createAuthLayer 🛠️

The createAuthLayer function is the core of Better Auth's Next.js integration. It provides a set of pre-built helpers that make it easy to implement authentication checks and guards in your Next.js actions, routes and components.

Setup 🔧

First, create an auth layer in your Next.js project:

import { createAuthLayer } from 'payload-better-auth'
import { config } from '@/payload.config'
import { payloadBetterAuthConfig } from '@/payload-better-auth.config'
 
export const {
  // betterAuth instance
  auth,
  // checkers
  isAuth,
  isGuest,
  isUser,
  isAdmin,
  isRole,
  // guards
  guardAuth,
  // guardGuest,
  // guardUser,
  // guardAdmin,
  // guardRole,
} = createAuthLayer(config, payloadBetterAuthConfig)

Available Helpers 🎯

The createAuthLayer function returns several helpers:

Better Auth Instance

• auth: Better Auth Instance

Learn more on auth instance

Checkers

• isAuth: Check if user is authenticated
• isGuest: Check if user is a guest (not authenticated)
• isUser: Check if user is logged in
• isAdmin: Check if user is an admin
• isRole: Check if user has specific role

Learn more on checkers

Guards

• guardAuth: Protect and redirect if user is not authenticated
• guardGuest: Protect and redirect if user is a guest (not authenticated)
• guardUser: Protect and redirect if user is logged in
• guardAdmin: Protect and redirect if user is an admin
• guardRole: Protect and redirect if user has specific role

Learn more on guards

Usage Examples

Using in Components

import { isAdmin } from '@/lib/auth'
 
export default async function ProtectedPage() {
  const isAdminUser = await isAdmin()
 
  if (!isAdminUser) {
    return <div>Access denied</div>
  }
 
  return <div>Admin content</div>
}

Best Practices 📚

1. Create a single auth layer instance and export it
2. Use guards for route protection
3. Use checkers for conditional rendering
4. Handle errors appropriately
5. Cache authentication state when possible