# Deployment

This section covers everything you need to deploy an Apache Pinot cluster, from bootstrapping your first ZooKeeper-connected cluster through configuring tables, ingestion pipelines, and component-level settings. Use these guides to stand up Pinot in any environment -- bare metal, VMs, or containers -- before moving on to production hardening.

## When to use these guides

* You are deploying Pinot for the first time outside of the quickstart.
* You need to start individual Pinot components (controller, broker, server) with custom configuration files.
* You are setting up tables, schemas, and ingestion jobs against a running cluster.
* You want to optimize your configuration using the recommendation engine or decouple the controller from the real-time data path.

## Prerequisites

* Java 21 or later installed (or Docker if using container-based deployment).
* A running Apache ZooKeeper ensemble (three nodes recommended for production).
* Access to a deep store (local filesystem for development; S3, GCS, HDFS, or ADLS for production).
* The Pinot binary distribution downloaded from [pinot.apache.org/download](https://pinot.apache.org/download) or the official Docker image.

## Child pages

### Cluster setup

[Set up a Pinot cluster](/operate-pinot/deployment/setup-cluster.md) walks through creating a cluster namespace and starting controller, broker, and server instances.

### Advanced Pinot setup

[Advanced Pinot Setup](/operate-pinot/deployment/advanced-pinot-setup.md) provides step-by-step instructions for starting each Pinot component individually using Docker or launcher scripts, configuring components with custom config files, creating batch and streaming tables, and loading data.

### Server startup status checkers

[Server Startup Status Checkers](/operate-pinot/deployment/server-startup-status-checkers.md) explains readiness and liveness health checks, static consumption wait, offset-based and freshness-based segment checkers, and recommended configurations for QA and production environments.

### Table setup

[Set up a table](/operate-pinot/deployment/setup-table.md) links to table creation instructions including schema design, table configuration, and index settings.

### Ingestion setup

[Set up ingestion](/operate-pinot/deployment/setup-ingestion.md) covers creating segments and running batch data ingestion jobs to load data into your tables.

### Decoupling controller from the data path

[Decoupling Controller from the Data Path](/operate-pinot/deployment/decoupling-controller-from-the-data-path.md) explains how to bypass the controller during real-time segment completion by uploading completed segments directly to deep store, and how to enable peer download for failure recovery.

### Command-line interface (CLI)

[CLI Reference](/operate-pinot/deployment/cli.md) documents every `pinot-admin.sh` command -- from `AddSchema` and `AddTable` through `RebalanceTable`, `LaunchDataIngestionJob`, and cluster validation utilities.

### Configuration recommendation engine

[Configuration Recommendation Engine](/operate-pinot/deployment/configuration-recommendation-engine.md) describes the rule-based engine accessible via the controller REST API that recommends optimal index, partitioning, segment size, and real-time provisioning settings based on your schema, query patterns, and workload characteristics.

## Next step

Once your cluster is deployed and serving data, harden it for production use. See [Production Guides](/operate-pinot/production-guides.md) for capacity planning, health checks, graceful operations, and disaster recovery.


---

# Agent Instructions: Querying This Documentation

If you need additional information that is not directly available in this page, you can query the documentation dynamically by asking a question.

Perform an HTTP GET request on the current page URL with the `ask` query parameter:

```
GET https://docs.pinot.apache.org/operate-pinot/deployment.md?ask=<question>
```

The question should be specific, self-contained, and written in natural language.
The response will contain a direct answer to the question and relevant excerpts and sources from the documentation.

Use this mechanism when the answer is not explicitly present in the current page, you need clarification or additional context, or you want to retrieve related documentation sections.