Getting Started

Build a User Management App with React

This tutorial demonstrates how to build a basic user management app. The app authenticates and identifies the user, stores their profile information in the database, and allows the user to log in, update their profile details, and upload a profile photo. The app uses:

Supabase User Management example

Project setup

Before we start building we're going to set up our Database and API. This is as simple as starting a new Project in Supabase and then creating a "schema" inside the database.

Create a project

  1. Create a new project in the Supabase Dashboard.
  2. Enter your project details.
  3. Wait for the new database to launch.

Set up the database schema

Now we are going to set up the database schema. We can use the "User Management Starter" quickstart in the SQL Editor, or you can just copy/paste the SQL from below and run it yourself.

  1. Go to the SQL Editor page in the Dashboard.
  2. Click User Management Starter.
  3. Click Run.
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supabase link --project-ref <project-id># You can get <project-id> from your project's dashboard URL: https://supabase.com/dashboard/project/<project-id>supabase db pull

Get the API keys

Now that you've created some database tables, you are ready to insert data using the auto-generated API. We just need to get the Project URL and anon key from the API settings.

  1. Go to the API Settings page in the Dashboard.
  2. Find your Project URL, anon, and service_role keys on this page.

Building the app

Let's start building the React app from scratch.

Initialize a React app

We can use Vite to initialize an app called supabase-react:

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npm create vite@latest supabase-react -- --template reactcd supabase-react

Then let's install the only additional dependency: supabase-js.

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npm install @supabase/supabase-js

And finally we want to save the environment variables in a .env.local file. All we need are the API URL and the anon key that you copied earlier.

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VITE_SUPABASE_URL=YOUR_SUPABASE_URLVITE_SUPABASE_ANON_KEY=YOUR_SUPABASE_ANON_KEY

Now that we have the API credentials in place, let's create a helper file to initialize the Supabase client. These variables will be exposed on the browser, and that's completely fine since we have Row Level Security enabled on our Database.

Create and edit src/supabaseClient.js:

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import { createClient } from '@supabase/supabase-js'const supabaseUrl = import.meta.env.VITE_SUPABASE_URLconst supabaseAnonKey = import.meta.env.VITE_SUPABASE_ANON_KEYexport const supabase = createClient(supabaseUrl, supabaseAnonKey)

App styling (optional)

An optional step is to update the CSS file src/index.css to make the app look nice. You can find the full contents of this file here.

Set up a login component

Let's set up a React component to manage logins and sign ups. We'll use Magic Links, so users can sign in with their email without using passwords.

Create and edit src/Auth.jsx:

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import { useState } from 'react'import { supabase } from './supabaseClient'export default function Auth() {  const [loading, setLoading] = useState(false)  const [email, setEmail] = useState('')  const handleLogin = async (event) => {    event.preventDefault()    setLoading(true)    const { error } = await supabase.auth.signInWithOtp({ email })    if (error) {      alert(error.error_description || error.message)    } else {      alert('Check your email for the login link!')    }    setLoading(false)  }  return (    <div className="row flex flex-center">      <div className="col-6 form-widget">        <h1 className="header">Supabase + React</h1>        <p className="description">Sign in via magic link with your email below</p>        <form className="form-widget" onSubmit={handleLogin}>          <div>            <input              className="inputField"              type="email"              placeholder="Your email"              value={email}              required={true}              onChange={(e) => setEmail(e.target.value)}            />          </div>          <div>            <button className={'button block'} disabled={loading}>              {loading ? <span>Loading</span> : <span>Send magic link</span>}            </button>          </div>        </form>      </div>    </div>  )}

Account page

After a user is signed in we can allow them to edit their profile details and manage their account.

Let's create a new component for that called src/Account.jsx.

