better-auth-social-login

better-auth-social-login

Goal

Implement Better Auth social login (OAuth/OIDC) with Drizzle and drizzle-kit using a secure, migration-safe workflow, including cookie/JWT hardening and exact auth table expectations.

Rules

1. Configure providers under socialProviders with valid OAuth credentials and provider redirect URIs that exactly match your Better Auth callback route.
2. Set a correct baseURL (or BETTER_AUTH_URL) for each environment; callback mismatch is the most common social login failure.
3. For Drizzle projects, do not use @better-auth/cli migrate; use @better-auth/cli generate then drizzle-kit generate and drizzle-kit migrate.
4. Always run Better Auth schema generation with --output to a dedicated auth schema file.
5. Keep Better Auth config in a CLI-discoverable file path or pass --config explicitly.
6. Keep auth cookies httpOnly; keep sameSite at lax unless you have a specific cross-site requirement.
7. Keep CSRF and origin protections enabled (disableCSRFCheck: false, disableOriginCheck: false by default).
8. Use trustedOrigins as an explicit allowlist for browser origins that are allowed to use auth endpoints.
9. For shared-subdomain sessions, enable crossSubDomainCookies only when needed and scope domain as narrowly as possible.
10. If using JWT plugin, treat JWT as service token support, not a replacement for session-based browser auth.
11. Rotate provider secrets and revoke compromised refresh/access tokens through provider consoles.
12. Commit config, generated auth schema, and Drizzle migration artifacts together.

End-to-End Social Flow

1. User initiates sign-in via authClient.signIn.social({ provider }).
2. Better Auth redirects to provider authorize endpoint with callback URL, state, and PKCE values.
3. Provider redirects to /api/auth/callback/{provider}.
4. Better Auth validates OAuth state/PKCE and origin safeguards.
5. Better Auth resolves/creates user and account records.
6. Better Auth creates/updates session, sets signed cookie(s), and returns control to app callback path.

Canonical Server Config (Drizzle + Social + JWT)

import { betterAuth } from "better-auth";
import { drizzleAdapter } from "better-auth/adapters/drizzle";
import { jwt } from "better-auth/plugins";
import { db, schema } from "../db";

export const auth = betterAuth({
  baseURL: process.env.BETTER_AUTH_URL,
  database: drizzleAdapter(db, {
    provider: "pg",
    schema,
  }),
  socialProviders: {
    github: {
      clientId: process.env.GITHUB_CLIENT_ID as string,
      clientSecret: process.env.GITHUB_CLIENT_SECRET as string,
    },
    google: {
      clientId: process.env.GOOGLE_CLIENT_ID as string,
      clientSecret: process.env.GOOGLE_CLIENT_SECRET as string,
      accessType: "offline",
      prompt: "select_account consent",
    },
  },
  trustedOrigins: [
    "http://localhost:3000",
    "https://app.example.com",
  ],
  advanced: {
    useSecureCookies: true,
    // Keep origin and CSRF checks enabled by default.
    // disableOriginCheck: false,
    // disableCSRFCheck: false,
  },
  plugins: [
    jwt(),
  ],
});

Cookie and Security Baseline

• Cookies are signed by Better Auth secret, httpOnly, and sameSite=lax by default.
• secure is enabled in production mode; set advanced.useSecureCookies: true to force secure cookies.
• Use trustedOrigins to allow only known origins and block CSRF/open redirect vectors.
• Keep OAuth callback URLs exact by scheme/host/port/path.
• Do not disable disableCSRFCheck or disableOriginCheck except in controlled debugging.
• For Safari cross-domain setups, use reverse proxy or shared parent domain with careful cookie domain scoping.

JWT Plugin Guidance

• Add jwt() server plugin and jwtClient() client plugin when downstream services need bearer-style JWT.
• Use /api/auth/token to retrieve JWT and /api/auth/jwks for verifier keys.
• Verify JWT in services using JWKS (kid-aware cache strategy).
• Default issuer/audience are based on baseURL; set explicit values when required by consumers.
• JWT plugin adds jwks table; include it in schema generation and migrations.

