Finding your Ably Account ID, App IDs, and API Keys

Ably uses IDs to specify which account or app an operation should affect, and API keys to authenticate these operations.

This page covers how to find your:

• Account ID
• App ID
• API Key

Account IDs are used by operations that affect your entire account, such as listing the apps associated with a particular account.

In the Ably dashboard click the dropdown from the top right, then select ‘Account settings’:

Note, if you have more than one account, you can change accounts from the top left dropdown.

Your account settings are displayed and you can now find your account ID on this page:

App IDs are used by operations that affect individual apps, such as creating an API key.

In the Ably dashboard select the app you want to find the app ID for. Click on the ‘Settings’ tab:

The “App ID” is displayed under ‘Application settings’:

Ably uses API keys for authentication, either directly (basic authentication) or for generating tokens (token authentication). Each application has at least one API key and each key can have different capabilities specified.

API keys contain three parts: the public app ID and public app key ID (which, combined, form the API key ID) and the API key secret. An example API key is: I2E_JQ.OqUdfg:EVKVTCBlzLBPYJiCZTsIW_pqylJ9WVRB5K9P19Ap1y0, made up of:

• I2E_JQ.OqUdfg is the public API key ID (made from the public app ID and app key ID)
  • I2E_JQ is the public app ID (the part before the first period)
  • OqUdfg is the public app key ID (after the period and before the colon)
• EVKVTCBlzLBPYJiCZTsIW_pqylJ9WVRB5K9P19Ap1y0 is the API secret key (after the colon)

API keys should be kept secret.

In the Ably dashboard select the app you want to find the API keys for. Click on the “API Keys” tab:

Your API keys are then individually displayed with only the public key segment showing, click ‘show’ to reveal your API secret key: