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title: API Tokens
weight: 1
---

By default, some cluster-level API tokens are generated with infinite time-to-live (`ttl=0`). In other words, API tokens with `ttl=0` never expire unless you invalidate them. Tokens are not invalidated by changing a password.

You can deactivate API tokens by deleting them or by deactivating the user account.

### Deleting tokens
To delete a token,

1. Go to the list of all tokens in the Rancher API view at `https://<Rancher-Server-IP>/v3/tokens`.

1. Access the token you want to delete by its ID. For example, `https://<Rancher-Server-IP>/v3/tokens/kubectl-shell-user-vqkqt`

1. Click **Delete**.

Here is the complete list of tokens that are generated with `ttl=0`:

| Token | Description |
|-------|-------------|
| `kubeconfig-*` | Kubeconfig token | 
| `kubectl-shell-*` | Access to `kubectl` shell in the browser |
| `agent-*` | Token for agent deployment |
| `compose-token-*` | Token for compose |
| `helm-token-*` | Token for Helm chart deployment |
| `*-pipeline*` | Pipeline token for project |
| `telemetry-*` | Telemetry token |
| `drain-node-*` | Token for drain (we use `kubectl` for drain because there is no native Kubernetes API) |


### Setting TTL on Kubeconfig Tokens

Admins can set a global TTL on Kubeconfig tokens. Once the token expires the kubectl command will require the user to authenticate to Rancher.

Go to the global settings and:

1. Set the `kubeconfig-generate-token` setting to `false`. This setting instructs Rancher to no longer automatically generate a token when a user clicks on download a kubeconfig file. The kubeconfig file will now provide a command to login to Rancher.

_**Note:**_ Once this setting is deactivated, a generated kubeconfig will reference the [Rancher CLI]({{<baseurl>}}/rancher/v2.6/en/cli) to retrieve a short lived token for the cluster. When you use this kubeconfig in a client, such as `kubectl`, the Rancher CLI needs to be installed as well.

2. Set the `kubeconfig-token-ttl-minutes` setting to the desired duration in minutes. By default, `kubeconfig-token-ttl-minutes` is 960 (16 hours).

_**Note:**_ This value cannot exceed max-ttl of API tokens.(`https://<Rancher-Server-IP/v3/settings/auth-token-max-ttl-minutes`). `auth-token-max-ttl-minutes` is set to 1440 (24 hours) by default.  `auth-token-max-ttl-minutes would default to 0 allowing tokens to never expire`.

### Token Hashing

Users can enable token hashing, where tokens will undergo a one-way hash using the SHA256 algorithm. This is a non-reversible process, once enabled, this feature cannot be disabled. It is advisable to take backups prior to enabling and/or evaluated in a test environment first.

To enable token hashing, refer to [this section]({{<baseurl>}}/rancher/v2.6/en/installation/resources/feature-flags).

This feature will affect all tokens which include, but are not limited to, the following:

- Kubeconfig tokens
- Bearer tokens API keys/calls
- Tokens used by internal operations