Current limitations

Automaton is early. These are the specific things to know before you rely on it.

Platform

x86_64 Linux only. Ubuntu and Debian 12 are supported (apt, systemd, Docker Engine) for the server and the Runner host. Other x86_64 Linux with systemd and Docker may work but is untested, and you install Docker yourself. ARM and fully offline or private-only installs are not supported yet.
Public DNS and HTTPS. The server needs two DNS records (example.com and *.example.com, DNS only) and public ports 80, 443 and 5671.
A Runner is the agent you install on a server to run apps. With one Runner, automaton deploy uses it automatically; with several you pick one per app. There is no automatic balancing.
No high availability. The API, database and each Runner run on single machines. A machine that goes down takes its apps with it until you restore it.
No autoscaling or cross-region failover. Each app runs where it is assigned.
Open streams and WebSockets are capped per app. Server-Sent Events and WebSockets work, but one app holds at most 20 at a time and an idle one closes after five minutes.
Routing at large scale is unvalidated. The proxy configuration holds per-app rules and is regenerated on change; behavior with thousands of apps has not been measured (see the self-hosted core notes).

Updates cause brief interruptions. An update replaces the API, Worker, Studio and the app store; they can be unavailable for a short time.
Updates are not fully automatic. Infrastructure changes and Runner-machine upgrades are separate steps you run.
Backups need an off-site copy. Nightly backups of the database and keys (not your apps' data files) are kept for 7 days on the server. An off-site backup app is available from the catalog, but you must install and configure it or arrange your own off-site copies.

Built for people you trust. Public multi-tenant hosting is out of scope. Two-user isolation and restart checks passed on the test server (#521); that does not make the platform suitable for hosting strangers' code.
No self sign-up. Users are added by an administrator.
The Runner is trusted. The Runner controls the machine's Docker, so treat Runner machines as part of your trusted base. See the security overview.

The standalone CLI needs no .NET. Only the NuGet tool (dotnet tool install) needs the .NET 10 SDK or later; standalone builds cover Linux x64/arm64, macOS x64/arm64 and Windows x64.

We update this page as these are fixed. See the roadmap for what is planned.