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import { useState, useEffect } from 'react'import { supabase } from './supabaseClient'export default function Account({ session }) {  const [loading, setLoading] = useState(true)  const [username, setUsername] = useState(null)  const [website, setWebsite] = useState(null)  const [avatar_url, setAvatarUrl] = useState(null)  useEffect(() => {    let ignore = false    async function getProfile() {      setLoading(true)      const { user } = session      const { data, error } = await supabase        .from('profiles')        .select(`username, website, avatar_url`)        .eq('id', user.id)        .single()      if (!ignore) {        if (error) {          console.warn(error)        } else if (data) {          setUsername(data.username)          setWebsite(data.website)          setAvatarUrl(data.avatar_url)        }      }      setLoading(false)    }    getProfile()    return () => {      ignore = true    }  }, [session])  async function updateProfile(event, avatarUrl) {    event.preventDefault()    setLoading(true)    const { user } = session    const updates = {      id: user.id,      username,      website,      avatar_url: avatarUrl,      updated_at: new Date(),    }    const { error } = await supabase.from('profiles').upsert(updates)    if (error) {      alert(error.message)    } else {      setAvatarUrl(avatarUrl)    }    setLoading(false)  }  return (    <form onSubmit={updateProfile} className="form-widget">      <div>        <label htmlFor="email">Email</label>        <input id="email" type="text" value={session.user.email} disabled />      </div>      <div>        <label htmlFor="username">Name</label>        <input          id="username"          type="text"          required          value={username || ''}          onChange={(e) => setUsername(e.target.value)}        />      </div>      <div>        <label htmlFor="website">Website</label>        <input          id="website"          type="url"          value={website || ''}          onChange={(e) => setWebsite(e.target.value)}        />      </div>      <div>        <button className="button block primary" type="submit" disabled={loading}>          {loading ? 'Loading ...' : 'Update'}        </button>      </div>      <div>        <button className="button block" type="button" onClick={() => supabase.auth.signOut()}>          Sign Out        </button>      </div>    </form>  )}

Launch!

Now that we have all the components in place, let's update src/App.jsx:

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import './App.css'import { useState, useEffect } from 'react'import { supabase } from './supabaseClient'import Auth from './Auth'import Account from './Account'function App() {  const [session, setSession] = useState(null)  useEffect(() => {    supabase.auth.getSession().then(({ data: { session } }) => {      setSession(session)    })    supabase.auth.onAuthStateChange((_event, session) => {      setSession(session)    })  }, [])  return (    <div className="container" style={{ padding: '50px 0 100px 0' }}>      {!session ? <Auth /> : <Account key={session.user.id} session={session} />}    </div>  )}export default App

Once that's done, run this in a terminal window:

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npm run dev

And then open the browser to localhost:5173 and you should see the completed app.

Supabase React

Bonus: Profile photos

Every Supabase project is configured with Storage for managing large files like photos and videos.

Create an upload widget

Let's create an avatar for the user so that they can upload a profile photo. We can start by creating a new component:

Create and edit src/Avatar.jsx:

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import { useEffect, useState } from 'react'import { supabase } from './supabaseClient'export default function Avatar({ url, size, onUpload }) {  const [avatarUrl, setAvatarUrl] = useState(null)  const [uploading, setUploading] = useState(false)  useEffect(() => {    if (url) downloadImage(url)  }, [url])  async function downloadImage(path) {    try {      const { data, error } = await supabase.storage.from('avatars').download(path)      if (error) {        throw error      }      const url = URL.createObjectURL(data)      setAvatarUrl(url)    } catch (error) {      console.log('Error downloading image: ', error.message)    }  }  async function uploadAvatar(event) {    try {      setUploading(true)      if (!event.target.files || event.target.files.length === 0) {        throw new Error('You must select an image to upload.')      }      const file = event.target.files[0]      const fileExt = file.name.split('.').pop()      const fileName = `${Math.random()}.${fileExt}`      const filePath = `${fileName}`      const { error: uploadError } = await supabase.storage.from('avatars').upload(filePath, file)      if (uploadError) {        throw uploadError      }      onUpload(event, filePath)    } catch (error) {      alert(error.message)    } finally {      setUploading(false)    }  }  return (    <div>      {avatarUrl ? (        <img          src={avatarUrl}          alt="Avatar"          className="avatar image"          style={{ height: size, width: size }}        />      ) : (        <div className="avatar no-image" style={{ height: size, width: size }} />      )}      <div style={{ width: size }}>        <label className="button primary block" htmlFor="single">          {uploading ? 'Uploading ...' : 'Upload'}        </label>        <input          style={{            visibility: 'hidden',            position: 'absolute',          }}          type="file"          id="single"          accept="image/*"          onChange={uploadAvatar}          disabled={uploading}        />      </div>    </div>  )}

Add the new widget

And then we can add the widget to the Account page at src/Account.jsx:

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// Import the new componentimport Avatar from './Avatar'// ...return (  <form onSubmit={updateProfile} className="form-widget">    {/* Add to the body */}    <Avatar      url={avatar_url}      size={150}      onUpload={(event, url) => {        updateProfile(event, url)      }}    />    {/* ... */}  </form>)

At this stage you have a fully functional application!