Single sign-on integration
Enterprise Edition

Neo4j supports OpenID Connect (OIDC), which allows for integration with many identity providers including Okta, Microsoft Entra ID, and Google. This integration permits federated users, managed by the identity provider, to access Neo4j instead of, or in addition to the native users and roles. For examples with different providers and troubleshooting, see the SSO configuration tutorial.

OIDC configuration settings

Neo4j supports multiple OIDC identity providers at the same time, as such each provider configuration must be assigned a prefix to differentiate it from others. In the configuration examples below the provider-specific prefix is represented by <provider>, which should be replaced with a name representing your provider. For example, if you are using Okta as your identity provider you might use okta in the place of <provider> below.

The following configuration settings are important to consider when configuring single sign-on. For a more detailed overview of the single sign-on configuration options, see Configuration settings. Some of these settings can also be updated while the database is running, see Dynamic settings for more information on how to do this. Altering any of these settings causes users to re-authenticate as their permissions may have changed as a result.

Parameter name Default value Dynamic Description

dbms.security.oidc.<provider>.display_name

false

The display name for the provider. This is displayed in clients such as Neo4j Browser and Bloom.

dbms.security.oidc.<provider>.auth_flow

pkce*

true

The OIDC auth_flow for clients such as Neo4j Browser and Bloom to use.

dbms.security.oidc.<provider>.well_known_discovery_uri

true

The OpenID Connect Discovery URL for the provider.

dbms.security.oidc.<provider>.auth_endpoint

true

URL of the provider’s Authorization Endpoint.

dbms.security.oidc.<provider>.auth_params

true

Optional parameters that clients may require with the Authorization Endpoint. The map is a semicolon-separated list of key-value pairs. For example: k1=v1;k2=v2.

dbms.security.oidc.<provider>.token_endpoint

true

URL of the provider’s OAuth 2.0 Token Endpoint.

dbms.security.oidc.<provider>.token_params

true

Option parameters that clients may require with the Token Endpoint. The map is a semicolon-separated list of key-value pairs. For example: k1=v1;k2=v2.

dbms.security.oidc.<provider>.jwks_uri

true

URL of the provider’s JSON Web Key Set.

dbms.security.oidc.<provider>.user_info_uri

true

URL of the provider’s UserInfo Endpoint.

dbms.security.oidc.<provider>.issuer

true

URL that the provider asserts as its issuer identifier. This will be checked against the iss claim in the token.

dbms.security.oidc.<provider>.audience

true

The expected value for the aud claim.

dbms.security.oidc.<provider>.params

true

Option parameters that clients may require. The map is a semicolon-separated list of key-value pairs. For example: k1=v1;k2=v2.

dbms.security.oidc.<provider>.config

true

Option additional configuration that clients may require. The map is a semicolon-separated list of key-value pairs. For example: k1=v1;k2=v2.

dbms.security.oidc.<provider>.get_groups_from_user_info

false

true

Whether to fetch the groups claim from the user info endpoint on the identity provider. The default is false, to read the claim from the token.

dbms.security.oidc.<provider>.get_username_from_user_info

false

true

Whether to fetch the username claim from the user info endpoint on the identity provider. The default is false, to read the claim from the token.

dbms.security.oidc.<provider>.claims.username

sub

true

The claim to use for the database username. Neo4j expects to find a string claim in the JWT or user_info response with this name.

dbms.security.oidc.<provider>.claims.groups

true

The claim to use for the database roles. Neo4j expects to find a claim in the JWT or user_info response with this name. The claim may be a string claim representing a single role or a string array claim representing multiple roles. The JWT claim may also contain a single group returned as a string as well as a list of groups as was previously required.

dbms.security.oidc.<provider>.authorization.group_to_role_mapping

true

List an authorization mapping from groups to the pre-defined built-in roles admin, architect, publisher, editor, and reader, or to any custom-defined roles.

dbms.security.logs.oidc.jwt_claims_at_debug_level_enabled

false

false

When set to true, it logs the claims from the JWT into the security log (provided the security log level is also set to DEBUG).

*Always use pkce auth flow. It adds an additional layer of security to the authorization code flow, which prevents certain types of attacks, such as authorization code interception attacks.

implicit flow has been removed from OAuth 2.1 because it exposes the access or ID token in the browser history and the redirect URL, in addition to other security vulnerabilities. Starting with Neo4j 2026.06, its support is deprecated and will be removed in a future release.

