Running Chroma in Client-Server Mode ↗
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Documentation Index#
Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://docs.trychroma.com/llms.txt Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.
Chroma can also be configured to run in client/server mode. In this mode, the Chroma client connects to a Chroma server running in a separate process.
This means that you can deploy single-node Chroma to a Docker container, or a machine hosted by a cloud provider like AWS, GCP, Azure, and others. Then, you can access your Chroma server from your application using our HttpClient.
You can quickly experiment locally with Chroma in client/server mode by using our CLI:
chroma run --path /db_path
```
Then use the Chroma `HttpClient` to connect to the server:
```python
import chromadb
chroma_client = chromadb.HttpClient(host='localhost', port=8000)
```
Chroma also provides an `AsyncHttpClient`. The behaviors and method signatures are identical to the synchronous client, but all methods that would block are now async:
```python
import asyncio
import chromadb
async def main():
client = await chromadb.AsyncHttpClient()
collection = await client.create_collection(name="my_collection")
await collection.add(
documents=["hello world"],
ids=["id1"]
)
asyncio.run(main())
```
If you intend to deploy your Chroma server, you may want to consider our [thin-client package](./python-thin-client) for client-side interactions.
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<span class="tab-start" data-tab-title="TypeScript"></span>
Chroma can also be configured to run in client/server mode. In this mode, the Chroma client connects to a Chroma server running in a separate process.
This means that you can deploy single-node Chroma to a [Docker container](./docker), or a machine hosted by a cloud provider like [AWS](./aws), [GCP](./gcp), [Azure](./azure), and others. Then, you can access your Chroma server from your application using our `ChromaClient`.
You can quickly experiment locally with Chroma in client/server mode by using our CLI:
```terminal
chroma run --path /db_path
```
Then connect to the Chroma server from your program:
```typescript
import { ChromaClient } from "chromadb";
const client = new ChromaClient();
```
<span class="tab-end"></span>
<span class="tab-start" data-tab-title="Rust"></span>
Chroma can also be configured to run in client/server mode. In this mode, the Rust client connects to a Chroma server running in a separate process.
You can quickly experiment locally with Chroma in client/server mode by using our CLI:
```terminal
chroma run --path /db_path
```
Then connect to the Chroma server from your program:
```rust
use chroma::ChromaHttpClient;
let client = ChromaHttpClient::new(Default::default());
```
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<span class="tab-group-end"></span>Link last verified
June 7, 2026.
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Source: Chroma Docs
Link last verified: 2026-03-04