> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://docs.nylon.dev/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

# What is BYOK?

> Running social OAuth through your own platform apps instead of Nylon's, and when that is worth doing.

Every connection runs on **Nylon's own platform apps** by default. There is nothing for you to register with Meta or Google, no review queue to sit in, and token refresh is handled for you. Most teams never change this.

BYOK — bring your own keys — runs the same connections through platform apps that **you** registered. The Nylon API is identical either way; what changes is whose app the user is authorizing.

## When each one makes sense

|                               | Nylon-managed OAuth           | Your OAuth (BYOK)                                      |
| ----------------------------- | ----------------------------- | ------------------------------------------------------ |
| **Setup**                     | None                          | Register an app with each platform and get it reviewed |
| **Consent screen shows**      | Nylon                         | Your company                                           |
| **Rate quota**                | Shared across Nylon customers | Yours alone                                            |
| **Token refresh**             | Handled for you               | Handled for you                                        |
| **Who fixes a suspended app** | Nylon                         | You                                                    |

Three reasons to take it on:

<AccordionGroup>
  <Accordion title="Branding" icon="palette">
    Your users see *your* company on the platform's permission screen, not a vendor they have never heard of. For a product whose users are non-technical, this is usually the deciding reason.
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="Rate quota" icon="gauge">
    Platform rate limits are per app. On Nylon's app you share a quota with other customers; on your own you do not. This matters at volume and almost never below it.
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="Compliance" icon="file-check">
    Some agreements require that the platform relationship — the terms, the data request, the app review — is yours directly rather than a vendor's.
  </Accordion>
</AccordionGroup>

Against that: platform app review is genuinely slow, and when a platform suspends or changes an app, it becomes your problem to resolve.

## Per provider, not per account

BYOK is configured for a **provider**, and takes effect on every account connected through that provider afterwards. Configure Meta and every new Facebook and Instagram connection uses your app; existing connections keep whichever app they were made with.

The **OAuth app** column on the Connections page shows which app each profile uses — *Nylon* or *Your app* — so the two can coexist.

<Note>
  Switching an existing connection from one to the other means disconnecting and connecting again. There is no in-place migration, because the token was issued to a different app.
</Note>

## What can use your own app

Thirteen providers accept BYOK credentials: Meta (Facebook and Instagram), X, LinkedIn, Pinterest, Bluesky, TikTok, Threads, Discord, Google (YouTube and Google Business), Dribbble, Kick, Twitch and Whop.

Mastodon is absent on purpose — Nylon registers an application with each Mastodon server on the fly, so there is no single app to bring. DEV.to is absent because it has no OAuth at all.

## Related

<Columns cols={2}>
  <Card title="Configure BYOK" icon="settings" href="/help/configure-byok">
    Callback URLs, credentials, and getting it working.
  </Card>

  <Card title="BYOK reference" icon="square-terminal" href="/byok">
    How it looks from the API's side.
  </Card>
</Columns>