Configure Neo4j to use OpenID Connect

First, you configure Neo4j to use OpenID Connect as an authentication and authorization provider in the neo4j.conf file.

  1. Make sure security is turned on. The default value for dbms.security.auth_enabled is true.

  2. Uncomment the settings dbms.security.authentication_providers and dbms.security.authorization_providers and change their value to oidc-<provider>, where <provider> maps to the provider name used in the configuration settings. This way, the OIDC connector is used as a security provider for both authentication and authorization. If you want, you can still use the native provider for mixed-mode authentication and authorization. The values are comma-separated and queried in the declared order.

    Example 1. Configure Neo4j to use two OpenID Connect and the native authentication and authorization providers.
    dbms.security.authentication_providers=oidc-newsso,oidc-oldsso,native
dbms.security.authorization_providers=oidc-newsso,oidc-oldsso,native

  3. Check connectivity. Neo4j needs to connect to the identity provider to discover settings and fetch public keys to verify tokens. Check firewall settings and security controls, and, if necessary, logs to ensure that the Neo4j server is able to connect to the identity provider using HTTPS. If a proxy is required, this can be configured in the Java virtual machine using the configuration setting server.jvm.additional. Proxies that require credentials are not supported.

Map the identity provider groups to the Neo4j roles

Before identity provider managed groups can be used with Neo4j, you have to decide on an approach for mapping identity provider groups to Neo4j roles. The simplest approach is to create identity provider groups with the same names as Neo4j roles. If you decide to go this way, no mapping configuration is necessary. Assuming, however, that identity provider groups do not directly map 1:1 to the desired Neo4j roles, it is necessary to map the identity provider groups to the Neo4j built-in and custom-defined roles. To do that, you need to know what privileges the Neo4j roles have, and based on these privileges, create the mapping to the groups defined in the identity provider. The map must be formatted as a semicolon-separated list of key-value pairs, where the key is the identity provider group name and the value is a comma-separated list of the corresponding role names. For example, group1=role1;group2=role2;group3=role3,role4,role5;group4=role6;group5=role6.

Example 2. Example of identity provider groups to Neo4j roles mapping
dbms.security.oidc.mysso.authorization.group_to_role_mapping=\
    neo4j_readonly  = reader;    \ (1)
    neo4j_rw        = editor,publisher; \ (2)
    neo4j_rw        = publisher; \ (3)
    neo4j_create    = publisher; \
    neo4j_dba       = admin; \
    neo4j_exec      = rolename (4)
1 Mapping of an identity provider group to a Neo4j built-in role.
2 Mapping of an identity provider group to two Neo4j built-in roles.
3 Mapping of two identity provider groups to a Neo4j built-in role.
4 Mapping of an identity provider group to a custom-defined role. Custom-defined roles, such as rolename, must be explicitly created using the CREATE ROLE rolename command before they can be used to grant privileges. See Manage roles.

When specifying explicit group to role mapping the automatic mapping for groups and roles sharing a name is disabled. This means that all groups and roles need to be specified to be mapped, even if they share a name.

Configure Neo4j to use an OpenID Connect identity provider

This option allows users to log in through an OIDC compliant identity provider by offering a token from the provider instead of a username and password. Typically, these tokens take the form of a signed JSON Web Token (JWT). The following configuration examples use mysso as the provider’s name. It is recommended to use a name describing the provider that is being integrated.

OpenID Connect using JWT claims

In this configuration, Neo4j receives a JWT from the identity provider containing claims representing the database username (e.g. email), and the Neo4j roles.

  1. Set a display name.

    In the neo4j.conf file, uncomment and configure the following settings:

    dbms.security.oidc.mysso.display_name=SSO Provider

    This is displayed on a button on the login page of clients, such as Neo4j Browser and Bloom so that you can identify the provider you are using to login.

  2. Configure discovery.

    Uncomment and configure the following settings:

    dbms.security.oidc.mysso.well_known_discovery_uri=https://my-idp.example.com/.well-known/openid-configuration

    The well_known_discovery endpoint of the identity provider supplies the OpenID provider metadata to allow Neo4j to interact with that provider. It is also possible to configure the provider settings manually:

    dbms.security.oidc.mysso.auth_endpoint=https://my-idp.example.com/openid-connect/auth
dbms.security.oidc.mysso.token_endpoint=https://my-idp.example.com/openid-connect/token
dbms.security.oidc.mysso.jwks_uri=https://my-idp.example.com/openid-connect/certs
dbms.security.oidc.mysso.user_info_uri=https://my-idp.example.com/openid-connect/userinfo
dbms.security.oidc.mysso.issuer=abcd1234

    Manual settings always take priority over those retrieved from the discovery endpoint.

