API Stronghold
Sign Up
← Back to Blog
August 16, 2025 · API Stronghold Team

Why API Key Rotation Matters (and How to Do It Right)

Why API Key Rotation Matters (and How to Do It Right)

What is key rotation?

Key rotation is the practice of replacing an API key with a new one on a defined cadence or in response to a security event. Done well, rotation keeps credentials short-lived, reduces the blast radius of a leak, and helps you meet security and compliance expectations.

Why rotation matters

  • Limit exposure: Short-lived secrets turn a potential long-term breach into a narrow window.
  • Invalidate leaks fast: If a key is committed to source control or shared by accident, rotation lets you revoke quickly.
  • Compliance alignment: Frameworks like SOC 2 and ISO 27001 expect periodic credential rotation and auditability.
  • Operational hygiene: Prevents orphaned or over-privileged keys from lingering for years.

How often should you rotate?

Match cadence to risk. Many teams aim for every 90 days or less. For high-risk integrations and machine-to-machine traffic, prefer automated, event-driven rotation (daily or per-deploy). Any suspected exposure should trigger immediate rotation.

Best practices for API key rotation

  1. Inventory & ownership: Track every key, where it’s used, and a responsible owner.
  2. Least privilege: Scope keys to the minimum permissions and specific environments.
  3. Short TTLs: Prefer ephemeral keys with automatic expiry; avoid “never expires”.
  4. Dual-key rollover: Support a grace window where old and new keys both work to prevent downtime.
  5. Atomic rollout: Rotate per-service with health checks; fail closed but roll back cleanly.
  6. Centralized secrets: Store in a secret manager or KMS/HSM—never in source code or images.
  7. Audit & monitor: Log issuance, usage, and revocation; alert on anomalies and overuse.
  8. Automate everything: Treat rotation as code via pipelines, policies, and schedules.
  9. Decommission safely: After verification, revoke old keys and remove all references.
  10. Test regularly: Run game days for break-glass rotation and expired-key handling.

Reference workflow

  1. Generate new key with least-privilege scope
  2. Distribute to consumers via secret manager injection
  3. Enable dual-key window (old + new) for N minutes
  4. Verify health checks and traffic using the new key
  5. Flip providers/consumers to require the new key
  6. Revoke the old key and purge caches/artifacts
  7. Rotate downstream stored copies (CI/CD, runners, images)
  8. Record evidence in audit logs and notify owners

How API Stronghold helps

  • Centralized secrets & environment variables: One secure place to store and manage API keys and env vars across all services and environments—no more scattering values across repos, CI settings, and dashboards.

  • Integrations for deployment workflows: Keep deployments in sync without copy-paste.

    • Vercel: Sync environment variables to projects and preview deployments so each build picks up the latest values.
    • GitHub: Provide updated secrets to GitHub Actions/workflows to eliminate drift between branches and environments.
    • AWS (rotation): Rotate AWS access keys on demand, then roll out fresh values to connected deployments to avoid downtime.