Firebase FAQ

The page is a collection of FAQs and troubleshooting help for Firebase in general, as well as for specific products.

Do you have other challenges or can't find your issue described on this page?



Platforms and frameworks

Visit the platform-specific troubleshooting & FAQ pages for helpful tips and answers for more FAQ.



Firebase projects and Firebase apps

Permissions and access to Firebase projects



Firebase console

How does the console's "sample app experience" work? What happens and what can I do?

The Firebase console provides a sample app experience so that you have a real working app to explore and experiment with Firebase and other Google services (like the Gemini API ).

Automatic Firebase setup and deployment of the sample app

When you go through the sample app experience in the Firebase console, we automatically do the following for you:

  • Create a new Firebase project for your sample app
  • Register a Firebase Web App in the new Firebase project
  • Enable services and APIs that are used by the sample app (for example, Firebase Authentication , Cloud Firestore , etc.)
  • Provision any required resources (for example, database instances and security rules)
  • Set up Firebase AI Logic to use the Gemini Developer API
  • Deploy the sample app to a temporary preview URL using Firebase Hosting (by default, this URL expires in 7 days )
Explore the sample app's codebase
  • Option 1: Open a personalized version of the sample app's codebase in Firebase Studio

    The sample app experience provides a pathway to open a personalized version of the sample app's codebase in Firebase Studio (Google's browser-based workspace for full-stack app development). After your project and app are set up (see above), you can find links to Firebase Studio in banners in the Firebase console and at the top of the deployed app.

    When you open your sample app in Firebase Studio , we automatically do the following for you:

    • Use the same Firebase project, Firebase Web App, and resources created in the initial setup (see above)
    • Insert your sample app's Firebase configuration into the codebase (usually into src/bootstrap.js )

    Within Firebase Studio , you can explore the codebase to understand how you can interact with various Firebase and Google services.

  • Option 2: View the public, non-personalized version of the sample app's codebase in GitHub

    Alternatively, you can view the public, non-personalized version of the sample app's codebase in GitHub.



Firebase Local Emulator Suite



Pricing

For pricing FAQs specific to a product, see the product's section on this page or within its dedicated product documentation.

Does Firebase offer no-cost trial credits for paid products?

Firebase paid services can be used under the Google Cloud Free Trial . New Google Cloud and Firebase users can take advantage of a 90-day trial period that includes $300 in free Cloud Billing credits to explore and evaluate Google Cloud and Firebase products and services.

During the Google Cloud Free Trial period, you'll be provided a Free Trial Cloud Billing account. Any Firebase project that's linked to that billing account will be on the pay-as-you-go Blaze pricing plan during the Free Trial period.

Don't worry, linking a Firebase project to this Free Trial Cloud Billing account does not enable us to charge you for usage beyond these credits. You are not charged for usage beyond these credits unless you explicitly enable billing by upgrading your Free Trial Cloud Billing account to a paid account. You can upgrade to a paid account at any time during the trial. After you've upgraded to a paid account, you can still use any remaining credits (within the 90-day period).

Once the free trial expires and if you have not upgraded the Free Trial Cloud Billing account to a paid account, then your linked Firebase project is automatically downgraded to the Spark pricing plan . Note that you can upgrade to the Blaze pricing plan again at any time.

Learn more about the Google Cloud Free Trial .



Privacy



A/B Testing



AdMob



Analytics



Authentication

Authentication :How can I prevent SMS abuse when using phone authentication?

To help protect your project from SMS traffic pumping and API abuse, take the following steps:

Consider setting an SMS region policy
  1. View your regional SMS usage .

    Look for regions with a very high number of sent SMS and a very low number (or zero) of verified SMS. The ratio of verified/sent is your success rate. Healthy success rates are commonly in the 70-85% range since SMS is not a guaranteed delivery protocol, and some regions may experience abuse. Success rates lower than 50% imply many sent SMS but few successful logins, which is a common indicator of bad actors and SMS traffic pumping.

  2. Use SMS Region Policy to either deny SMS regions with low success rates, or only allow certain regions if your app is only intended for distribution in certain markets.

Limit your authorized authentication domains

Use the Authentication settings dashboard to manage authorized domains. The localhost domain is added by default to the approved authentication domains to simplify development. Consider removing localhost from the authorized domains in your productionproject to prevent bad actors from running code on their localhost to access your production project.

