Amazon DynamoDB Movies Demo

Amazon DynamoDB Movies Demo is a boilerplate Next.js application that fetches movie records from an Amazon DynamoDB table and demonstrates secure cloud-database access using Vercel's OIDC Federation.

What is the Amazon DynamoDB Movies Demo?

Amazon DynamoDB Movies Demo is a sample application built with Next.js that retrieves movies from a DynamoDB database. It runs on Vercel and connects to DynamoDB without hardcoded access tokens by using Vercel's OIDC Federation to mint short-lived AWS credentials. The project is maintained by Vercel and published on GitHub under the repository name aws-dynamodb-demo. It includes a seed script that populates the table with movie data, plus a live demo hosted at aws-dynamodb-demo.labs.vercel.dev.

Key Features

• Secure AWS access — uses Vercel OIDC Federation to connect to DynamoDB with temporary credentials; no access tokens are hardcoded in the codebase.
• Next.js app — the frontend is built with Next.js, allowing server-side rendering of the movie list fetched from DynamoDB.
• One-click deploy — clicking the Deploy button on the readme clones the repo, creates a new Vercel project, configures the AWS integration, and provisions a DynamoDB table automatically.
• Local development workflow — documented steps include pulling environment variables with vercel env pull, installing dependencies with pnpm, seeding the database via pnpm run db:seed, and launching the dev server on port 3000.
• pnpm project — all package scripts use pnpm, including install, db:seed, and dev.
• Vercel Marketplace support — the readme points to Vercel Marketplace for installing Amazon DynamoDB into a project.

Who is it for?

• Developers new to AWS integration — this demo shows the full path from a Next.js page to a DynamoDB query, so they can see how the pieces fit together.
• Vercel users who need AWS resources — teams can copy the OIDC Federation pattern to avoid storing long-lived AWS keys in environment variables.
• Full-stack engineers — the seed script and data model demonstrate how to prepare a DynamoDB table for a small application.

What can you do with the Amazon DynamoDB Movies Demo?

• Build a serverless reference app: follow the deploy and local setup instructions to get a working Next.js app connected to DynamoDB in minutes.
• Learn OIDC Federation: inspect how Vercel provisions temporary AWS credentials so you can replicate the same setup in your own projects.
• Seed and query DynamoDB: use the included seed script to load movie entries and see how the app reads them back.

How does it work?

1. Click the Deploy button in the readme to clone the repository, create a Vercel project, install the AWS integration, and provision a DynamoDB table.
2. Clone the newly created GitHub repository and run vercel env pull to fetch environment variables locally.
3. Install dependencies with pnpm install, seed the table with pnpm run db:seed, and start the app with pnpm run dev at http://localhost:3000.

FAQ

Does the demo require hardcoded AWS credentials?

No. The app connects to DynamoDB using Vercel's OIDC Federation, which exchanges Vercel-issued identity tokens for temporary AWS credentials. This avoids storing access keys in the codebase or environment variables.

How do I deploy this demo?

Use the Deploy with Vercel button on the readme. It clones the repository, sets up a Vercel project, configures the AWS integration through Vercel Marketplace, and provisions a DynamoDB table. After deployment, clone the resulting GitHub repo to work locally.

What package manager is required?

The project uses pnpm. The setup commands are pnpm install, pnpm run db:seed, and pnpm run dev.

Where is the live demo?

A hosted version of the app is available at https://aws-dynamodb-demo.labs.vercel.dev.