Exact Table Formation (Core + JWT)

Core Better Auth tables:

1. user
   • id (pk)
   • name
   • email (unique)
   • emailVerified
   • image (nullable)
   • createdAt
   • updatedAt
2. session
   • id (pk)
   • userId (fk -> user.id)
   • token (unique)
   • expiresAt
   • ipAddress (nullable)
   • userAgent (nullable)
   • createdAt
   • updatedAt
3. account
   • id (pk)
   • userId (fk -> user.id)
   • accountId (provider account id)
   • providerId (google/github/etc)
   • accessToken (nullable)
   • refreshToken (nullable)
   • idToken (nullable)
   • accessTokenExpiresAt (nullable)
   • refreshTokenExpiresAt (nullable)
   • scope (nullable)
   • password (nullable; credential auth)
   • createdAt
   • updatedAt
4. verification
   • id (pk)
   • identifier
   • value
   • expiresAt
   • createdAt
   • updatedAt

JWT plugin table:

5. jwks
   • id (pk)
   • publicKey
   • privateKey
   • createdAt
   • expiresAt (nullable)

Notes:

• Better Auth also manages OAuth state/PKCE protections as part of its OAuth flow; keep generated schema current whenever auth/plugins change.
• Names can be customized (modelName, fields, plugin schema mapping), but mappings must remain consistent across auth config, Drizzle schema, and migrations.

Drizzle Schema and Config Pattern

// drizzle.config.ts
import { defineConfig } from "drizzle-kit";

export default defineConfig({
  dialect: "postgresql",
  schema: ["./src/db/schema.ts", "./src/db/auth-schema.ts"],
  out: "./drizzle",
  dbCredentials: {
    url: process.env.DATABASE_URL!,
  },
});

Required Scripts

{
  "scripts": {
    "auth:schema": "npx @better-auth/cli@latest generate --config ./src/lib/auth.ts --output ./src/db/auth-schema.ts --yes",
    "db:generate": "drizzle-kit generate",
    "db:migrate": "drizzle-kit migrate",
    "db:check": "drizzle-kit check",
    "db:sync": "npm run auth:schema && npm run db:generate",
    "db:sync:migrate": "npm run db:sync && npm run db:migrate"
  }
}

Migration Workflow (Auth + Social Changes)

1. Change social provider config, auth options, or plugins.
2. Run npm run auth:schema.
3. Run npm run db:generate.
4. Review SQL migration output in drizzle/*.
5. Run npm run db:migrate.
6. Validate sign-in callback and session persistence in browser.
7. Commit auth config + auth-schema.ts + drizzle/* artifacts together.

Provider Setup Checklist

• GitHub redirect URI: http://localhost:3000/api/auth/callback/github (dev) and production equivalent.
• Google redirect URI: http://localhost:3000/api/auth/callback/google (dev) and production equivalent.
• Ensure BETTER_AUTH_URL/baseURL matches the deployed domain used by users.
• For GitHub Apps, grant email read permission or expect email lookup failures.
• For Google refresh tokens, prefer accessType: "offline" with consent prompt.

Common Failure Patterns

• redirect_uri_mismatch
  • Fix: align provider console redirect URI with Better Auth callback and baseURL.
• Social callback succeeds but no session in browser
  • Fix: check cookie secure/domain/SameSite settings and frontend credentials: "include" usage.
• Safari only: session appears lost across domains
  • Fix: proxy auth route under frontend domain or use shared parent domain cookie strategy.
• JWT verifies locally but fails in service
  • Fix: verify issuer/audience and refresh JWKS on unknown kid.
• Drizzle migration missing plugin tables
  • Fix: regenerate auth schema before Drizzle generation and ensure auth-schema.ts is listed in drizzle.config.ts.

Reference Docs

• Better Auth OAuth: https://www.better-auth.com/docs/concepts/oauth
• Better Auth cookies: https://www.better-auth.com/docs/concepts/cookies
• Better Auth security: https://www.better-auth.com/docs/reference/security
• Better Auth database concepts: https://www.better-auth.com/docs/concepts/database
• Better Auth JWT plugin: https://www.better-auth.com/docs/plugins/jwt
• Better Auth GitHub provider: https://www.better-auth.com/docs/authentication/github
• Better Auth Google provider: https://www.better-auth.com/docs/authentication/google
• Better Auth Drizzle adapter: https://www.better-auth.com/docs/adapters/drizzle
• Drizzle Kit overview: https://orm.drizzle.team/docs/kit-overview
• drizzle-kit generate: https://orm.drizzle.team/docs/drizzle-kit-generate
• drizzle-kit migrate: https://orm.drizzle.team/docs/drizzle-kit-migrate