Enable and enforce App Check

Enable App Check to help protect your project from API abuse by attesting that requests only come from applications associated with your project.

To use App Check with Firebase Authentication , you must upgrade to Firebase Authentication with Identity Platform .

Remember that you need to enforce App Check for Authentication in the Firebase console (consider monitoring traffic before enforcing). Also, double check your reCAPTCHA Enterprise approved sites list to validate that it only contains your production sites, and that the list of applications registered to your project in App Check is accurate.

Note that App Check helps protect against automated attacks by asserting that the call comes from one of your registered applications. It does not prevent users from using your app in unintended ways (for example, starting then never finishing login flows to generate sent SMS).

Authentication :Are phone numbers ported to a new carrier supported by phone authentication?

At this time, numbers ported between carriers will result in all SMS becoming undeliverable for those end users. There is no workaround, and Firebase is working on this issue.

Follow the troubleshooting steps in this FAQ if you're getting the following error:

 GoogleFragment: Google sign in failed
    com.google.android.gms.common.api.ApiException: 13: Unable to get token.
        at
com.google.android.gms.internal.auth-api.zbay.getSignInCredentialFromIntent(com.google.android.gms:play-services-auth@@20.3.0:6) 
  1. Make sure that Googlesign-in is properly enabled as an authentication provider:

    1. In the Firebase console, open the Authentication section .

    2. Within the Sign in methodtab, disable and then re-enable the Googlesign-in method (even if it's already enabled):

      1. Open the Googlesign-in method, disable it, and then click Save.

      2. Re-open the Googlesign-in method, enable it, and then click Save.

  2. Make sure that your app is using its up-to-date Firebase configuration file ( google-services.json ).
    Obtain your app's config file.

  3. Check if you're still getting the error. If you are, continue to the next troubleshooting step.

  4. Make sure the required underlying OAuth 2.0 clients are present.

    1. In the Credentials page of the Google Cloud console, look in the OAuth 2.0 Client IDssection.

    2. If OAuth 2.0 clients are not present (and you've done all the troubleshooting steps above), then contact Support .

Authentication :In my Apple platform app, why am I getting the following error:
You must specify <clientID> in <GIDConfiguration> ?

Follow the troubleshooting steps in this FAQ if you're getting the following error:

 You must specify |clientID| in |GIDConfiguration| 
  1. Make sure that Googlesign-in is properly enabled as an authentication provider:

    1. In the Firebase console, open the Authentication section .

    2. Within the Sign in methodtab, disable and then re-enable the Googlesign-in method (even if it's already enabled):

      1. Open the Googlesign-in method, disable it, and then click Save.

      2. Re-open the Googlesign-in method, enable it, and then click Save.

  2. Make sure that your app is using its up-to-date Firebase configuration file ( GoogleService-Info.plist ).
    Obtain your app's config file.

  3. Check if you're still getting the error. If you are, continue to the next troubleshooting step.

  4. Make sure the required underlying OAuth 2.0 clients are present.

    1. In the Credentials page of the Google Cloud console, look in the OAuth 2.0 Client IDssection.

    2. If OAuth 2.0 clients are not present (and you've done all the troubleshooting steps above), then contact Support .

Authentication :In my web app, why am I getting the following error:
AuthErrorCode.INVALID_OAUTH_CLIENT_ID ?

Follow the troubleshooting steps in this FAQ if you're getting the following error:

 AuthErrorCode.INVALID_OAUTH_CLIENT_ID 
  1. Make sure that Googlesign-in is properly enabled as an authentication provider:

    1. In the Firebase console, open the Authentication section .

    2. Within the Sign in methodtab, disable and then re-enable the Googlesign-in method (even if it's already enabled):

      1. Open the Googlesign-in method, disable it, and then click Save.

      2. Re-open the Googlesign-in method, enable it, and then click Save.

  2. Also, in the Googlesign-in provider configuration of the Authentication section, make sure that the OAuth client ID and secret match the web client displayed in the Credentials page of the Google Cloud console (look in the OAuth 2.0 Client IDssection).

