A simple Next.js app using Unkey to generate and verify API keys that expire after 60 seconds.
This example is a Next.js project bootstrapped with create-next-app
. The example has a single page at the root to generate api keys that expire in one minute and an api route at /api/forecast
to retrieve a fake 7 day weather forecast.
The examples only requires two environment variables.
UNKEY_ROOT_KEY
- One can be created at here.UNKEY_API_ID
- One can be created at here. After selecting the api the id can be found in the top right.Configure these environments variables in a .env
file.
First, run the development server:
1npm run dev2# or3yarn dev4# or5pnpm dev6# or7bun dev
Then navigate to http://localhost:3000 to generate an api key. The key will expire in one minute. The key will appear underneath the Create Key
button.
Then using your favorite http client make a GET request to http://localhost:3000/api/forecast with the Authorization header set to Bearer <NEW_API_KEY>
. Continue making requests. After a minute you should see a 401 response due to the key expiring.
The code for creating apis keys is in src/server/unkey-client.ts
. There is a function called createApiKey
that accepts a name and expiration time in milliseconds. It uses the unkey client to create a new key and returns the key.
The verification happens in the route handler at /app/api/forecast/route.ts
. It simple checks for the Authorization header and checks if the key is valid using verifyKey
. All the logic of checking the expiration time is handled by unkey.
2500 verifications and 100K successful rate‑limited requests per month. No CC required.