Rivet Actors adds SQLite storage: one database per agent, tenant, or document

Rivet Actors, an open-source alternative to Cloudflare Durable Objects, has released SQLite storage under Apache 2.0 license. Every actor gets its own SQLite database, allowing for millions of independent databases—one per agent, tenant, user, or document.

Key Details

This approach provides per-entity data isolation with SQLite running in-process with each actor. A custom VFS persists writes to HA storage (FoundationDB or Postgres). The single-writer actor model keeps reads local and fresh, unlike client-server databases where reads can be slow or stale.

Use cases include:

• AI agents: per-agent DB for message history, state, embeddings
• Multi-tenant SaaS: real per-tenant isolation without RLS hacks
• Collaborative documents: each document gets its own database with built-in multiplayer
• Per-user databases: isolated, scales horizontally, runs at the edge

How it compares

• Cloudflare Durable Objects & Agents: similar colocated SQLite and compute, but closed-source and vendor-locked
• Turso Cloud: closed-source with different use case—clients query over network, so reads are slow or stale
• D1, Turso (the DB), Litestream, rqlite, LiteFS: tools for running a single SQLite database with replication, while Rivet is for running lots of isolated databases

Rivet Actors also provide realtime (WebSockets), React integration (useActor), horizontal scalability, and actors that sleep when idle.