expo-jwt

A library for encoding or decoding JSON Web Tokens (JWT) in an Expo based React Native project.

In an Expo project the JavaScript environment is not node.js so specific objects such as Stream are not available, rendering many of the popular node-based JWT libraries on NPM unusable with Expo.

Additionally unless the Expo project is "ejected" there is no access to the iOS/Android native code as other React Native specific JWT libraries have done.

This library implements HMAC-SHA signing for JWT by using Crypto.JS in pure JavaScript so it can be used inside of an Expo project.

Supported Algorithms

HS256	HS384	HS512	RS256	RS384	RS512	ES256	ES384	ES512
Yes	Yes	Yes	No	No	No	No	No	No

Supported Claims

exp	nbf	iat	sub	iss	aud	jti
Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No

Installation

npm install --save expo-jwt

Usage

Encode

import JWT, { SupportedAlgorithms } from 'expo-jwt';

const key = 'shh';

JWT.encode({ foo: 'bar' }, key);
// => eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJmb28iOiJiYXIifQ.YVoZ0LkWCMCnwEf7Nju2SJt_9mseJP1Q3RvCz4frGwM

JWT.encode({ foo: 'bar' }, key, { algorithm: SupportedAlgorithms.HS512 });
// => eyJhbGciOiJIUzUxMiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJmb28iOiJiYXIifQ.Kyojwz8Z5SckLbMU-EImuzHEjjg_1apSOLz_tsZQj1025OH--qaORzkHUkScScd8-RZnWUdCu0epiaofQZNkBA

JWT.encode({ foo: 'bar' }, key, { algorithm: SupportedAlgorithms.NONE });
// => eyJhbGciOiJub25lIiwidHlwIjoiSldUIn0.eyJmb28iOiJiYXIifQ.

Decode

import JWT from 'expo-jwt';

const key = 'shh';
const token =
  'eyJhbGciOiJIUzUxMiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJmb28iOiJiYXIifQ.Kyojwz8Z5SckLbMU-EImuzHEjjg_1apSOLz_tsZQj1025OH--qaORzkHUkScScd8-RZnWUdCu0epiaofQZNkBA';

JWT.decode(token, key);
// => { foo: 'bar' }

TypeScript

If you would like to take advantage of a typed decode object body, you may pass a generic:

const foo = JWT.decode(token, key);
// foo.body === any

type MyType = Record<string, number>;
const bar = JWT.decode<MyType>(token, key);
// bar.body === MyType

JWT Claims

The claims exp, nbf, and iat will automatically be verified if the decoded payload of the JWT contains any of them.

The iss, sub, and aud claims can be verified by passing in the expected value to the decode options.

// Issuer - iss
JWT.decode(token, key, { iss: 'expected-issuer' });

// Subject - sub
JWT.decode(token, key, { sub: 'expected-subject' });

// Audience - aud
JWT.decode(token, key, { aud: 'expected-audience' });

Time Skew

As mentioned in issue 7 certain device clocks may be slightly off, causing time based claims to fail. If you are experiencing this issue you can pass the option timeSkew to JWT.decode which will take this into account.

The value of this parameter is the number of seconds that the claim can be skewed by. Example:

// Allow verification of tokens that include "exp", "nbf", or "iat" claims
// within an additional 30 seconds of the system time.
JWT.decode(token, key, { timeSkew: 30 });