User registration

With the createUser flag on, the web UI grows a sign-up form so people can create their own account from the browser instead of an administrator adding them by hand.

Off by default, but not experimental

This is a long-standing feature gated by the createUser feature flag, which is false unless you turn it on. Self-registration is a deliberate choice, so it is never enabled for you.

Enabling it

flags:
  createUser: true

Restart the registry. This adds the sign-up screen to the web UI and registers the endpoint behind it; with the flag off, neither exists.

What it does and does not cover

The flag governs registration from the web UI only.

Registering from the command line — npm adduser — goes through the registry's own user endpoint and is not affected by this flag. Whether it succeeds is decided by your authentication plugin. With the default htpasswd plugin, max_users is the setting that controls it:

auth:
  htpasswd:
    file: ./htpasswd
    # -1 refuses every registration, including npm adduser
    max_users: 100

So turning createUser off does not close the door on its own. If your intent is that nobody registers themselves, set max_users: -1 as well.

Who can then do what

Creating an account and being allowed to read or publish are separate matters. A freshly registered user is simply authenticated; what they can reach is decided by your package access rules. Registration is only worth enabling alongside rules that do not hand $authenticated more than you intend:

packages:
  '@my-company/*':
    access: $authenticated
    publish: $authenticated # every self-registered account could publish here

Review those rules before opening registration on a registry reachable beyond your network.