Authentication :In my web app, why are sign-in with redirects failing with the following error:
This domain YOUR_REDIRECT_DOMAIN is not authorized to run this operation ?

Follow the troubleshooting steps in this FAQ if you're getting the following error:

 This domain YOUR_REDIRECT_DOMAIN 
is not authorized to run this operation. 

This error is most likely caused because your redirect domain isn't listed as a authorized domain for Firebase Authentication , or the API key that you use with the Firebase Authentication Service is invalid.

First make sure that YOUR_REDIRECT_DOMAIN is in the list of authorized domains for your Firebase project. If your redirect domain is already listed there, continue to troubleshoot an invalid API key.

By default, Firebase Authentication JS SDK relies on the API key for your Firebase project that's labeled as the Browser key , and it uses this key to verify that a sign-in redirect URL is valid according to the list of authorized domains. Authentication gets this API key depending on how you access the Authentication SDK:

  • If you use Hosting -provided Auth helpers to log users in with the Authentication JS SDK, then Firebase automatically obtains your API key with the rest of your Firebase configuration each time you deploy to Firebase Hosting . Make sure that the authDomain in your web app firebaseConfig is properly configured to use one of the domains for that Hosting site. You can verify this by going to https:// authDomain __/firebase/init.json , and checking that the projectId matches that from your firebaseConfig .

  • If you self-host the sign-in code , then you can use a __/firebase/init.json file to provide the Firebase configuration to the self-hosted Authentication JS SDK Redirect helper. The API key and the projectId listed in this config file should match your web app firebaseConfig .

Check to make sure this API key hasn't been deleted: Go to the APIs & Services > Credentials panel in the Google Cloud console where all the API keys for your project are listed.

  • If the Browser key has not been deleted, check the following:

    • Make sure the Firebase Authentication API is in the list of allowed APIs for the key to access ( learn more about API restrictions for API keys ).

    • If you self-host the sign-in code, make sure the API key listed in your __/firebase/init.json file matches the API key in the Google Cloud console. Correct the key in the file, if necessary, then redeploy your app.

    • If the Browser key has been deleted, you can have Firebase generate a new API key for you: In the Firebase console, go to > Project settings , then in the Your appssection, click your web app. This action automatically creates an API key that you can see in the SDK setup and configurationsection for your web app.

    Note that in the Google Cloud console this new API key won't be called Browser key ; instead, it will be the same name as your Firebase Web App's nickname. If you decide to add API restrictions to this new API key, make sure the Firebase Authentication API is in the list of allowed APIs.

    Once your new API key is created, complete the applicable steps below:

    • If you use reserved Hosting URLs , then redeploy your app to Firebase so that it can automatically obtain the new API key with the rest of your Firebase configuration.

    • If you self-host the sign-in code , copy the new API key and add it to your __/firebase/init.json file, then redeploy your app.

Authentication :How do I manually construct an OAuth web client?
  1. Open the Credentials page of the Google Cloud console.

  2. At the top of the page, select Create credentials > OAuth client ID.

  3. If you're prompted to configure your consent screen, follow the on-screen instructions, and then continue with the following steps of this FAQ.

  4. Create the OAuth web client:

    1. For the Application Type, select Web application.

    2. For the Authorized JavaScript Origins, add the following:

      • http://localhost
      • http://localhost:5000
      • https:// PROJECT_ID .firebaseapp.com
      • https:// PROJECT_ID .web.app
    3. For the Authorized Redirect URIs, add the following:

      • https:// PROJECT_ID .firebaseapp.com/__/auth/handler
      • https:// PROJECT_ID .web.app/__/auth/handler
    4. Save the OAuth client.

  5. Copy the new OAuth client ID and client secret to your clipboard.

  6. In the Firebase console, open the Authentication section .

  7. Within the Sign in methodtab, open the Google sign-inprovider, and then paste the web server client ID and secret you just constructed and copied from the Google Cloud console. Click Save.

Authentication :How is %APP_NAME% determined for the email template for the confirmation email that can be sent to a user when they sign up using an email address and password?

Before December 2022, the %APP_NAME% in the email template was populated with the OAuth brand name that was automatically provisioned whenever an Android app was registered in the Firebase project. Now, since the OAuth brand is provisioned only when Google sign-in is enabled, the following describes how %APP_NAME% is determined:

  • If the OAuth brand name is available, then the %APP_NAME% in the email template will be the OAuth brand name (same as pre-December 2022 behavior).

