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API client / Methods / API keys
Required API Key: no ACL required
Method signature
SearchClient::generateSecuredApiKey(string apiKey, [
  'filters'           => string,
  'validUntil'        => integer,
  'restrictIndices'   => array,
  'restrictSources'   => string,
  'userToken'         => string
  // + any searchParameter
])

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About this method

Generate a secured API key without any calls to Algolia’s servers.

When you need to restrict the scope of an API key, generate a secured API key on your server, without any calls to Algolia.

You can’t generate secured API keys from your Admin API key or from other secured API keys.

When you generate a secured API key, you can define several restrictions, such as how long the key is valid for and which indexes it can access. The more restrictions you set, the longer the key will be. If the key is longer than 500 characters, you may have problems using it on some networks.

If you want to limit the number of requests that can be made with a secured API key, you must also rate-limit the key that you use to generate it. You can create a rate-limited key in the Algolia dashboard or use the Add API key or Update API key methods of an API client.

Examples

Read the Algolia CLI documentation for more information.

Generate a secured API key containing a filter

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// Create a public API key with a fixed filter
use \Algolia\AlgoliaSearch\SearchClient;
$public_key = SearchClient::generateSecuredApiKey(
  'YourSearchOnlyApiKey',
  [
    'filters' => '_tags:user_42'
  ]
);

Generate a secured API key with an expiration date

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// Create a public API key that expires in 1 hour
use \Algolia\AlgoliaSearch\SearchClient;
$validUntil = time() + 3600;
$public_key = SearchClient::generateSecuredApiKey(
  'YourSearchOnlyApiKey',
  [
    'validUntil' => $validUntil
  ]
);

Generate a secured API key with indices restriction

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// Create a public API key that is restricted to "index1" and "index2"
use \Algolia\AlgoliaSearch\SearchClient;
$public_key = SearchClient::generateSecuredApiKey(
  'YourSearchOnlyApiKey',
  [
    'restrictIndices' => 'index1,index2'
  ]
);

Generate a secured API key with a network restriction

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// Create a public API key that is restricted to `192.168.1.0/24`
use \Algolia\AlgoliaSearch\SearchClient;
$public_key = SearchClient::generateSecuredApiKey(
  'YourSearchOnlyApiKey',
  [
    'restrictSources' => '192.168.1.0/24'
  ]
);

Generate a secured API key with rate-limiting applied per user

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// Create a public API key for a specific user
use \Algolia\AlgoliaSearch\SearchClient;
$public_key = SearchClient::generateSecuredApiKey(
  'YourSearchOnlyApiKey',
  [
    'userToken' => 'user_42'
  ]
);

Parameters

Parameter Description
apiKey
type: string
Required

The search-only API key that the secured API key will inherit its restrictions from.

filters
type: string
default: ""
Optional

Filters that apply to every search made with the secured API key. You can add extra filters at search time with the filters query parameter.

For example, if you set the filter group:admin on your generated API key, and you add groups:press OR groups:visitors with the filters query parameter, your final search filter is equivalent to groups:admin AND (groups:press OR groups:visitors).

validUntil
type: integer
default: no expiration date
Optional

Unix timestamp used to set the expiration date of the API key.

restrictIndices
type: list
default: all indices
Optional

Index names that can be queried.

restrictSources
type: string
default: no restricted sources
Optional

IPv4 network allowed to use the generated key. Use this to protect against API key leaking and reuse.

You can only provide a single source, but you can specify a range of IPs (for example, 192.168.1.0/24).

userToken
type: string
default: users' IP address
Optional

Unique user IP address.

This can be useful when you want to impose a rate limit on specific users. By default, rate limits are set based on the IP address. This can become an issue when several users search from the same IP address. To avoid this, you can set a unique userToken for each user when generating their API key. This lets you restrict each user to a maximum number of API calls per hour, even if they share their IP with another user.

Specifying the userToken in a secured API key is also a good security practice as it ensures users don’t change it. Many features like Analytics, Personalization, and Dynamic Re-ranking rely on the authenticity of user identifiers. Setting the userToken at the API key level ensures that downstream services work as expected and prevents abuse.

searchParameter
type: key/value mapping
default: none
Optional

Search parameters applied at query time.

If you specify any of the following parameters in both the API key (A) and in your search (B), they are combined (A AND B):

Response

This section shows the JSON response returned by the API. Each API client encapsulates this response inside objects specific to the programming language, so that the actual response might be different. You can view the response by using the getLogs method. Don’t rely on the order of attributes in the response, as JSON doesn’t guarantee the ordering of keys in objects.

JSON format

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"YTgyMzMwOTkzMjA2Mzk5OWUxNjhjYmIwMGZkNGFmMzk2NDU3ZjMyYTg1NThiZjgxNDRiOTk3ZGE3NDU4YTA3ZWZpbHRlcnM9X3RhZ3MlM0F1c2VyXzQy"
Field Description
api_key
string

The generated API key.

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