Social login APIs return a name and an email. Social connections return impressions, audience data and earnings. Which one you need, and who does each well.
- A social login API returns identity (name, email, avatar, user ID); a social platform connection returns account data (impressions, demographics, earnings).
- Login providers such as Auth0, Clerk, Supabase, Firebase and WorkOS never return impressions or audience data on any plan.
- Direct platform access is free but approval is slow: TikTok 1 to 2 weeks, Meta several weeks, LinkedIn 3 to 4 months.
- 1 platform with spare engineering favours building direct; 3 or more favours a unified layer such as Phyllo.
- 30-second test: if a field is visible only to the account holder, no login provider will ever return it.
If you are searching for a social login API, there is a good chance you need one of 2 completely different products, and the wrong one will cost you a quarter.
A social login API signs a user in. They click "Continue with Google", and you get their name, email and a verified user ID. That is the whole job, and providers like Auth0, Clerk and Supabase do it well.
A social platform connection does something else entirely. The creator authorises your app to read their account, and you get their real impressions, their audience demographics, their Stories performance and their earnings. No login provider returns any of that, no matter which plan you buy.
Both use OAuth. That shared protocol is the reason the 2 keep getting confused. Here is how to tell which one you need, and the honest options in each category.
| Social login API | Social connection API | |
|---|---|---|
| What you get back | Name, email address, profile picture, a verified user ID | True impressions and reach, audience demographics, Stories performance, earnings where the platform exposes them |
| The question it answers | Who is this person? | What is this account doing? |
| Who the data comes from | An identity provider acting as a broker | The platform itself, on the account holder's authorisation |
| Typical providers | Auth0, Clerk, Supabase, Firebase, WorkOS | Each platform API directly, or a unified connection layer |
What does a social login API actually do?
It handles identity. The user proves who they are through a provider they already trust, and you avoid storing passwords.
What you receive back is a small, fixed set of fields: a name, an email address, a profile picture URL and a stable user ID. Some providers add session management, multi-factor authentication, organisations and enterprise single sign-on on top.
What you do not receive is anything about what that person does on the platform they logged in with. Signing in with Google does not give you their YouTube analytics. Signing in with Facebook does not give you their Instagram reach. The login scope and the data scope are separate permissions, and login providers request only the first.
That distinction sounds obvious written down. It is much less obvious at 2am when a product spec says "let creators connect their socials" and an engineer reaches for the auth library already in the codebase.
Which social login providers are worth comparing?
5 names come up repeatedly, and they are genuinely different products rather than the same product at different prices.
| Provider | Best for | What to know |
|---|---|---|
| Auth0 | Enterprise requirements and the widest set of social connections | Owned by Okta. The most configuration options of any provider here, which is a strength and a learning curve. Generally the most expensive at scale |
| Clerk | React and Next.js products that want prebuilt UI | Drop-in components mean a working sign-in flow in an afternoon. Bills on monthly returning users rather than monthly active users, so model it against your own traffic shape |
| Supabase Auth | Teams already on Supabase | Included with the platform and tied into Postgres row-level security. Open source underneath, which gives you an exit path |
| Firebase Auth | Mobile-first products already on Firebase | Strong mobile SDKs. Watch phone and SMS verification separately, because that is priced per message and varies by country |
| WorkOS AuthKit | B2B products that will need SAML single sign-on | Positioned as enterprise infrastructure. Basic auth is generous on the free tier, while enterprise single sign-on and directory sync are priced per connection |
One warning about every comparison table on this subject, including the one above. Published free tier limits for these providers contradict each other badly. In sources dated within weeks of each other in 2026, I found Auth0's free tier reported as both 25,000 and 7,500 monthly active users, and Clerk's as both 50,000 monthly returning users and 10,000 monthly active users. Several of the most visible comparison articles are published by one of the vendors about its competitors.
So use a table like this to build a shortlist, then get the numbers from each vendor's own pricing page on the day you decide. Pay attention to the billing unit as much as the number, because monthly active users and monthly returning users are not the same thing and the gap grows with your traffic.
When is a social login API not enough?
Run this test. Write down the fields your product displays on screen. If any of them are impressions, reach, audience age or location, saves, shares, Stories performance or earnings, a login provider cannot get them for you.
Those fields sit behind a different set of OAuth scopes, granted by the account holder, and served by the platform itself rather than by an identity provider. The platform releases them to the person who owns the account and to applications that person has explicitly authorised. We go through that boundary in detail in authenticated versus public social data.
At that point your options narrow to 2: connect to each platform directly, or use a layer that has already done it.
Option 1: connect to each platform yourself
Every major platform runs its own OAuth implementation, and each one is free to call. What they cost you is approval time and maintenance.
| Platform | Approval needed | The catch | Token behaviour |
|---|---|---|---|
| App Review plus Business Verification | Professional account required, and a linked Facebook Page for the Graph API path | 60-day token, no automatic refresh | |
| TikTok | Sandbox, then a production audit | Commonly 1 to 2 weeks on a clean submission | 24-hour token, and no native content webhooks |
| YouTube | None for read-only access | Quota units, where one search call costs 100 times a metadata call | OAuth from the channel owner for analytics |
| Marketing Developer Platform | 3 to 4 months is the typical wait | A version header that changes monthly |
Verified against each platform's developer documentation in July 2026. 4 platforms means 4 approval processes, 4 token models and 4 sets of limits.
A few specifics worth knowing before you scope the work.
- Instagram requires the account to be Professional, meaning Business or Creator, and the Graph API path needs that account linked to a Facebook Page. Long-lived tokens last about 60 days and do not refresh themselves, so connections fail one at a time roughly 2 months after launch unless you built a refresh job. The full picture is in our Instagram API guide.
- TikTok access tokens expire every 24 hours. There are no native content webhooks, so keeping data current means polling, and polling consumes the same quota your publishing needs. Details are in our TikTok API rate limits guide.
- YouTube is free to read but runs on quota units, where a single search call costs 100 times what a metadata call costs. Channel analytics require OAuth from the channel owner.
- LinkedIn is the slowest. Marketing Developer Platform approval commonly takes 3 to 4 months, and every Marketing API call must carry a version header that changes monthly. Our LinkedIn API access guide covers the approval process and what it does not unlock.
Direct integration is the right call in one specific situation: you need 1 platform, that platform is stable, and you have an engineer with capacity to own it. Below that threshold you are buying maximum control at a reasonable price.
Above it, the arithmetic changes. 4 platforms is not 4 times the work, because the normalisation between them grows faster than the integration count. Each one has its own field names, its own token behaviour and its own deprecation schedule, and every change lands on your team.
Option 2: use a unified connection layer
A connection layer sits between your product and the platforms. The creator connects once through your interface, and you receive normalised data through one set of endpoints regardless of which network it came from.
What you are buying is the part nobody demos: the OAuth flows, the app review submissions, the token refresh jobs, the retry logic and the schema that stays the same when a platform changes its field names.
Phyllo's social data API does this across 25+ platforms. A creator connects their accounts through your product, approves the scopes, and you receive their profile, content performance, audience demographics, engagement across every format including Stories, and earnings where the platform exposes them. Identity resolution ties a creator's connected accounts to a single record, so 1 person on 5 networks is 1 record rather than 5 guesses.
The field list for each platform is published at getphyllo.com/coverage, and the API reference is public. You can check whether the fields your product needs are available before you speak to anyone.
See which fields are available on each platform, and which ones need creator authorisation. Read the coverage list
When is a connection layer the wrong purchase?
It needs the creator to connect. Someone who has never authorised your app does not appear in your data, through us or through the platform directly.
So if your product has to work on creators who have never heard of you, cold discovery, competitor research or brand monitoring, a connection layer cannot serve it at any price. That work needs a public data source instead, and buying the wrong category is the expensive version of this mistake.
And if you only need identity, use a login provider. Auth0, Clerk, Supabase, Firebase and WorkOS all do that job properly, and paying for a data layer to return an email address would be poor value.
How do you choose, in 3 questions?
- What do you display on screen? If the answer is a name and an avatar, you need a login provider. If it includes impressions, demographics or earnings, you need a connection.
- Will the person authorise you? Creators connect when the connection unlocks something they want, such as a media kit that fills itself or a payout that depends on verified numbers. Candidates and competitors will not, which means a different data model entirely.
- How many platforms? 1 platform with engineering capacity favours a direct integration. 3 or more, or a small team, favours a layer, because the maintenance compounds rather than adds.
The short version
Pick a login provider for identity. Auth0 if enterprise requirements drive the decision, Clerk for React and Next.js speed, Supabase if you are already on Supabase, WorkOS if enterprise single sign-on is coming, Firebase if you are mobile-first on Google infrastructure. Verify the current pricing on their own site rather than any comparison table.
Pick a connection layer, or build direct, when you need what the account holder sees rather than who they are. 1 platform and spare engineering capacity favours building. 3 or more favours a layer.
And if the fields you need are visible to nobody but the account holder, no login provider will ever return them, which is worth establishing in week 1 rather than month 6.
Check whether the fields your product needs require creator authorisation, or talk to us about your connect flow. Get a demo
What is the difference between a social login API and a social data API?
A social login API signs a user in and returns name, email, picture and a user ID. A social data API returns what the account is doing, such as impressions and earnings, once the holder authorises.
Can I get Instagram analytics from a social login provider?
No. Login providers request identity scopes only. Instagram insights need a Professional account, permissions approved through Meta app review and, in most cases, a linked Facebook Page.
Which OAuth provider supports the most social platforms?
For login, Auth0 supports the widest set of social identity connections. For account data, no identity provider brokers it: you integrate each platform directly or use a layer such as Phyllo.
Do I need separate OAuth apps for login and for data access?
Usually yes, with different scopes and a separate review. Facebook login needs basic profile permissions, while reading Instagram insights needs business permissions, app review and verification.
How long does social platform API approval take?
TikTok commonly clears a clean submission in 1 to 2 weeks. Meta app review is measured in weeks. LinkedIn Marketing Developer Platform approval typically runs 3 to 4 months and can be declined.
What happens when a creator disconnects their account?
Data access stops immediately, usually with no notification, so calls start failing. Treat a revoked connection differently from an expired token: one needs a reconnect, the other a token refresh.
