CockroachDB, a flexible and powerful database solution, integrates seamlessly with DigitalOcean's straightforward cloud infrastructure, making it a favorable choice for developers who prioritize simplicity and efficiency. This guide demonstrates setting up a distributed 3-node CockroachDB cluster on DigitalOcean using the command-line tool doctl in under 20 minutes, highlighting its capabilities in automatic data distribution and survivability. While the demo uses an insecure setup not recommended for production, it showcases how to install CockroachDB, create and manage DigitalOcean Droplets, and scale the database horizontally by adding nodes to the cluster. Key features such as CockroachDB’s ability to automatically distribute data across nodes without complex configurations and its resilience through three-way data replication are illustrated, ensuring that data remains accessible and consistent even if a node fails. The demonstration concludes with insights into maintaining the cluster’s integrity by rejoining nodes and updating data, encouraging users to explore more secure deployments with SSL encryption.