render-env-vars

Instructions for configuring environment variables and secrets on Render, a cloud platform for running services. They cover the Render Dashboard, Blueprint files, API or MCP tools, shared environment groups, generated values, and service-to-service settings.

In plain words
What is it for?
Use them to add, change, remove, or troubleshoot variables and secrets. They help wire values from databases, services, groups, or generated secrets in Render Blueprints and service settings.
Why use it?
They help prevent missing or incorrectly scoped configuration values during deployment. They also explain that Render supplies values as text, so applications must convert numbers, booleans, or structured data themselves.

Skill for Claude CodeCodex

Install

Getting it into your agent

One page per mod, every tool's command on it. A separate URL per tool would split the same page into five that compete with each other.

agentmods
npx agentmods add skills/render-oss/render-plugin-claude-code/render-env-vars
Any agent
npx skills add render-oss/render-plugin-claude-code --skill render-env-vars
Clone the repo
git clone --depth 1 https://github.com/render-oss/render-plugin-claude-code

Made for: Claude Code, Codex.

Per session 60 Skills are progressive disclosure: only the name and description are preloaded; the body loads when the skill is used.
When invoked 1,899 The whole file, excluding the scripts and references it only reads on demand.
Security scan A 0 findings. Scan, not verified.
Origin 100% copy Near-identical to another mod in the catalogue.
Token cost

What it costs to keep this loaded

Counted locally with the o200k_base tokenizer, which is exact for GPT models; Claude uses its own tokenizer and its counts differ. Treat this as one consistent yardstick across the catalogue rather than a bill. Prices are per million input tokens.

ModelPer sessionOnce invoked
Fable 5 $0.00060 $0.01899
Opus 5 $0.00030 $0.00949
Sonnet 5 $0.00012 $0.00380
Haiku 4.5 $0.00006 $0.00190

Measured 2d ago against content hash ed9182eb9983, method: parsed. Prices are Anthropic first-party input rates as of 2026-08-30, from the pricing page.

Security

Grade A, and why

render-env-vars scanned grade A with 0 findings against 26 rules in 11 categories — prompt injection, anti-refusal, data exfiltration, privilege escalation, supply chain, agent snooping, system-prompt leakage, SSRF and excessive agency — measured 2d ago.

A static scan of the body, not an audit. Every finding is printed with the line that produced it so you can judge whether it matters here. A mod is markdown that instructs an agent; that is exactly why what it instructs is worth reading.

Nothing flagged

None of the 26 patterns this scan looks for appear in this file: no shell pipes, no recursive deletes, no credential paths, no hidden text, no instruction-override or anti-refusal phrasing, no agent-config snooping. That is not a guarantee, it is the absence of the things that are checkable.

Origin

This is a copy

100% identical to render-env-vars — 0 lines differ, which has more behind it and is treated as the original. This page carries a canonical link to it rather than competing with it.

skills/render-env-vars/SKILL.md · 148 lines

How it starts

The opening of the file, as written. The whole thing — 148 lines — stays where its author put it; the contents beside it link to each section on GitHub.

Environment Variables on Render

Render exposes configuration to services as environment variables. Values are always strings at the platform layer—applications must parse numbers, booleans, and structured data explicitly.

There are three primary ways to set variables:

  1. Render Dashboard — per-service UI, bulk import from .env, save/redeploy options
  2. BlueprintenvVars (and related keys) in render.yaml
  3. MCP / API — e.g. update_environment_variables on a service

Deep wiring patterns, full platform variable tables, and language-specific notes live under references/.

When to Use This Skill

Use this skill when users want to:

  • Add, change, or remove environment variables or secrets
  • Understand Dashboard vs Blueprint vs API/MCP flows
  • Use environment groups for shared configuration
  • Wire fromDatabase, fromService, fromGroup, sync: false, or generateValue in Blueprints
  • Debug missing vars, secret files, precedence, or platform-injected names

For full Blueprint authoring, pair with render-blueprints. For first-time deploys, render-deploy. For web service behavior and ports, render-web-services.

Setting Variables

Dashboard

  • Add variables individually (name + value) or in bulk by pasting/uploading a .env-style file.
  • Save options typically include:
    • Save and rebuild & deploy — picks up build-time changes
    • Deploy only — runtime change without a full rebuild (when applicable)
    • Save only — persist without triggering a deploy

Use Dashboard edits when iterating quickly or when the repo should not carry certain values.

Blueprint (render.yaml)

Declare envVars on each service. Values can be literals, generated secrets, sync-disabled prompts, or references to databases, other services, or env groups. See Blueprint Wiring below and references/wiring-reference.md for exhaustive patterns and YAML.

MCP / API

Automation tools can set variables on existing services (e.g. update_environment_variables). Useful for CI, rotation, or keeping Dashboard state in sync with external secret stores—without committing secrets to Git.

Read the full file on GitHub · 148 lines

Files

What ships with it

2 files beside SKILL.md in the same directory: the scripts, references and assets a skill reads on demand. Not counted in the per-session cost; read them before you install if any of them is executable.

Changes

What this file has done since we first saw it

Hashed on every crawl. A supply-chain change to an agent config is a question of when, not whether, so the history is kept rather than the latest state alone.

  1. 2d ago First seen · 148 lines · 60 tokens per session scan A ed9182eb9983

Subscribe to this mod's changes

render-env-vars is a skill published in the GitHub repository render-oss/render-plugin-claude-code (0 stars, last pushed 14d ago), licensed MIT. It adds 60 tokens to every session and 1,899 once invoked, about $0.0003 per session on Opus 5. A static security scan graded it A with 0 findings. It is 100% identical to render-env-vars, differing in 0 lines, and is treated as a copy.

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