  3. Configure audience.

    Provide the expected value for the audience(aud) claim:

    dbms.security.oidc.mysso.claims.audience=myaudience

  4. Configure claims.

    Provide the name of the claims that map to the database username and roles. username is expected to be a string claim, and roles is expected to be a list of strings representing a set of roles or a single string representing a single role:

    dbms.security.oidc.mysso.claims.username=sub
dbms.security.oidc.mysso.claims.groups=roles

  5. Optionally, map the groups in the OIDC groups claim to the Neo4j built-in and custom roles.

    See Map the identity provider groups to the Neo4j roles

OpenID Connect fetching claims from a provider

In this configuration, Neo4j receives a token from the identity provider and uses that token to call back to the identity provider using its UserInfo endpoint to retrieve claims for the database username and Neo4j roles.

  1. Configure Neo4j for OpenID Connect Using JWT Claims.

  2. Configure the claims to fetch from the UserInfo endpoint:

    dbms.security.oidc.mysso.get_username_from_user_info=true
dbms.security.oidc.mysso.get_groups_from_user_info=true

    It is possible to fetch just the username, just the groups, or both from the userinfo endpoint.

Configure SSO at the user level using auth providers

User auth providers can be used to determine which users can authenticate and authorize using the configured providers.

You must change the dbms.security.require_local_user configuration setting to true to use auth providers. This means that a user with a matching auth provider must exist in order to be able to authenticate and authorize. This applies to all providers.

Conversely, when dbms.security.require_local_user is set to false, users' auth providers have no bearing on the way that they are authenticated and authorized, instead authentication and authorization is controlled centrally (for all users) by the database configuration.

The following examples show how to configure users with auth provider using Cypher.

Example 3. Create a user with an auth provider who can authenticate and authorize using mysso
CREATE USER jake
SET AUTH 'oidc-mysso' {SET ID 'jakesUniqueMySsoId'} // the id must match the claim that you configured via dbms.security.oidc.mysso.claims.username

The command creates the user jake who can authenticate and authorize using mysso provided they present a valid token with a sub claim of jakesUniqueMySsoId. The claim used for authentication is determined by the dbms.security.oidc.mysso.claims.username config setting (the default is the sub claim).

Example 4. Create a user with two auth providers allowing the user to authenticate and authorize with one of them
CREATE USER jake
SET HOME DATABASE anotherDb
SET AUTH 'oidc-mysso1' {SET ID 'jakesUniqueMySso1Id'} // `jakesUniqueMySso1Id` must match the value of the claim that you configured via dbms.security.oidc.mysso1.claims.username
SET AUTH 'oidc-mysso2' {SET ID 'jakesUniqueMySso2Id'} // `jakesUniqueMySso2Id` must match the value of the claim that you configured via dbms.security.oidc.mysso2.claims.username

The command creates the user jake who can authenticate and authorize using mysso1 or mysso2. The example also illustrates that the user can have their home database set even when using only external auth providers.

Example 5. Alter a user to remove one of their auth providers
ALTER USER jake
REMOVE AUTH 'oidc-mysso2'

The command prevents the user jake from being able to authenticate and authorize with the mysso2 provider.

Example 6. Alter a user to allow them to authenticate and authorize using username and password
ALTER USER jake
SET AUTH 'native' {SET PASSWORD 'changeme' SET PASSWORD CHANGE REQUIRED}

The command allows the user jake to authenticate and authorize using the specified username and password (in addition to what they are already configured to use).

Example 7. Configure the database to allow authentication via mysso and authorization via the native provider

  1. Set the following database config:

    dbms.security.authentication_providers=oidc-mysso
dbms.security.authorization_providers=native

  2. Create a user with a mysso auth provider:

    CREATE USER jake
SET AUTH 'oidc-mysso' {SET ID 'jakesUniqueMySsoId'} // `jakesUniqueMySsoId` must match the value of the claim that you configured via dbms.security.oidc.mysso.claims.username

  3. Natively grant the READER role to the user:

    GRANT ROLE READER TO jake

    The command allows the user jake to authenticate using mysso and receive the READER role from the native provider.

  4. You can also give the user the union of roles from mysso and native by setting mysso as an authorization provider too:

    dbms.security.authentication_providers=oidc-mysso
dbms.security.authorization_providers=native,oidc-mysso
Example 8. Suspend a user
ALTER USER jake
SET STATUS SUSPENDED

The command completely prevents the user from being able to authenticate/authorize by any means.

