Deploy and Host FastAPI Authentication and User Management on Railway

FastAPI Authentication and User Management is a single-file Python backend providing JWT-based auth (access + refresh tokens with rotation), user registration/login, profile management, admin controls, and a built-in dark-themed frontend—all powered by FastAPI and async SQLAlchemy.

About Hosting FastAPI Authentication and User Management

Hosting this service requires a Python runtime and a PostgreSQL database. Railway handles both seamlessly—deploy the app from GitHub and attach a PostgreSQL plugin. The app auto-detects the DATABASE_URL environment variable, creates all database tables on startup, and begins serving immediately. No manual migration steps, no Dockerfile, no reverse proxy configuration. Nixpacks builds the project automatically from requirements.txt. A single environment variable (SECRET_KEY) is recommended for production to ensure JWT tokens survive across redeploys.

Common Use Cases

• Adding plug-and-play authentication to a new or existing web/mobile app
• Bootstrapping a SaaS MVP with user registration, login, and role-based admin access
• Teaching or learning JWT authentication flows with a live, deployable reference implementation

Dependencies for FastAPI Authentication and User Management Hosting

• Python 3.10+
• PostgreSQL (provided via Railway plugin)

Deployment Dependencies

• FastAPI
• SQLAlchemy (async)
• asyncpg
• python-jose
• bcrypt
• Uvicorn

Implementation Details

The entire application is a single main.py file containing the API, database models, auth logic, and an embedded HTML/JS frontend. Key design choices:

# Auto-adapts DATABASE_URL for async drivers
DATABASE_URL = os.getenv("DATABASE_URL", "sqlite+aiosqlite:///./auth.db")
if DATABASE_URL.startswith("postgres://"):
    DATABASE_URL = DATABASE_URL.replace("postgres://", "postgresql+asyncpg://", 1)

# Tables are created automatically on startup via lifespan
@asynccontextmanager
async def lifespan(app: FastAPI):
    async with engine.begin() as conn:
        await conn.run_sync(Base.metadata.create_all)
    yield

Refresh tokens use single-use rotation—each refresh revokes the old token and issues a new pair, limiting the window for token theft.

Why Deploy FastAPI Authentication and User Management on Railway?

Railway is a singular platform to deploy your infrastructure stack. Railway will host your infrastructure so you don't have to deal with configuration, while allowing you to vertically and horizontally scale it.

By deploying FastAPI Authentication and User Management on Railway, you are one step closer to supporting a complete full-stack application with minimal burden. Host your servers, databases, AI agents, and more on Railway.