API Bearer Auth vs Sessions

The API Bearer Auth plugin enables authentication for the REST API by using JWT access an refresh tokens. After the user logs in, the access and refresh tokens are returned and can be used for the next requests. Issued tokens can be revoked from within the users admin screen. See below for the endpoints. Note that after activating this plugin, all REST API endpoints will need to be authenticated, unless the endpoint is whitelisted in the api_bearer_auth_unauthenticated_urls filter (see FAQ for how to use this filter). JWT Access tokens can be formatted as JWT tokens. For this to work, you first have to create a secret and add it to the wp-config.php file. If you don’t do this, access tokens will work also, but are just random strings. To create a random secret key, you can do for example: base64_encode(openssl_random_pseudo_bytes(64)); And then add the result to wp-config: define('API_BEARER_JWT_SECRET', 'mysecretkey'); If you have problems, you can verify your JWT tokens at: https://jwt.io/ Revoke tokens This plugin adds a column to the users table in de admin where you can see when a token expires. You can also revoke tokens by selection the “Revoke API tokens” from the bulk actions select box. API endpoints Note that all endpoints expect JSON in the POST body. Login Endpoint: POST /api-bearer-auth/v1/login Request body: Note: client_name is optional. But if you use it, make sure to use it as well for the refresh call! {"username": "my_username", "password": "my_password", "client_name": "my_app"} Response: { "wp_user": { "data": { "ID": 1, "user_login": "your_user_login", // other default WordPress user fields } }, "access_token": "your_access_token", "expires_in": 86400, // number of seconds "refresh_token": "your_refresh_token" } Make sure to save the access and refresh token! Refresh access token Endpoint: POST /api-bearer-auth/v1/tokens/refresh Request body: Note: client_name is optional. But if you did use it for the login call, make sure to use it here as well! {"token": "your_refresh_token", "client_name": "my_app"} Response success: { "access_token": "your_new_access_token", "expires_in": 86400 } Response when sending a wrong refresh token is a 401: { "code": "api_api_bearer_auth_error_invalid_token", "message": "Invalid token.", "data": { "status": 401 } } Do a request After you have the access token, you can make requests to authenticated endpoints with an Authorization header like this: Authorization: Bearer Note that Apache sometimes strips out the Authorization header. If this is the case, make sure to add this to the .htaccess file: RewriteCond %{HTTP:Authorization} ^(.*) # Don't know why, but some need the line below instead of the RewriteRule line # SetEnvIf Authorization .+ HTTP_AUTHORIZATION=$0 RewriteRule ^(.*) - [E=HTTP_AUTHORIZATION:%1] If you are not logged in or you send an invalid access token, you get a 401 response: { "code": "api_bearer_auth_not_logged_in", "message": "You are not logged in.", "data": { "status": 401 } } Important update Update immediately if you’re using a version below 20200807. Before this version all access tokens were updated when calling the refresh callback. If you are affected by this the fastest solution is to execute this query: update wp_user_tokens set access_token_valid = NOW(); This will invalidate all access tokens. This means that all users need to refresh their access token and will get a new access token and a unique one this time. A big thank to @harchvertelol for reporting this and suggesting the fix as well!

Sessions is a powerful sessions manager for WordPress with a multi-criteria sessions limiter and full analytics reporting about logins, logouts and account creation. It relies on the standard WordPress sessions manager and add it extra features and controls. You can limit concurrent sessions, on a per role basis for the following criteria: count per user; count per IP adresses; count per country (requires the free IP Locator plugin); count per device classes and types, client types, browser or OS (requires the free Device Detector plugin). For each roles defined on your site, you can also block login based on private/public IP ranges, and define idle times for sessions auto-termination. You can also set a maximum number of IPs used for each user – useful to limit credential sharing between many people. Sessions can report the following main items and metrics: KPIs: login success, active sessions, cleaned sessions, active users, turnover and spam sessions; active and cleaned sessions details; users and sessions variations; moves distribution; login/logout breakdowns; password resets; Sessions supports a set of WP-CLI commands to: manage WordPress active sessions (list, kill) – see wp help sessions active for details; toggle on/off main settings – see wp help sessions settings for details; modify operations mode – see wp help sessions mode for details; display sessions and accounts statistics – see wp help sessions analytics for details. For a full help on WP-CLI commands in Sessions, please read this guide. Sessions is part of PerfOps One, a suite of free and open source WordPress plugins dedicated to observability and operations performance. Sessions is a free and open source plugin for WordPress. It integrates many other free and open source works (as-is or modified). Please, see ‘about’ tab in the plugin settings to see the details. Support This plugin is free and provided without warranty of any kind. Use it at your own risk, I’m not responsible for any improper use of this plugin, nor for any damage it might cause to your site. Always backup all your data before installing a new plugin. Anyway, I’ll be glad to help you if you encounter issues when using this plugin. Please read carefully the FAQ at the bottom of this page before requesting support. Privacy This plugin, as any piece of software, is neither compliant nor non-compliant with privacy laws and regulations. It is your responsibility to use it – by activating the corresponding options or services – with respect for the personal data of your users and applicable laws. This plugin doesn’t set any cookie in the user’s browser. This plugin may handle personally identifiable information (PII). If the GDPR or CCPA or similar regulation applies to your case, you must adapt your processes (consent management, security measure, treatment register, etc.). Donation If you like this plugin or find it useful and want to thank me for the work done, please consider making a donation to La Quadrature Du Net or the Electronic Frontier Foundation which are advocacy groups defending the rights and freedoms of citizens on the Internet. By supporting them, you help the daily actions they perform to defend our fundamental freedoms!