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Authorizing your application

Amadeus for Developers uses OAuth to authenticate access requests. OAuth generates an access token which grants the client permission to access a protected resource.

The method to acquire a token is called grant. There are different types of OAuth grants. Amadeus for Developers uses the Client Credentials Grant.

Requesting an access token

Once you have created an app and received your API Key and API Secret, you can generate an access token by sending a POST request to the authorization server:

https://test.api.amadeus.com/v1/security/oauth2/token

Information

Remember that your API Key and API Secret should be kept private. Read more about best practices for secure API key storage.

The body of the request is encoded as x-www-form-urlencoded, where the keys and values are encoded in key-value tuples separated by '&', with a '=' between the key and the value:

Key Value
grant_type The value client_credentials
client_id The API Key for the application
client_secret The API Secret for the application

Specify the type of the request using the content-type HTTP header with the value application/x-www-form-urlencoded.

The following example uses cURL to request a new token:

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curl "https://test.api.amadeus.com/v1/security/oauth2/token" \
     -H "Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded" \
     -d "grant_type=client_credentials&client_id={client_id}&client_secret={client_secret}"
Note that the -X POST parameter is not needed in the cURL command. As we are sending a body, cURL sends the request as POST automatically.

Response

The authorization server will respond with a JSON object:

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{
    "type": "amadeusOAuth2Token",
    "username": "foo@bar.com",
    "application_name": "BetaTest_foobar",
    "client_id": "3sY9VNvXIjyJYd5mmOtOzJLuL1BzJBBp",
    "token_type": "Bearer",
    "access_token": "CpjU0sEenniHCgPDrndzOSWFk5mN",
    "expires_in": 1799,
    "state": "approved",
    "scope": ""
}
The response will contain the following parameters:

Parameter Description
type The type of resource. The value will be amadeusOAuth2Token.
username Your username (email address).
application_name The name of your application.
client_id The API Key for your application
token_type The type of token issued by the authentication server. The value will be Bearer.
access_token The token to authenticate your requests.
expires_in The number of seconds until the token expires.
state The status of your request. Values can be approved or expired.

Using the token

Once the token has been retrieved, you can authenticate your requests to Amadeus Self-Service APIs.

Each API call must contain the authorization HTTP header with the value Bearer {access_token}, where acess_token is the token you have just retrieved.

The following example is a call to the Flight Check-in Links API to retrieve the check-in URL for Iberia (IB):

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curl "https://test.api.amadeus.com/v2/reference-data/urls/checkin-links?airline=IB" \
     -H "Authorization: Bearer CpjU0sEenniHCgPDrndzOSWFk5mN"

Managing tokens from your source code

To retrieve a token using your favourite programming language, send a POST request and parse the JSON response as in the cURL examples above.

There are different strategies to maintain your token updated, like checking the time remaining until expiration before each API call or capturing the unauthorized error when the token expires. In both cases, you must request a new token.

To simplify managing the authentication process, you can use the Amadeus for Developers SDKs available on GitHub. The SDKs automatically fetch and store the access_token and set the headers in all API calls.

Example of initializing the client and authenticating with the Node SDK:

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var Amadeus = require('amadeus');

var amadeus = new Amadeus({
  clientId: '[API Key]',
  clientSecret: '[API Secret]'
});

You can then call the API. The following example is a call to the Flight Check-in Links API to retrieve the check-in URL for Iberia (IB):

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var Amadeus = require('amadeus');

var amadeus = new Amadeus({
  clientId: '[API Key]',
  clientSecret: '[API Secret]'
});

amadeus.referenceData.urls.checkinLinks.get({
  airlineCode : 'IB'
}).then(function(response){
  console.log(response.data);
}).catch(function(responseError){
  console.log(responseError.code);
});
Last update: September 24, 2024