How to Set Server-Side Cookie In Next JS
Jasser Mark Arioste
Hello, hustlers! In this tutorial, you'll learn how to set server-side cookies in NextJS. We'll do them in middleware, getServerSideProps, and API routes.
Prerequisites #
To follow this tutorial, you should have at least NextJS v12.3.4.
Setting Cookies in middleware.ts
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Setting cookies in middleware is the easiest since NextJS already provides us with an awesome API. To set cookies in middleware we can us the NextResponse object:
// middleware.ts import { NextRequest, NextResponse } from "next/server"; export async function middleware(req: NextRequest) { const res = NextResponse.next(); //Setting cookies in response. //This will be sent back to the browser. res.cookies.set("my-cookie", "my-cookie-value", { path: "/", httpOnly: true, }); // Setting cookies in the request. // This will be forwarded to api handler or getServerSideProps // depending on the route. req.cookies.set({ name: "test", value: "test-cookie-value", }); return res; }1234567891011121314151617181920
Setting Cookies in API handler #
To set cookies in an API handler, we'll install the cookie package to make it easier to write cookies. Since it is executed on the server-side, we don't have to worry about the package size.
yarn add cookie && yarn add -D @types/cookie1
Now, let's set a cookie in /api/hello.ts using res.setHeader method:
// pages/api/hello.ts import { serialize } from "cookie"; import type { NextApiRequest, NextApiResponse } from "next"; export default function handler(req: NextApiRequest, res: NextApiResponse) { const cookie = serialize("hello-cookie", "api-hello-cookie-value", { httpOnly: true, path: "/", }); res.setHeader("Set-Cookie", cookie); res.status(200).json({ message: "Successfully set cookie!" }); }1234567891011
We use the serialize function to encode the cookie into a string. We use the Set-Cookie header so that the cookie will be sent to the user agent. Now, if you go to /api/hello and open the dev tools, you should see the hello-cookie cookie.
Setting Cookies in getServerSideProps
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Setting cookies in getServerSideProps is similar to API handler. We'll still use the serialize function like so:
import { serialize } from "cookie"; import { GetServerSideProps } from "next"; import React from "react"; const SsrPage = () => { return <div>SsrPage</div>; }; export default SsrPage; export const getServerSideProps: GetServerSideProps = async ({ res }) => { const cookie = serialize("ssr-cookie", "ssr-cookie-value", { httpOnly: true, path: "/", }); res.setHeader("Set-Cookie", cookie); return { props: {}, }; };1234567891011121314151617
That's it!
The full code can be accessed here: nextjs-set-cookies-tutorial.
Conclusion #
We learned how to set cookies from the server-side in NextJS. The cookie package is a great tool for helping us write cookies.
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Further Reading #
Improve your NextJS knowledge by reading my previous tutorials:
Credits: Image by congerdesign from Pixabay
