How to migrate from your authentication provider to Kinde

Changing your authentication provider can be a lot like a breakup.

Chances are, you realized they weren’t putting in as much effort as you needed them to, and your relationship was getting suuuper expensive. But then a cooler, nicer option comes along, that’s actually there to support you; marriage material, so to speak.

With the right advice, breaking up with your auth provider doesn’t have to be as scary as you think… so here is a step-by-step guide.

Once you’ve decided you want to switch, find out how difficult your provider is going to make it.

At the end of the day, it’s your data, so it belongs to you. Don’t let them tell you otherwise.

If you are on a contract or mid-subscription, crunch some numbers and work out if the move is worth it. Sometimes it’s worth paying the price for less pain. Contact us if you’re concerned about the cost of switching and we’ll help walk you through it.

Take the tour, get a demo, and play around. Make sure we have everything you need (and let us know if we don’t, we might already be building it).

Then, get developer help to connect your product to Kinde. You’ll want to start using Kinde for new user sign up before you stop using your other auth system. That way anyone signing up while you migrate your users will be already on Kinde, and no users will be left behind.

Export all the details you can from your provider’s site. You might need to make a special request to get user passwords. But you also might not need them, for example, if you want users to start using passwordless authentication.

Users and passwords will likely be supplied in separate files.

If you want to maintain full password continuity for users, you’ll need both the user details and password files.

• User details: At a minimum, we need email addresses to import users. Ideally, the user details file also includes first names, last names, and indicates if the user details are verified.
• Passwords: These are typically “hashed” to conceal the actual password and an algorithm is provided that enables us to match the password to the user on our end.

If you want to change how user’s sign in and make things even more secure, now is a good time. You can use any available authentication options, like passwordless, social sign in, and multi-factor authentication.

Set up the methods before you migrate your users. For instance, switch on passwords as an authentication option if you’re importing passwords as well as user details.

Once you have your data and have set up the authentication methods in Kinde, you’re ready to import user details. Just a few steps and the hard part is over.

You have three options:

• Import users and passwords at the same time. These get matched up in Kinde.
• Just import users - import passwords later or don’t use passwords at all.
• Just import passwords - if you’ve already imported users. We will match the records for you.

If you brought both users and passwords across to Kinde, almost all your users will have a seamless experience and barely notice any change.

Some users - if they just signed up or changed their password while you were managing the import - will be prompted to change their password the next time they sign in. A small price to pay.

If you took the opportunity to update your authentication approach, and added MFA or went passwordless, then all your users will need to take some actions when they next sign in.

But don’t worry, we have a user migration kit you can use to help prepare your users and make the change to Kinde.

You can leave Kinde at any time and take your users with you - we don’t hold them ransom.

We’ll never lock you in. Here’s to our healthy blossoming relationship :)