Use a self-signed certificate (SSL) in a test environment

Production environments should always use an SSL certificate issued by a Certificate Authority for secure access to the identity provider. However, there are scenarios, for example in test environments, where you may want to use a self-signed SSL certificate on the identity provider server.

To configure a self-signed SSL certificate used on an identity provider server, enter the details of a Java keystore containing the relevant certificates using server.jvm.additional in neo4j.conf. The path to the certificate file MyCert.jks is an absolute path to the Neo4j server.

server.jvm.additional=-Djavax.net.ssl.keyStore=/path/to/MyCert.jks
server.jvm.additional=-Djavax.net.ssl.keyStorePassword=mypasword
server.jvm.additional=-Djavax.net.ssl.trustStore=/path/to/MyCert.jks
server.jvm.additional=-Djavax.net.ssl.trustStorePassword=mypasword

Debug logging of JWT claims

While setting up an OIDC integration, it is sometimes necessary to perform troubleshooting. In these cases, it can be useful to view the claims contained in the JWT supplied by the identity provider.

To enable the logging of these claims at DEBUG level in the security log, set dbms.security.logs.oidc.jwt_claims_at_debug_level_enabled to be true and the security log level to DEBUG. You can do this in <NEO4J_HOME>/conf/server-logs.xml.

If you need more information on how to set up and manage the security log, see Configure the security log.

Make sure to set dbms.security.logs.oidc.jwt_claims_at_debug_level_enabled back to false for production environments to avoid unwanted logging of potentially sensitive information. Also, bear in mind that the set of claims provided by an identity provider in the JWT can change over time.

Glossary

allocator

A component in the cluster that allocates databases to servers according to the topology constraints specified and an allocation strategy.

asynchronous replication

Asynchronous replication is used by secondary copies to poll for new transactions, which means they cannot be guaranteed to have received the most recent transactions. This enables efficient scale-out of read-performance.

Aura instance

A fully-managed DBMS represented by a single instance ID, that is running in the Neo4j Aura cloud.

auto-commit transaction

An automatically committed transaction that contains a single query.

Bolt protocol

Bolt is a protocol used for interaction between Neo4j instances and drivers.

bookmark

A marker the client can request from the cluster to ensure that it is able to read its own writes so that the application’s state is consistent and only databases that have a copy of the bookmark are permitted to respond.

category (Bloom)

A category is based on a node label and is defined in a Perspective as a way of visually distinguishing nodes with the same label(s).

causal consistency

All servers in a cluster agree on the order in which transactions take place. The position of a server on the causal chain can be guaranteed using a bookmark.

cluster

A Neo4j DBMS that spans multiple servers working together to increase fault tolerance and/or read scalability. Databases on a cluster may be configured to replicate across servers in the cluster thus achieving read scalability or high availability.

client application

Software that interacts with a Neo4j server.

commit

A commit is the successful completion of a transaction, which ensures durability of any changes made. For more details, visit Operations Manual → Transaction management.

composite database

Composite databases are the means to access partitioned graph data with a single Cypher query.

constraint

Constraints are sets of data modeling rules that ensure the data is consistent and reliable.

Cypher®

Neo4j’s graph query language.

data model

A data model defines how information is organized in a database. A good data model will make querying and understanding your data easier. In Neo4j, the data models have a graph structure.

database

A database is a container used by the DBMS to manage and store graph data. The physical structure of data is controlled by the database.

database vs graph

Databases are the physical containers of graph data. Graphs are the logical structure of data in Neo4j.

Database Management System

Database Management System, or DBMS, capable of managing multiple databases. A DBMS may run on a single server, or span several servers configured as a cluster.

database schema

The prescribed property existence and datatypes for nodes and relationships.

deallocate

An act of removing a database from a server or a server from a cluster without loss of data or reduced fault tolerance.

degree (of a node)

The number of relationships of a specific node; loops are counted twice.

disaster recovery

A manual intervention to restore availability of a cluster, or databases within a cluster.

driver

A software library that provides access to Neo4j from a particular programming language.

election

In the event that the Raft leader becomes unresponsive, followers automatically trigger an election and vote for a new leader.

entity

A node or a relationship.

expression (Cypher)

A component of a Cypher query which produces values. It may be used in projections, as a predicate, or when setting properties on graph elements.

fabric

Fabric is the architectural design of a unified system that provides a single access point to local or distributed graph data.

fault tolerance

A guarantee that a cluster can maintain a database’s persistence and availability in the event of one or more servers failing.

follower

A primary copy of a database acting as a follower, receives and acknowledges synchronous writes from the leader.

