gcloud run deploy hello-app \
  --image gcr.io/YOUR_PROJECT_ID/hello-app \
  --platform managed \
  --region us-central1 \
  --allow-unauthenticated

Once deployed, Cloud Run will return a public HTTPS URL where your app is live!

3. Hello World with App Engine

Step 1: Create Your App

You can reuse the same main.py and requirements.txt as above. Add:

# app.yaml (App Engine config)
runtime: python311
entrypoint: python main.py

handlers:
- url: /.*
  script: auto

Step 2: Deploy to App Engine

gcloud app create --region=us-central
gcloud app deploy

After deployment, your app will be live at https://PROJECT_ID.REGION_ID.r.appspot.com.

4. Summary

Both Cloud Run and App Engine make deploying a simple app incredibly fast and easy. Use Cloud Run if you prefer working with containers and want flexibility, or App Engine for a more opinionated, code-first PaaS approach.

Next Steps

• Add environment variables or configs
• Connect a custom domain
• Add authentication via Firebase or IAM
• Explore CI/CD with Cloud Build or GitHub Actions