Overview

The following methods can be used to authenticate your requests to the Coinbase Developer Platform (CDP). Choose the method that best suits your needs:

Method	Difficulty	Description
Use our modified HTTP client	Easy	Use a pre-configured urllib3 client that automatically handles authentication for all requests.
Generate your authorization headers	Intermediate	Generate authentication headers and apply them to your preferred HTTP client.
Generate your JWT	Advanced	Generate a JWT token, manually create your authentication headers, and apply them to your preferred HTTP client.

Visit the CDP Authentication docs for more details.

Generate a JWT

The following example shows how to generate a JWT token, which can then be injected manually into your Authorization header as a Bearer Token to authenticate REST API requests to the CDP APIs using the HTTP request library of your choice.

Step 1: Install the required package:

pip install cdp-sdk

Step 2: Generate a JWT:

from cdp.auth.utils.jwt import generate_jwt, JwtOptions

# For REST (HTTP) requests
jwt = generate_jwt(JwtOptions(
    api_key_id="YOUR_API_KEY_ID",
    api_key_secret="YOUR_API_KEY_SECRET",
    request_method="GET",
    request_host="api.cdp.coinbase.com",
    request_path="/platform/v2/evm/accounts",
    expires_in=120  # optional (defaults to 120 seconds)
))

print(jwt)

# For websocket connections
websocket_jwt = generate_jwt(JwtOptions(
    api_key_id="YOUR_API_KEY_ID",
    api_key_secret="YOUR_API_KEY_SECRET",
    request_method=None,
    request_host=None,
    request_path=None,
    expires_in=120  # optional (defaults to 120 seconds)
))

print(websocket_jwt)

For information about the above parameters, please refer to the Authentication parameters section.

Step 3: Use your JWT (Bearer token) in the Authorization header of your HTTP request:

curl -L 'https://api.cdp.coinbase.com/platform/v2/evm/accounts' \
  -H 'Content-Type: application/json' \
  -H 'Accept: application/json' \
  -H 'Authorization: Bearer $jwt'

Generate your authorization headers

The following example shows how to generate the required authentication headers for authenticating a request to the CDP REST APIs. These headers can be added to your request manually using the HTTP request library of your choice.

Step 1: Install the required package:

pip install cdp-sdk

Step 2: Generate authorization headers:

from cdp.auth.utils.http import get_auth_headers, GetAuthHeadersOptions

# Example POST request with a body
headers = get_auth_headers(
    GetAuthHeadersOptions(
        api_key_id="YOUR_API_KEY_ID",
        api_key_secret="YOUR_API_KEY_SECRET",
        wallet_secret="YOUR_WALLET_SECRET",
        request_method="POST",
        request_host="api.cdp.coinbase.com",
        request_path="/platform/v2/evm/accounts",
        request_body={
            "name": "MyAccount",
        },
        expires_in=120  # optional (defaults to 120 seconds)
    )
)

# Prints the headers required for authentication
print(headers)

For information about the above parameters, please refer to the Authentication parameters section.

Use a modified urllib3 request client

The following example shows how to use a modified urllib3 request client to authenticate your requests to the CDP REST APIs. This client will automatically add the appropriate authentication headers to each request.

Step 1: Install the required packages:

pip install urllib3 cdp-sdk

Step 2: Generate an HTTP request using the urllib3 request library:

from cdp.auth.clients import Urllib3AuthClient, Urllib3AuthClientOptions

# Create an authenticated HTTP client
client = Urllib3AuthClient(
    Urllib3AuthClientOptions(
        api_key_id="YOUR_API_KEY_ID",
        api_key_secret="YOUR_API_KEY_SECRET",
        wallet_secret="YOUR_WALLET_SECRET"
    ),
    base_url="https://api.cdp.coinbase.com"
)

# Make authenticated requests (example)
# The appropriate authentication headers will be automatically added to the request
try:
    response = client.request(
        "POST",
        "/platform/v2/evm/accounts",
        body={
            "name": "MyAccount",
        }
    )
    print(response.data)
except Exception as error:
    print("Request failed:", error)

The Urllib3AuthClient will automatically:

• Generate a JWT for each request
• Add the JWT to the Authorization header
• Set the appropriate Content-Type header
• Add wallet authentication when required

For information about the above parameters, please refer to the Authentication parameters section.

Authentication parameters

The following table provides more context of many of the authentication parameters used in the examples above:

Parameter	Required	Description
api_key_id	true	The unique identifier for your API key. Supported formats are: - xxxxxxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxxxxxxxxxx - organizations/{orgId}/apiKeys/{keyId}
api_key_secret	true	Your API key secret. Supported formats are: - Edwards key (Ed25519): xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx== - Elliptic Curve key (ES256): -----BEGIN EC PRIVATE KEY-----\n...\n...\n...==\n-----END EC PRIVATE KEY-----\n
request_method	true*	The HTTP method for the API request you're authenticating (ie, GET, POST, PUT, DELETE). Can be None for JWTs intended for websocket connections.
request_host	true*	The API host you're calling (ie, api.cdp.coinbase.com). Can be None for JWTs intended for websocket connections.
request_path	true*	The path of the specific API endpoint you're calling (ie, /platform/v1/wallets). Can be None for JWTs intended for websocket connections.
expires_in	false	The JWT expiration time in seconds. After this time, the JWT will no longer be valid, and a new one must be generated. Defaults to 120 (ie, 2 minutes) if not specified.

* Either all three request parameters (request_method, request_host, and request_path) must be provided for REST API requests, or all three must be None for JWTs intended for websocket connections.