Skip to content
  • About
    • What is Symfony?
    • Community
    • News
    • Contributing
    • Support
  • Documentation
    • Symfony Docs
    • Symfony Book
    • Screencasts
    • Symfony Bundles
    • Symfony Cloud
    • Training
  • Services
    • Platform.sh for Symfony Best platform to deploy Symfony apps
    • SymfonyInsight Automatic quality checks for your apps
    • Symfony Certification Prove your knowledge and boost your career
    • SensioLabs Professional services to help you with Symfony
    • Blackfire Profile and monitor performance of your apps
  • Other
  • Blog
  • Download
sponsored by SensioLabs
  1. Home
  2. Documentation
  3. Security
  4. How to Build a JSON Authentication Endpoint
  • Documentation
  • Book
  • Reference
  • Bundles
  • Cloud

How to Build a JSON Authentication Endpoint

Edit this page

Warning: You are browsing the documentation for Symfony 4.3, which is no longer maintained.

Read the updated version of this page for Symfony 6.3 (the current stable version).

How to Build a JSON Authentication Endpoint

In this entry, you'll build a JSON endpoint to log in your users. When the user logs in, you can load your users from anywhere - like the database. See Security for details.

First, enable the JSON login under your firewall:

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
# config/packages/security.yaml
security:
    # ...

    firewalls:
        main:
            anonymous: ~
            json_login:
                check_path: /login
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
<!-- config/packages/security.xml -->
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<srv:container xmlns="http://symfony.com/schema/dic/security"
    xmlns:srv="http://symfony.com/schema/dic/services"
    xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"
    xsi:schemaLocation="http://symfony.com/schema/dic/services
        https://symfony.com/schema/dic/services/services-1.0.xsd">

    <config>
        <firewall name="main">
            <anonymous/>
            <json-login check-path="/login"/>
        </firewall>
    </config>
</srv:container>
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
// config/packages/security.php
$container->loadFromExtension('security', [
    'firewalls' => [
        'main' => [
            'anonymous'  => null,
            'json_login' => [
                'check_path' => '/login',
            ],
        ],
    ],
]);

Tip

The check_path can also be a route name (but cannot have mandatory wildcards - e.g. /login/{foo} where foo has no default value).

The next step is to configure a route in your app matching this path:

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
// src/Controller/SecurityController.php

// ...
use Symfony\Bundle\FrameworkBundle\Controller\AbstractController;
use Symfony\Component\HttpFoundation\Request;
use Symfony\Component\Routing\Annotation\Route;

class SecurityController extends AbstractController
{
    /**
     * @Route("/login", name="login", methods={"POST"})
     */
    public function login(Request $request)
    {
        $user = $this->getUser();

        return $this->json([
            'username' => $user->getUsername(),
            'roles' => $user->getRoles(),
        ]);
    }
}
1
2
3
4
5
# config/routes.yaml
login:
    path:       /login
    controller: App\Controller\SecurityController::login
    methods: POST
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
<!-- config/routes.xml -->
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" ?>
<routes xmlns="http://symfony.com/schema/routing"
    xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"
    xsi:schemaLocation="http://symfony.com/schema/routing
        https://symfony.com/schema/routing/routing-1.0.xsd">

    <route id="login" path="/login" controller="App\Controller\SecurityController::login" methods="POST"/>
</routes>
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
// config/routes.php
use App\Controller\SecurityController;
use Symfony\Component\Routing\Loader\Configurator\RoutingConfigurator;

return function (RoutingConfigurator $routes) {
    $routes->add('login', '/login')
        ->controller([SecurityController::class, 'login'])
        ->methods(['POST'])
    ;
};

Now, when you make a POST request, with the header Content-Type: application/json, to the /login URL with the following JSON document as the body, the security system intercepts the request and initiates the authentication process:

1
2
3
4
{
    "username": "dunglas",
    "password": "MyPassword"
}

Symfony takes care of authenticating the user with the submitted username and password or triggers an error in case the authentication process fails. If the authentication is successful, the controller defined earlier will be executed.

If the JSON document has a different structure, you can specify the path to access the username and password properties using the username_path and password_path keys (they default respectively to username and password). For example, if the JSON document has the following structure:

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
{
    "security": {
        "credentials": {
            "login": "dunglas",
            "password": "MyPassword"
        }
    }
}

The security configuration should be:

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
# config/packages/security.yaml
security:
    # ...

    firewalls:
        main:
            anonymous: ~
            json_login:
                check_path:    login
                username_path: security.credentials.login
                password_path: security.credentials.password
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
<!-- config/packages/security.xml -->
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<srv:container xmlns="http://symfony.com/schema/dic/security"
    xmlns:srv="http://symfony.com/schema/dic/services"
    xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"
    xsi:schemaLocation="http://symfony.com/schema/dic/services
        https://symfony.com/schema/dic/services/services-1.0.xsd">

    <config>
        <firewall name="main">
            <anonymous/>
            <json-login check-path="login"
                        username-path="security.credentials.login"
                        password-path="security.credentials.password"/>
        </firewall>
    </config>
</srv:container>
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
// config/packages/security.php
$container->loadFromExtension('security', [
    'firewalls' => [
        'main' => [
            'anonymous'  => null,
            'json_login' => [
                'check_path' => 'login',
                'username_path' => 'security.credentials.login',
                'password_path' => 'security.credentials.password',
            ],
        ],
    ],
]);
This work, including the code samples, is licensed under a Creative Commons BY-SA 3.0 license.
TOC
    Version
    We stand with Ukraine.
    Version:
    Measure & Improve Symfony Code Performance

    Measure & Improve Symfony Code Performance

    Peruse our complete Symfony & PHP solutions catalog for your web development needs.

    Peruse our complete Symfony & PHP solutions catalog for your web development needs.

    Symfony footer

    ↓ Our footer now uses the colors of the Ukrainian flag because Symfony stands with the people of Ukraine.

    Avatar of Marcel Serra Julià, a Symfony contributor

    Thanks Marcel Serra Julià (@serrajm) for being a Symfony contributor

    1 commit • 2 lines changed

    View all contributors that help us make Symfony

    Become a Symfony contributor

    Be an active part of the community and contribute ideas, code and bug fixes. Both experts and newcomers are welcome.

    Learn how to contribute

    Symfony™ is a trademark of Symfony SAS. All rights reserved.

    • What is Symfony?

      • Symfony at a Glance
      • Symfony Components
      • Case Studies
      • Symfony Releases
      • Security Policy
      • Logo & Screenshots
      • Trademark & Licenses
      • symfony1 Legacy
    • Learn Symfony

      • Symfony Docs
      • Symfony Book
      • Reference
      • Bundles
      • Best Practices
      • Training
      • eLearning Platform
      • Certification
    • Screencasts

      • Learn Symfony
      • Learn PHP
      • Learn JavaScript
      • Learn Drupal
      • Learn RESTful APIs
    • Community

      • SymfonyConnect
      • Support
      • How to be Involved
      • Code of Conduct
      • Events & Meetups
      • Projects using Symfony
      • Downloads Stats
      • Contributors
      • Backers
    • Blog

      • Events & Meetups
      • A week of symfony
      • Case studies
      • Cloud
      • Community
      • Conferences
      • Diversity
      • Documentation
      • Living on the edge
      • Releases
      • Security Advisories
      • SymfonyInsight
      • Twig
      • SensioLabs
    • Services

      • SensioLabs services
      • Train developers
      • Manage your project quality
      • Improve your project performance
      • Host Symfony projects

      Deployed on

    Follow Symfony

    Search by Meilisearch