Arweave Manifests 101

Stop looking for that needle in a haystack, and use manifests to organize, deploy, and find your files on Arweave.

With Arweave you get permanent data, but there are limited options to organize your data. Now, with the Arweave File System (ArFS) and Arweave manifests you can map all of your transactions on Arweave with friendly names – and host your NFT collection, react app, or static website. Arweave manifests enable you to:

Map Arweave Transaction IDs to friendly names (“puppies.jpg” instead of “43t9bn023-9rtgsodfae-nw5505bnbnnghh8_9330gn55.jpg”)
Use friendlier URLs
Create logical groupings of content
Reference individual transactions by their file name and/or path
Easily host static websites, applications, and NFT projects

Resources:

Video: How to get your NFT Project onto ArDrive with ArDrive CTO Ariel Melendez
Article: Arweave and NFT Metadata by Cowboy Coder
Knowledgebase: Arweave Manifests

NFT Projects

Artwork from NFT project CrypToadz was saved with ArDrive using a manifest

NFT artists create collections of their work that involve hundreds to thousands of files. Manifests will allow you to save time and effort by organizing thousands of files onto the Arweave network in one transaction. You will also be able to establish user-friendly names for your NFTs so everything is organized and easy to find.

Website Hosting

Our original website (circa 2020) lives forever through a manifest on ArDrive

Ever thought of hosting your website permanently? ArDrive makes this possible for simple websites that do not need frequent updates. Most static (unchanging) websites cost less than $1 to save forever using a manifest. Pay once and never worry about hosting fees again!

Resource:

Video: How to save a website permanently with ArDrive

React Apps

You can even host a decentralized React app on the permaweb by creating a manifest with all its assets. Check out our pricing calculator (above) – it’s actually an embedded React app hosted forever on Arweave.

Resource

Video: How to get your NFT Project, Static Website, or dApp onto Arweave with ArDrive CTO Ariel Melendez

Make Your Manifest

To use manifests, first upload your assets (e.g. static website content) to a new folder in the ArDrive web app. Then click the +NEW button and select “Advanced” then “New manifest” to add a manifest to the content in that folder.

Manifests open up a whole new world of possibilities for interacting with the permaweb. And you don’t have to wait to start using them. They are now available in the ArDrive web app and the ArDrive CLI.

For technical help with your manifests, please see our knowledge base.