Next not found in deploying teh >Next project on the Azure App Service

Hi Habiba Asif,

Your Next.js app may deploy successfully to Azure App Service via GitHub Actions but still fail to load due to the error sh: 1: next: not found.

This happens because:

•  The server can't find the next CLI during startup
• The next package is likely listed under devDependencies instead of dependencies in your package.json
•  Azure App Service doesn't install devDependencies in production. As a result, when the app tries to run next start, it fails because the next command isn't available.

1). Move next to dependencies

Check your package.json and make sure that next, react, and react-dom are listed under dependencies instead of devDependencies.

"dependencies": {
  "next": "^13.5.2",
  "react": "^18.2.0",
  "react-dom": "^18.2.0"
}

Then run npm install

Configure a Node.js app for Azure App Service

2). Set NODE_ENV=production and install all dependencies

If you’re using GitHub Actions, make sure the build step installs all dependencies (not just production ones) or include next in your production dependencies. This way, your workflow will build and deploy correctly. Here’s an example:

- name: Install Dependencies
  run: npm install
- name: Build App
  run: npm run build
- name: Deploy to Azure Web App
  uses: azure/webapps-deploy@v2
  with:
    app-name: 'your-app-name'
    slot-name: 'production'
    publish-profile: ${{ secrets.AZURE_WEBAPP_PUBLISH_PROFILE }}
    package: .

3). Check your start script in package.json

Here’s how to use the next CLI, and since Azure App Service provides a PORT variable automatically.

"scripts": {
  "dev": "next dev",
  "build": "next build",
  "start": "next start -p $PORT"
}

After updating package.json, commit and push your changes to GitHub to start the GitHub Actions redeployment. When deployment is complete, restart your Azure App Service from the Azure Portal to make sure everything is running smoothly.

Deploy to Azure App Service by using GitHub Actions

Everything was configured as you described, I changed the start command to "./node_modules/next/dist/bin/next start", It is now not giving the next not found error but it is not also showing me the website I am seeing this

It is showing the website page for split second then show authentication error. I have added teh MS Entra as the auth in my app service and assigned the app registration with the following permissions

This app was successfully deployed once but then it crashed and gave the next not found error since then it was showing next error now it is showing auth error in the previous successful deployment it didn't require the auth