> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://tbd-6fc993ce-hypeship-docs-ia-restructure.mintlify.site/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

# Overview

> Kernel's serverless platform for running agents next to their browsers

The App Platform runs your code on Kernel. You deploy a codebase, register the functions you want to call, and invoke them on demand, on a schedule, or from your own backend — no sandboxes to provision and no infrastructure to operate.

The reason to use it is co-location. Your code runs in the same place as the Kernel browsers it creates, which removes the problems a remote CDP connection introduces:

* **Lower latency** — no network round trip between your code and the page.
* **Better reliability** — far fewer unexpected disconnects mid-run.
* **Higher throughput** — no bandwidth bottleneck on data-heavy operations like screenshots.

That matters most for computer-use agents, where every turn ships a screenshot. See [how you drive the browser](/introduction/driving-the-browser) for the full comparison against running your loop on your own infrastructure or using the [playwright execution API](/browsers/playwright-execution).

## Apps, actions, and invocations

| Object         | What it is                                                                                               |
| -------------- | -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| **App**        | A codebase deployed on Kernel, in TypeScript or Python.                                                  |
| **Action**     | An invokable entry point in an app. Actions can call ordinary methods, and an app can have many actions. |
| **Invocation** | A single execution of an action. Triggered via API or CLI, scheduled as a job, or run on demand.         |

An invocation ends when its code finishes. Terminating an invocation also destroys any browsers it created.

## When to reach for it

Use the App Platform when the automation is long-running, stateful, event-triggered, or a computer-use loop. For a single scripted interaction with a page, [playwright execution](/browsers/playwright-execution) is simpler — send code, get the result, no deployment.

<Card title="Build, deploy, and operate" href="/apps/build-deploy-operate" horizontal>
  Write an app, deploy it, invoke it, and monitor what it's doing.
</Card>

<Tip>
  Install the [MCP server](/reference/mcp-server) to give your coding agent the `search_docs` tool while it writes your app.
</Tip>