Clerk Webhooks & Events

Overview

Configure and handle Clerk webhooks for user lifecycle events and data synchronization. Clerk uses Svix for webhook delivery with HMAC-SHA256 signature verification. As of 2025, Clerk provides a built-in verifyWebhook() helper in @clerk/backend alongside the manual Svix approach.

Prerequisites

• Clerk account with webhook endpoint configured in Dashboard
• HTTPS endpoint (use ngrok for local dev)
• CLERK_WEBHOOK_SECRET environment variable (starts with whsec_)

Instructions

Step 1: Install Dependencies

# Option A: Use @clerk/backend's built-in verifyWebhook() (recommended)
# Already included with @clerk/nextjs — no extra install needed

# Option B: Manual Svix verification
npm install svix