# Nodes and more than one machine

> When one machine is no longer enough: adding another, what the panel drives on it, and what stays the node's own.

Source: https://stygion.eu/docs/panel/uzly
Updated: 2026-08-30

The panel can drive servers on machines other than its own. The first
one is the **master** — it holds the database, the accounts and the
screens. The others are **nodes**: a machine with a container engine and
an agent that listens to the master.

This is an advanced thing. One machine runs more servers than most
people have memory for, and a second machine adds a second thing that
can fall over. Add one when the first is running out of breath, not
before.

## Adding a node

**Admin → Nodes**. Name the node and issue a **join token** — it is
**one-time** and expires after a period you set beside it. The screen
prints the command to run on the new machine.

The short life is deliberate: a join token is the right to attach a
machine to your cluster. One that has been sitting in a chat for a month
is not a token, it is a back door.

Once joined, the node appears in the list and servers can be created on
it.

## What belongs to whom

**The node owns the data.** A server's data directory lives on the
machine the server runs on — the master does not reach into it. Which is
why [files](/docs/panel/soubory) and [backups](/docs/panel/zalohy) for a
server on a node are handled through that node.

**The master owns the decisions.** What should run, with which image, on
which port — and the accounts and permissions as well. A node does not
ask what is allowed; it is not the one deciding.

The link between them is mutually authenticated TLS. Without a valid
certificate from a join token, a node is not a node.

## Things worth holding to

- **Back up off the machine.** A node's backups, stored on that node,
  vanish with the node. An [off-box target](/docs/panel/zalohy) is more
  of an obligation here than a choice.
- **Do not walk servers between machines.** Moving a server between
  nodes is moving its data. It can be done, but it is a move, not a
  switch.
- **A lost node is not a lost master.** The panel carries on and says
  which machine has gone quiet.

Next: [When something does not work](/docs/panel/reseni-potizi).