JWT

Actions3

Overview

The JWT node in n8n allows you to work with JSON Web Tokens (JWTs). In the context of the Default resource and Decode operation, this node decodes a JWT token and returns its payload. This is useful for extracting information from tokens received from authentication systems or APIs, without verifying their signature.

Common scenarios:

Extracting user claims or metadata from a JWT provided by an external service.
Debugging or inspecting the contents of a JWT during workflow development.
Parsing tokens in automation flows where verification is not required.

Example:
You receive a JWT from an API response and want to extract the embedded user ID and roles for further processing in your workflow.

Properties

Name	Type	Meaning
Token	String	The JWT token string to decode.
Return Complete Token	Boolean	If true, returns the full decoded token object (header, payload, etc.); if false, returns only the payload.

Output

json:

If Return Complete Token is false:
The output is the decoded payload of the JWT as a JSON object.
Example:
```
{
  "sub": "1234567890",
  "name": "John Doe",
  "iat": 1516239022
}
```

If Return Complete Token is true:
The output is an object containing both the header and payload (and possibly signature) of the JWT.
Example:

{
  "header": {
    "alg": "HS256",
    "typ": "JWT"
  },
  "payload": {
    "sub": "1234567890",
    "name": "John Doe",
    "iat": 1516239022
  },
  "signature": "SflKxwRJSMeKKF2QT4fwpMeJf36POk6yJV_adQssw5c"
}

Dependencies

No external services or API keys are required for the Decode operation.
The node uses the jsonwebtoken library internally.
No special n8n configuration is needed for decoding.

Troubleshooting

Common issues:

Malformed Token:
If the provided token is not a valid JWT, the node will throw an error such as Invalid token specified.
Resolution: Ensure the input token is a properly formatted JWT string.
Empty Token:
If the Token property is left empty, the node may throw an error or return null.
Resolution: Always provide a non-empty JWT string.
Unexpected Output Structure:
If "Return Complete Token" is enabled, the output structure changes.
Resolution: Adjust downstream nodes to handle the different output format.

JWT