Database / Supabase Intermediate to Advanced Interview Questions
What is the difference between a custom access token hook and a raw JWT claim?
A raw JWT claim is simply a key-value pair Supabase Auth includes in every issued token by default — things like the user's ID (sub), role, and expiry, generated the same way for every user with no customization point.
A custom access token hook is a function (Postgres or Edge Function) that Supabase Auth calls right before issuing a token, letting you inject additional claims based on your own data — for example, looking up a user's subscription tier or organization ID and adding it to the JWT so that value is available to Row Level Security policies and the client without an extra database round trip on every request.
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