Tutorial

Deploy your first canister on the Internet Computer in under 10 minutes.

Prerequisites

Install icp-cli and the toolchain for your canister language.

Install icp-cli

Via Homebrew (macOS):

brew install dfinity/tap/icp-cli

From source:

git clone https://github.com/dfinity/icp-cli.git
cd icp-cli && cargo build --release
export PATH=$(pwd)/target/release:$PATH

For detailed installation options, see the Installation Guide.

Language Toolchains

Install the toolchain for the language you’ll use:

• Rust canisters: Rust and rustup target add wasm32-unknown-unknown
• Motoko canisters: mops and mops toolchain init

Verify Installation

icp --version

Create a Project

icp new my-project

Select a template when prompted, then enter the project directory:

cd my-project

Your project contains:

• icp.yaml — Project configuration
• src/ — Source code
• README.md — Project-specific instructions

Start the Local Network

icp network start -d

This starts a local Internet Computer network in the background.

Deploy

icp deploy

This single command:

1. Builds your source code into WebAssembly (WASM)
2. Creates a canister on the local network
3. Installs your WASM code

Tip: You can also run icp build separately if you want to verify compilation before deploying.

Interact with Your Canister

First, find your canister name:

icp canister list

Then call a method on it (replace <canister-name> with your actual canister name):

icp canister call <canister-name> greet '("World")'

You should see: ("Hello, World!")

Stop the Network

When you’re done:

icp network stop

Next Steps

You’ve deployed your first canister. Now:

• Core Concepts — Understand how icp-cli works
• Local Development — Learn the day-to-day workflow

Browse all documentation →