---
title: "Environment Variables"
description: "Any environment variables used in your tasks need to be added so the deployed code will run successfully."
---

An environment variable in Node.js is accessed in your code using `process.env.MY_ENV_VAR`.

We deploy your tasks and scale them up and down when they are triggered. So any environment variables you use in your tasks need to accessible to us so your code will run successfully.

## In the dashboard

### Setting environment variables

<Steps>

<Step title="Go to the Environment Variables page">
  In the sidebar select the "Environment Variables" page, then press the "New environment variable"
  button. ![Environment variables page](/images/environment-variables-page.jpg)
</Step>

<Step title="Add your environment variables">
  You can add values for your local dev environment, staging and prod. ![Environment variables
  page](/images/environment-variables-panel.jpg)
</Step>

</Steps>

<Note>
  Specifying Dev values is optional. They will be overriden by values in your .env file when running
  locally.
</Note>

### Editing environment variables

You can edit an environment variable's values. You cannot edit the key name, you must delete and create a new one.

<Steps>

<Step title="Press the action button on a variable">
  ![Environment variables page](/images/environment-variables-actions.png)
</Step>

<Step title="Press edit">
  ![Environment variables page](/images/environment-variables-edit-popover.png)
</Step>

</Steps>

### Deleting environment variables

<Warn>
  Environment variables are fetched and injected before a runs begins. So if you delete one you can
  cause runs to fail that are expecting variables to be set.
</Warn>

<Steps>

<Step title="Press the action button on a variable">
  ![Environment variables page](/images/environment-variables-actions.png)
</Step>

<Step title="Press delete">
  This will immediately delete the variable. ![Environment variables
  page](/images/environment-variables-delete-popover.png)
</Step>

</Steps>

## In your code

You can use our SDK to get and manipulate environment variables. You can also easily sync environment variables from another service into Trigger.dev.

### Directly manipulating environment variables

We have a complete set of SDK functions (and REST API) you can use to directly manipulate environment variables.

| Function                                              | Description                                                 |
| ----------------------------------------------------- | ----------------------------------------------------------- |
| [envvars.list()](/management/envvars/list)         | List all environment variables                              |
| [envvars.upload()](/management/envvars/import)     | Upload multiple env vars. You can override existing values. |
| [envvars.create()](/management/envvars/create)     | Create a new environment variable                           |
| [envvars.retrieve()](/management/envvars/retrieve) | Retrieve an environment variable                            |
| [envvars.update()](/management/envvars/update)     | Update a single environment variable                        |
| [envvars.del()](/management/envvars/delete)        | Delete a single environment variable                        |

### Sync env vars from another service

You could use the SDK functions above but it's much easier to use our `resolveEnvVars` function in your `trigger.config` file.

In this example we're using env vars from [Infisical](https://infisical.com).

```ts /trigger.config.ts
import type { TriggerConfig, ResolveEnvironmentVariablesFunction } from "@trigger.dev/sdk/v3";

//This runs when you run the deploy command or the dev command
export const resolveEnvVars: ResolveEnvironmentVariablesFunction = async ({
  //the project ref (starting with "proj_")
  projectRef,
  //any existing env vars from a .env file or Trigger.dev
  env,
  //"dev", "staging", or "prod"
  environment,
}) => {
  //the existing environment variables from Trigger.dev (or your local .env file)
  if (env.INFISICAL_CLIENT_ID === undefined || env.INFISICAL_CLIENT_SECRET === undefined) {
    //returning undefined won't modify the existing env vars
    return;
  }

  const client = new InfisicalClient({
    clientId: env.INFISICAL_CLIENT_ID,
    clientSecret: env.INFISICAL_CLIENT_SECRET,
  });

  const secrets = await client.listSecrets({
    environment,
    projectId: env.INFISICAL_PROJECT_ID!,
  });

  return {
    variables: secrets.map((secret) => ({
      name: secret.secretKey,
      value: secret.secretValue,
    })),
    // this defaults to true
    // override: true,
  };
};

//the rest of your config file
export const config: TriggerConfig = {
  project: "proj_1234567890",
  //etc
};
```

#### Local development

When you [develop locally](/cli-dev) `resolveEnvVars()` will inject the env vars from [Infisical](https://infisical.com) into your local `process.env`.

#### Deploy

When you run the [CLI deploy command](/cli-deploy) directly or using [GitHub Actions](/github-actions) it will sync the environment variables from [Infisical](https://infisical.com) to Trigger.dev. This means they'll appear on the Environment Variables page so you can confirm that it's worked.

This means that you need to redeploy your Trigger.dev tasks if you change the environment variables in [Infisical](https://infisical.com).

### The variables return type

You can return `variables` as an object with string keys and values, or an array of names + values.

```ts
return {
  variables: {
    MY_ENV_VAR: "my value",
    MY_OTHER_ENV_VAR: "my other value",
  },
};
```

or

```ts
return {
  variables: [
    {
      name: "MY_ENV_VAR",
      value: "my value",
    },
    {
      name: "MY_OTHER_ENV_VAR",
      value: "my other value",
    },
  ],
};
```

This should mean that for most secret services you won't need to convert the data into a different format.