Generative AI (GenAI)

A type of artificial intelligence (AI) system that generates text, images, or other media in response to prompts.

graph

A logical representation of a set of nodes where some pairs are connected by relationships.

index

Data structure that improves read performance of a database.

knowledge graph

A specific type of graph that has an organizing principle so that a user (or a computer system) can reason about the underlying data. The organizing principle provides an additional layer of structure that adds context to support knowledge discovery.

label

Marks a node as a member of a named and indexed subset. A node may be assigned zero or more labels.

leader

A single primary copy of a database is designated as the leader. It receives all write transactions from clients and replicates writes synchronously to followers and asynchronously to secondary copies of the database.

main database

In terms of Neo4j Enterprise Studio, the database(s) containing the user’s data. Can exist in the same Neo4j deployment as the tool asset database.

motif

A description of a specific pattern within a graph.

node

A node represents an entity or discrete object in your graph data model. Nodes can be connected by relationships, hold data in properties, and are classified by labels.

operator

A symbol representing a mathematical or logical operation.

parameter

Named value provided when running a Cypher statement.

path

A sequence of nodes and the relationships connecting them, that does not contain duplicate relationships. Several paths can match a pattern.

pattern

A specific arrangement of nodes and relationships that can be matched in a graph. A pattern follows a motif.

perspective (Bloom)

A Perspective defines a certain business view or domain that can be found in the target Neo4j graph. A single Neo4j graph can be viewed through different Perspectives, each tailored for a different business purpose.

primary

A copy of the database that is able to process write transactions and is eligible to be elected as a leader. It participates in fault tolerant writes as it is part of the majority required to acknowledge and commit write transactions.

primary vs secondary

In a cluster, databases can operate in either primary or secondary mode. Primary databases are able to process write and read transactions, ensuring fault tolerance. Secondary databases are replicated asynchronously from primaries, and their main purpose is to provide read scaling within the cluster.

project (Aura)

An isolated environment in the unified Aura console that contains its own database instances, configurations, and resources. Preceded by tenant in the classic Aura console.

property

Properties are key-value pairs that are used for storing data on nodes and relationships.

query (Cypher)

A statement that retrieves or writes information to a database.

Raft group

A group of servers that are participating in hosting a particular database in primary mode.

Raft group member

A server that is participating in a Raft group. A server can be a member of one or more groups.

Raft log

A shared log between all Raft group members that is guaranteed to be consistently updated and viewed by those members. The log contains both database data and operational state of the Raft group.

Raft protocol

The networking mechanism that enables a database to replicate its data across multiple servers to give high availability for accessing the data and high durability to the data stored.

read scaling

Distributing query load by creating additional database copies hosted in secondary mode (read-only).

relationship

A relationship represents a connection between nodes in your graph data model. Relationships connect a source node to a target node, hold data in properties, and are classified by type.

secondary

An asynchronously replicated copy of the database that provides read scaling within the cluster.

seed

A seed is a database dump or a full backup used to create a database on a cluster. This is sometimes called seeding.

server

A physical machine, a virtual machine, or a container running an instance of Neo4j. Servers can be standalone or part of a cluster.

session

A causally linked sequence of transactions.

session consistency

An alternative name for Neo4j’s causal consistency.

standalone

A single server running Neo4j and not part of a cluster.

synchronous replication

Synchronous replication requires the leader primary to replicate a transaction and block the commit until a quorum of the follower primaries acknowledges that the transaction is successfully replicated. Once the transaction is replicated, the commit is allowed to proceed. This ensures data durability and consistency within the cluster.

system database

A database used by Neo4j to store system information.

tenant (Aura)

An isolated environment in the classic Aura console that contains its own database instances, configurations, and resources. Replaced by project in the unified Aura console.

tool asset database

In terms of Neo4j Enterprise Studio, the database where tools' assets are stored. This can be in the same Neo4j deployment as the main database(s) or in a separate deployment.

topology

A configuration that describes how the copies of a database should be spread across the servers in a cluster, see primary mode and secondary mode.

transaction

A transaction comprises a unit of work performed against a database. It is treated in a coherent and reliable way, independent of other transactions. Transactions comply with the ACID consistency model (atomic, consistent, isolated, and durable).