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Ory Kratos is an API first identity and user management system for cloud native applications. It centralizes login, registration, recovery, verification, and profile management flows so your services consume them instead of reimplementing them. **Table of contents** - [What is Ory Kratos?](#what-is-ory-kratos) - [Why Ory Kratos](#why-ory-kratos) - [Migrating from Auth0, Okta, and similar providers](#migrating-from-auth0-okta-and-similar-providers) - [Deployment options](#deployment-options) - [Use Ory Kratos on the Ory Network](#use-ory-kratos-on-the-ory-network) - [Self-host Ory Kratos](#self-host-ory-kratos) - [Quickstart](#quickstart) - [Who is using it?](#who-is-using-it) ## What is Ory Kratos? Ory Kratos is an API first identity and user management system that follows [cloud architecture best practices](https://www.ory.com/docs/ecosystem/software-architecture-philosophy). It focuses on core identity workflows that almost every application needs: - Self service login and registration - Account verification and recovery - Multi factor authentication - Profile and account management - Identity schemas and traits - Admin APIs for lifecycle management We recommend starting with the [Ory Kratos introduction docs](https://www.ory.com/kratos/docs/) to learn more about its architecture, feature set, and how it compares to other systems. ### Why Ory Kratos Ory Kratos is designed to: - Remove identity logic from your application code and expose it over HTTP APIs - Work well with any UI framework through browser based and native app flows - Scale to large numbers of identities and devices - Integrate with the rest of the Ory stack for OAuth2, OpenID Connect, and access control - Fit into modern cloud native environments such as Kubernetes and managed platforms ## Migrating from Auth0, Okta, and similar providers If you are migrating from Auth0, Okta, or another identity provider that uses OAuth2 / OpenID Connect based login, consider using **Ory Hydra + Ory Kratos** together: - **Ory Hydra** acts as the OAuth2 and OpenID Connect provider and can replace most authorization server and token issuing capabilities of your existing IdP. - **Ory Kratos** provides identity, credentials, and user-facing flows (login, registration, recovery, verification, profile management). This combination is often a drop-in replacement for OAuth2 and OpenID Connect capabilities at the protocol level. In practice, you update client configuration and endpoints to point to Hydra, migrate identities into Kratos, and keep your applications speaking the same OAuth2 / OIDC protocols they already use. ## Deployment options You can run Ory Kratos in two main ways: - As a managed service on the Ory Network - As a self hosted service under your own control, with or without the Ory Enterprise License ### Use Ory Kratos on the Ory Network The [Ory Network](https://www.ory.com/cloud) is the fastest way to use Ory services in production. **Ory Identities** is powered by the open source Ory Kratos server and is API compatible. The Ory Network provides: - Identity and credential management that scales to billions of users and devices - Registration, login, and account management flows for passkeys, biometrics, social login, SSO, and multi factor authentication - Prebuilt login, registration, and account management pages and components - OAuth2 and OpenID Connect for single sign on, API access, and machine to machine authorization - Low latency permission checks based on the Zanzibar model with the Ory Permission Language - GDPR friendly storage with data locality and compliance in mind - Web based Ory Console and Ory CLI for administration and operations - Cloud native APIs compatible with the open source servers - Fair, usage based [pricing](https://www.ory.com/pricing) Sign up for a [free developer account](https://console.ory.sh/registration?utm_source=github&utm_medium=banner&utm_campaign=kratos-readme) to get started. ### Self-host Ory Kratos You can run Ory Kratos yourself for full control over infrastructure, deployment, and customization. The [install guide](https://www.ory.com/kratos/docs/install) explains how to: - Install Kratos on Linux, macOS, Windows, and Docker - Configure databases such as PostgreSQL, MySQL, and CockroachDB - Deploy to Kubernetes and other orchestration systems - Build Kratos from source This guide uses the open source distribution to get you started without license requirements. It is a great fit for individuals, researchers, hackers, and companies that want to experiment, prototype, or run unimportant workloads without SLAs. You get the full core engine, and you are free to inspect, extend, and build it from source. If you run Kratos as part of a business-critical system, for example login and account recovery for all your users, you should use a commercial agreement to reduce operational and security risk. The **Ory Enterprise License (OEL)** layers on top of self-hosted Kratos and provides: - Additional enterprise features that are not available in the open source version such as SCIM, SAML, organization login ("SSO"), CAPTCHAs and more - Regular security releases, including CVE patches, with service level agreements - Support for advanced scaling, multi-tenancy, and complex deployments - Premium support options with SLAs, direct access to engineers, and onboarding help - Access to a private Docker registry with frequent and vetted, up-to-date enterprise builds For guaranteed CVE fixes, current enterprise builds, advanced features, and support in production, you need a valid [Ory Enterprise License](https://www.ory.com/ory-enterprise-license) and access to the Ory Enterprise Docker registry. To learn more, [contact the Ory team](https://www.ory.com/contact/). ## Quickstart Install the [Ory CLI](https://www.ory.com/docs/guides/cli/installation) and create a new project to try Ory Identities. ```bash # Install the Ory CLI if you do not have it yet: bash <(curl https://raw.githubusercontent.com/ory/meta/master/install.sh) -b . ory sudo mv ./ory /usr/local/bin/ # Sign in or sign up ory auth # Create a new project ory create project --create-workspace "Ory Open Source" --name "GitHub Quickstart" --use-project ory open ax login ``` ### Who is using it? The Ory community stands on the shoulders of individuals, companies, and maintainers. The Ory team thanks everyone involved - from submitting bug reports and feature requests, to contributing patches and documentation. The Ory community counts more than 50.000 members and is growing. The Ory stack protects 7.000.000.000+ API requests every day across thousands of companies. None of this would have been possible without each and everyone of you! The following list represents companies that have accompanied us along the way and that have made outstanding contributions to our ecosystem. _If you think that your company deserves a spot here, reach out to office@ory.com now_!

Name	Website	Case Study
OpenAI	openai.com	OpenAI Case Study
Fandom	fandom.com	Fandom Case Study
Lumin	luminpdf.com	Lumin Case Study
Sencrop	sencrop.com	Sencrop Case Study
OSINT Industries	osint.industries	OSINT Industries Case Study
HGV	hgv.it	HGV Case Study
Maxroll	maxroll.gg	Maxroll Case Study
Zezam	zezam.io	Zezam Case Study
T.RowePrice	troweprice.com
Mistral	mistral.ai
Axel Springer	axelspringer.com
Hemnet	hemnet.se
Cisco	cisco.com
Presidencia de la República Dominicana	presidencia.gob.do
Moonpig	moonpig.com
Booster	choosebooster.com
Zaptec	zaptec.com
Klarna	klarna.com
Raspberry PI Foundation	raspberrypi.org
Tulip	tulip.com
Hootsuite	hootsuite.com
Segment	segment.com
Arduino	arduino.cc
Sainsbury's	sainsburys.co.uk
Contraste	contraste.com
inMusic	inmusicbrands.com
Buhta	buhta.com
Amplitude	amplitude.com

Many thanks to all individual contributors