Migrating Auth0 Rules to Auth0 Actions
Tags: webdev, programming, tutorial
Published: 2022-02-02 21:35:50

### Are you considering migrating your Auth0 Rules to Auth0 Actions? Here are some guidelines to do it successfully.

### <br>

Auth0 Actions offer many advantages over Rules. If you are using Rules to customize your Auth0 integration experience, you should consider migrating to Actions. Learn how to plan and implement this migration.

## Comparing Auth0 Rules and Actions

One of Auth0's strengths is its focus on extensibility, i.e., the ability for the user to customize the standard behavior of Auth0's identity solutions. [Auth0 Rules](https://auth0.com/docs/customize/rules) was the first tool that enabled users to run custom code to extend Auth0 authentication. Rules are serverless code blocks executed right after successful authentication but before tokens are issued.

To satisfy the widest range of extensibility needs, Auth0 has constantly worked on improving this tool. Recently, it consolidated the acquired experience on customization and provided developers with [Auth0 Actions](https://auth0.com/actions), a solid environment for most code-based customization needs.

Auth0 Actions offer a lot of benefits over Rules. So, if you are about to start your customization, Actions are the recommended tool. On the other hand, if you have already implemented your customization through Rules, you are strongly encouraged to migrate to Actions. Let's look at a few advantages you can get by switching to Actions:

- Rules let you handle just the authentication flow. **Auth0 Actions let you handle multiple flows**: authentication, pre and post user registration, password change, client credential exchange, phone message sending.
- Rules don't have an integrated version control system. Actions do. **You can modify an Action without affecting the one in production**, create multiple versions, and restore a previous one. 
- Unlike Rules, the Actions editor supports code hints, all npm packages, and isolated secrets management. **The developer experience is significantly improved**.

Read [this blog post for a quick introduction to Auth0 Actions](https://auth0.com/blog/introducing-auth0-actions/).

> While Auth0 Actions bring you an improved customization environment, Rules and Hooks are still available, and they all can live together. <u>Just remember that Rules and Hooks are executed before Actions.</u>

You can use Actions to replace your Rules, but be aware of some limitations:

- In Rules, you can share data with other Rules in the pipeline by adding properties to the `user` and `context` objects. These properties are accessible in subsequent Rules. In Actions, you can't do this, although changes to the user's metadata can be accessed by subsequent Actions.
- Rules can [modify SAML assertions or attributes](https://auth0.com/docs/authenticate/protocols/saml/saml-configuration/customize-saml-assertions). Actions can't.
- Rules have [limited access to the Auth0 Management API](https://auth0.com/docs/customize/rules/use-management-api) and [the `global` and `auth0` objects](https://auth0.com/docs/customize/rules/rules-best-practices/rules-environment-best-practices#global-object). Actions can't, but have an alternative approach for doing similar tasks, as you will learn in the following.

Take a look at [the full list of limitations of the current implementation](https://auth0.com/docs/customize/actions/limitations).
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