  • If the OAuth brand name is not available, here's how the %APP_NAME% in the email template is determined:

    • For web apps, the %APP_NAME% will be the default Firebase Hosting site name (the value preceding .firebaseapp.com and .web.app and usually the Firebase project ID).

    • For mobile apps:

      • If the Android package name or iOS bundle ID is present in the request, then the %APP_NAME% will be the app name used in the Play Store or App Store (respectively).

      • Otherwise, the %APP_NAME% will be the default Firebase Hosting site name (the value preceding .firebaseapp.com and .web.app and usually the Firebase project ID).

    Note that if the lookup of the default Firebase Hosting site name fails, then the final fallback is to use the Firebase project ID as the %APP_NAME% .



Cloud Functions

Visit the Cloud Functions for Firebase FAQ and Troubleshooting page for troubleshooting help and answers to common questions.



Cloud Messaging

FCM quotas and limits



Cloud Storage for Firebase

Cloud Storage for Firebase :What are the changes to the default bucket announced in September 2024?

Go to the Cloud Storage documentation to learn more about the Changes for the default Cloud Storage bucket .

Cloud Storage for Firebase :What are the changes to the pricing plan requirements for Cloud Storage announced in September 2024?

Go to the Cloud Storage documentation to learn more about the Changes for pricing plan requirements for Cloud Storage .

Here are some likely reasons for getting these errors:

  • The Cloud Storage for Firebase API is not enabled for your project.

    You can check if the API is enabled in the Google Cloud console. Learn how to find enabled APIs in your project and how to enable them in this Google Cloud guide .

  • The required service account for Cloud Storage for Firebase has one of the following issues:

    • The service account is missing required permissions.

    • The service account has been deleted. Note that in the Firebase console, a missing service account might manifest as a failure to add required IAM permissions.

    For these two service account issues, see the related FAQ on this page.

Cloud Storage for Firebase :Why do I see new or multiple service accounts in my Firebase projects that use Cloud Storage for Firebase ?

Firebase uses service accounts to operate and manage services without sharing user credentials. When you create a Firebase project, you might notice that a number of service accounts are already available in your project.

The required service account for Cloud Storage for Firebase is scoped to your project and is named: service- PROJECT_NUMBER @gcp-sa-firebasestorage.iam.gserviceaccount.com .

If you used Cloud Storage for Firebase before September 19, 2022, you may see an additional service account on previously-linked Cloud Storage buckets named: firebase-storage@system.gserviceaccount.com . This old service account is no longer supported as of September 19, 2022.

You can view all service accounts for your project in the Service accounts tab of the Firebase console.

If you deleted the required service account or it's not present in your project, you can do one of the following to add the service account.

In the Firebase console, a missing service account might manifest as a failure to add required IAM permissions.

We strongly discourage removing the service account because this may block access to your Cloud Storage buckets from your apps. To remove the service account from your project, follow the instructions in Disabling a service account .



Crashlytics

Visit the Crashlytics troubleshooting & FAQ page for helpful tips and answers to more FAQs.





Hosting

Visit the Firebase Hosting FAQ and Troubleshooting page for answers to common questions.



Performance Monitoring

Visit the Performance Monitoring troubleshooting & FAQ page for helpful tips and answers to more FAQs.



Realtime Database



Remote Config



Test Lab

Visit the Test Lab troubleshooting page for helpful tips and answers to FAQs.



Firebase App Indexing

What happened to Firebase App Indexing ?

Firebase App Indexing is no longer the recommended way of indexing content for display as suggested results in Google Search App. This FAQ points to other useful developer products.

Apple platforms

Universal Links are the recommended way of linking users directly from search results, websites and other apps to specific content within your app.

Android

Android App Links are the recommended way of linking users directly from search results, websites and other apps to specific content within your app.

You might also be interested in the following options:

  • App Search : High-performance on-device search

  • App Actions : Let users launch and control Android apps with their voice, using Google Assistant.

  • Android Shortcuts : Provide users with quick methods to perform an action or access content in your app.



Firebase User Segmentation Storage

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