TL;DR

supabase start runs the local stack in Docker containers. It's the most complete option, and the heaviest.

You can wire Postgres, PostgREST and auth together natively, but then you own the orchestration.

Single-process, Supabase-compatible backends now exist. They keep supabase-js unchanged but cover a subset of features.

Pick based on which Supabase features your app actually uses.

Option 1: The Supabase CLI (Docker)

This is the official path. supabase start boots Postgres, auth, the REST API, realtime, storage, Studio and supporting services as containers.

It's the closest match to hosted Supabase, which is its biggest strength. The cost is resources. In a benchmark published on Apple Silicon (macOS 15), the Docker stack is described as 12 containers, about 2.3 GB installed, and around 1.6 GB of memory . On a 32 GB workstation you won't notice.…