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Getting Started

Get Started with FlowFuse — Fast

Find the product that fits how you work, then follow a step-by-step guide to your first application. New to FlowFuse? There's a quick tour of how it all works further down.

Find your productI know my product
01
Start here

Find Your Product

FlowFuse comes in three products for three jobs. Answer four quick questions and we'll point you to the right one — then take you straight to its get-started guide. Already know? Skip ahead and pick it below.

Question 1 of 4
Where does most of your data come from?
02
Edge · Hub · Fleet

Get Started

Pick your product and follow the steps to your first running application. Each guide points to the exact starting materials for that path.

Choose your product
OT & digitalization teams

Connect the machines on your plant floor and standardize automation across every site.

  1. 1
    Install the Device Agent

    Install the Device Agent on your edge hardware — an industrial PC, a Raspberry Pi, whatever runs on the floor.

    Device Agent quickstart
  2. 2
    Register your device

    It appears in your team as a remote instance, managed from the same place as everything else.

  3. 3
    Connect your machines

    Use OT-certified nodes — OPC-UA, Modbus, EtherNet/IP — to read PLCs and sensors, and build your edge app.

  4. 4
    Standardize and roll out

    Snapshot a working app and deploy it across every line and site.

Starting materials
Edge overview Device Agent docs Blueprints Talk to sales
New to FlowFuse?

How It All Works

A five-minute tour of what FlowFuse is and how the pieces fit together — handy before you build, and here whenever you want it.

03
The Big Idea

What FlowFuse Is

FlowFuse is the industrial application platform — the place you build the applications that actually run your operation. It sits on top of the data and machines you already have, and unlike a closed product, it's open and yours to own.

What You Build
Your ApplicationsOEE, dashboards, integrations, alerts, MES-style apps
You Own This
The Platform
FlowFusebuild · deploy · govern — on managed Node-RED
What You Already Have
Your Data & MachinesPLCs, sensors, brokers, historians, ERPs

Why That's Different

Open, Not a Black Box
Built on open-source Node-RED. You can see and change how everything works.
Yours to Own
Run it on your infrastructure or ours. Your flows are portable — no lock-in.
The Layer Above Your Data
It sits on top of the brokers, historians and machines you already run.
Go deeper · technical reference
The technical documentation covers the how-to in detail.
Foundations
04
The Building Blocks

The Pieces You Build With

Every FlowFuse application — however big — is assembled from the same six pieces. Learn these and you understand the whole platform.

The Six Pieces

Instances
Your Node-RED runtimes — in the cloud, on your server, or on edge hardware. Same platform, wherever they live.
Team Broker
A shared message bus — your Unified Namespace — that ties data together across lines, sites and systems.
Tables
One shared operational database, built in. No separate service to stand up.
Dashboards
Operator-facing screens for the people who actually run the line.
Device & Fleet Management
Deploy, update and roll back across many devices, lines and plants from one place.
Governance & Security
SSO, role-based access and audit built in — the enterprise controls IT expects.
Go deeper · technical reference
The technical documentation covers the how-to in detail.
Foundations Data Plane
05
OT · IT · Fleet

It Fits Every Team

The plant floor, the business systems, and the devices in the field are different worlds — but the same platform and the same building blocks serve all three. That's how one company standardizes on FlowFuse instead of a tool per team.

FlowFuse Edge · OT
Run the Plant Floor
OT & digitalization teams
  • Connect PLCs, machines & controllers
  • Standardize automation across every site
  • Run apps right at the edge
One way to automate — every plant.
FlowFuse Hub · IT
Move Data Across the Business
Central IT & enterprise architects
  • Integrate ERPs, databases & cloud APIs
  • Govern centrally, not app by app
  • Serve the whole organisation
One governed integration layer.
FlowFuse Fleet
Manage a Fleet of Devices
OEMs, partners & asset operators
  • Ship & roll back flows remotely
  • Update thousands of devices at once
  • One live view across the field
Update the fleet without a truck roll.
Proof it works — in production today
WalterConnected machines and scaled operations without adding IT overhead.Read the story EnerginetGoverns real-time data across 7,000 km of Denmark's power grid.Read the story
Go deeper · technical reference
The technical documentation covers the how-to in detail.
Hardware Apps Software Apps OT Architectures IT Architectures IIoT Architectures
06
The Payoff

Why It Pays Off

Anyone can connect a PLC to a dashboard once. The reason teams standardize on FlowFuse is what happens next — shipping fast, governing centrally, scaling everywhere, and never getting locked in.

Speed to Value
First app running in days, not a multi-year project. Reuse building blocks and ship changes through pipelines.
One Platform, Every Team
OT, IT and field teams build on the same governed foundation — no silos, one standard.
Own It, No Lock-In
Open and built on Node-RED. Run it on your infrastructure or ours, and take your work with you.
Scales Without Breaking
From one line to thousands of sites and devices — the same pieces, centrally managed.
Proof it works — in production today
Arch SystemsAutomated 100+ databases and scaled real-time manufacturing data.Read the story Large US ManufacturerDeployed thousands of instances across the enterprise.Read the story
Go deeper · technical reference
The technical documentation covers the how-to in detail.
App Delivery Methods Architectures
07
End to End

See It in Action

Here's every piece working together in one real application: OEE — how much good product a line makes versus its potential — from the machine at the edge to a live dashboard in the cloud.

At the Edge — Built Once, Rolled Out per Line
Line AEdge block
Line BEdge block
Line CEdge block
Publish machine state over MQTT / UNS
Team Broker
Machine Stateedge → cloud
Subscribe · Write History
In the Cloud
Data-Driven Appcomputes + shows OEE
Time-Series DBhistory & trends
Edge Block
Reads machine signals at the edge and publishes state. Built once, rolled out to every line.
Team Broker
Carries machine state from edge to cloud. The edge publishes; the cloud app subscribes.
Data-Driven App
Computes availability, performance and quality, and shows the OEE dashboard.
Time-Series DB
Every reading is written so trends can be charted over time.

Four pieces, two connections — and you can see how the same pattern powers everything from energy monitoring to full MES.

Proof it works — in production today
Abrasive TechnologyAutomated precision manufacturing and streamlined machine communication.Read the story Opto 22Brought flow-based automation into their hardware platform.Read the story
Go deeper · technical reference
The technical documentation covers the how-to in detail.
Worked Example

Ready to build? Open FlowFuse and get going.

Jump into the platform and start your first application, or bring a use case and we'll walk it through with you.

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