Use Clerk with RedwoodJS

Learn how to use Clerk to quickly and easily add secure authentication and user management to your RedwoodJS application.

Create a RedwoodJS application

terminal
yarn create redwood-app my-redwood-project --typescript

Set environment keys

Below is an example of an .env file. If you are signed into your Clerk Dashboard, your keys should become visible by clicking on the eye icon.

.env
CLERK_PUBLISHABLE_KEY={{pub_key}}
CLERK_SECRET_KEY={{secret}}

Update redwood.toml

redwood.toml
[web]
  includeEnvironmentVariables = ['CLERK_PUBLISHABLE_KEY']

Set up Redwood auth

The next step is to run a Redwood CLI command to install the required packages and generate some boilerplate code:

my-redwood-project
yarn rw setup auth clerk --force

The --force flag is needed to overwrite the existing dbAuth logic, that is set by default.

You can now access Clerk functions through the Redwood useAuth() hook, which is exported from src/web/auth.tsx, or you can use the Clerk components directly.

Protecting your pages

Below is an example of using the useAuth hook to verify if the user is authenticated. This will open a modal for your user to sign in to their account.

index.tsx
import { useAuth } from '../../auth'
 
const HomePage = () => {
  const { currentUser, isAuthenticated, logIn, logOut } = useAuth()
 
  return (
    <>
      {isAuthenticated ? (
        <button onClick={logOut}>Log out</button>
        <h1>Hello {currentUser.firstName}</h1>
      ) : (
        <button onClick={logIn}>Log in</button>
      )}
    </>
  )
}
 
export default HomePage

Using Clerk components directly

index.tsx
import { SignInButton, UserButton } from '@clerk/clerk-react'
import { useAuth } from '../../auth'
 
const HomePage = () => {
  const { currentUser, isAuthenticated } = useAuth()
 
  return (
    <>
      {isAuthenticated ? (
        <UserButton afterSignOutUrl={window.location.href} />
        <h1>Hello {currentUser.firstName}</h1>
      ) : (
        <SignInButton mode="modal" />
      )}
    </>
  )
}

Next steps

Now that you have an application integrated with Clerk, you will want to read the following documentation:

Customization & Localization

Learn how to customize and localize the Clerk components.

Learn More

Authentication Components

Learn more about all our authentication components.

Learn More

Client Side Helpers

Learn more about our client side helpers and how to use them.

Learn More