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Integrate with Zulip

Support level: Community

What is Zulip?​

Zulip is an open-source team chat application that organizes conversations into topic-based streams, enabling more structured and efficient communication compared to traditional linear chat platforms.

-- https://zulip.com

Preparation​

The following placeholders are used in this guide:

  • zulip.company is the FQDN of the Zulip instance.
  • authentik.company is the FQDN of the authentik installation.
info

This documentation lists only the settings that you need to change from their default values. Be aware that any changes other than those explicitly mentioned in this guide could cause issues accessing your application.

authentik configuration​

To support the integration of Zulip with authentik, you need to create SAML property mappings and an application/provider pair in authentik.

Create property mappings​

Zulip expects SAML attributes for the user's email address and name. Create SAML provider property mappings that send those values with the attribute names used in the Zulip configuration.

  1. Log in to authentik as an administrator and open the authentik Admin interface.

  2. Navigate to Customization > Property Mappings, click Create, select SAML Provider Property Mapping, and then click Next.

  3. Configure the first mapping for the user's email address:

    • Name: Zulip email

    • SAML Attribute Name: email

    • Expression:

      return request.user.email

  4. Click Finish to save the mapping.

  5. Repeat the process to create the user's full name mapping:

    • Name: Zulip full name

    • SAML Attribute Name: full_name

    • Expression:

      return request.user.name or request.user.username

  6. Click Finish to save the mapping.

Create an application and provider​

SAML provider changes in authentik 2026.5

authentik 2026.5 introduces changes to how the SAML provider behaves. Specifically, the provider now automatically sets the Issuer value to: https://authentik.company/application/saml/<application_slug>/metadata/

Older versions of authentik set this value to authentik by default. If you're running an older version, please set Issuer to https://authentik.company/application/saml/<application_slug>/metadata/, where <application_slug> is the slug that you selected for the application.

  1. Log in to authentik as an administrator and open the authentik Admin interface.

  2. Navigate to Applications > Applications and click New Application to create an application and provider pair.

    • Application: provide a descriptive name, an optional group for the type of application, the policy engine mode, and optional UI settings. Take note of the Slug because it will be required later.
    • Choose a Provider type: select SAML Provider as the provider type.
    • Configure the Provider: provide a name (or accept the auto-provided name), the authorization flow to use for this provider, and the following required configurations.
      • Set the ACS URL to https://zulip.company/complete/saml/.
      • Set the Audience to https://zulip.company.
      • Set the SLS URL to https://zulip.company/complete/saml/.
      • Under Advanced protocol settings:
        • Select an available Signing Certificate.
        • Set NameID Property Mapping to Zulip email.
        • Add the Zulip email and Zulip full name property mappings to Selected User Property Mappings.
    • Configure Bindings (optional): you can create a binding (policy, group, or user) to manage the listing and access to applications on a user's Application Dashboard page.

  3. Click Submit to save the new application and provider.

Zulip configuration​

Zulip is a Django application and is configured with /etc/zulip/settings.py. Make sure that your settings.py file includes the current Zulip SAML authentication section before changing the settings below.

  1. Uncomment zproject.backends.SAMLAuthBackend in AUTHENTICATION_BACKENDS.

  2. In the SAML Authentication section, configure authentik as a SAML IdP:

    /etc/zulip/settings.py
    SOCIAL_AUTH_SAML_ORG_INFO = {
        "en-US": {
            "displayname": "authentik Zulip",
            "name": "zulip",
            "url": "{}{}".format("https://", EXTERNAL_HOST),
        },
    }

    SOCIAL_AUTH_SAML_ENABLED_IDPS: dict[str, Any] = {
        "authentik": {
            "entity_id": "https://authentik.company/application/saml/<application_slug>/metadata/",
            "url": "https://authentik.company/application/saml/<application_slug>/",
            "attr_user_permanent_id": "email",
            "attr_username": "email",
            "attr_email": "email",
            "attr_full_name": "full_name",
            "display_name": "authentik SAML",
        },
    }

  3. Download the signing certificate from the authentik SAML provider and place it at /etc/zulip/saml/idps/authentik.crt.

  4. Set the certificate permissions expected by Zulip:

    chown -R zulip.zulip /etc/zulip/saml/
    find /etc/zulip/saml/ -type f -exec chmod 644 -- {} +

  5. Restart Zulip.

Configuration verification​

To confirm that authentik is properly configured with Zulip, open Zulip and click Log in with authentik SAML. After you authenticate with authentik, you should be redirected back to Zulip.

Resources​