How this site is built, part 1: SvelteKit + GitHub Pages

I’m trying to keep it simple stupid, so here are the steps I took to get from zero to a deployed SvelteKit site on GitHub Pages.

1. Scaffold the project

npm create svelte@latest myapp
cd myapp
npm install
npm run dev

That gets you a working dev server. But the default adapter-auto won’t work for static hosting — you need adapter-static.

2. Switch to adapter-static

npm i -D @sveltejs/adapter-static

Then update svelte.config.js:

import adapter from '@sveltejs/adapter-static';

const config = {
  kit: {
    adapter: adapter()
  }
};

export default config;

This tells SvelteKit to emit plain HTML/CSS/JS — no server required.

3. Add the deploy script

npm i -D gh-pages

In package.json:

"deploy": "vite build && touch build/.nojekyll && gh-pages -d build -t true"

The .nojekyll file tells GitHub not to run Jekyll on your output. The -t true flag makes gh-pages include dotfiles — important if you use a custom domain CNAME file.

4. Configure GitHub Pages

In your repo’s Settings → Pages, set the source to the gh-pages branch. Run npm run deploy, and your site shows up at https://{username}.github.io.

That’s the whole thing. In part 2 I’ll cover adding a blog with MDSvex.