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CipherToken — Fast Python JWT Library Built with Rust

CipherToken is a next-generation token engine for developers who demand speed, security, and reliability. Unlike conventional JWT libraries, CipherToken delivers a complete token lifecycle — from creation and decoding to rotation and expiry tracking — all backed by the raw performance of Rust.

pip install ciphertoken

  • Up to 6x faster than PyJWT and python-jose — see benchmarks

  • Fully async — every operation has an async twin, backed by Tokio

  • Built-in key generation — HMAC secrets and RSA key pairs from Python

  • Complete lifecycle — create, verify, decode, inspect, rotate, track expiry

Quick Example

from ciphertoken import CipherToken
from ciphertoken.algorithms import HS256
from ciphertoken.time import minutes, days

token = CipherToken(
    secret="your-strong-secret-key",
    algorithm=HS256,
    access_ttl=minutes(10),
    refresh_ttl=days(7),
)

access_token = token.access(payload={"user_id": 42})
refresh_token = token.refresh(payload={"user_id": 42})
new_access, new_refresh = token.rotation(refresh_token)

print(token.verify(access_token))  # True

Ready for more? Follow the Quick Start guide.

Why CipherToken?

Conventional JWT Libraries CipherToken
Language Pure Python Rust + PyO3
Performance Interpreted overhead Near-native speed
Async Often limited or absent Fully async (Tokio)
Token lifecycle Generate / verify Create · Decode · Verify · Rotate · Inspect
Key management Manual Built-in HMAC + RSA key generation
Expiry tracking Manual Built-in (remaining_time)

See the full comparison with PyJWT and python-jose.

Performance at a Glance

CipherToken outperformed every Python JWT library we tested, in every category:

Library Token Creation (ops/sec) Token Verification (ops/sec)
CipherToken 587,156 244,500
PyJWT 101,591 35,928
python-jose 103,861 27,638

Full methodology, environment, and analysis on the Benchmarks page.

Broad Platform Support

One pip install works everywhere — prebuilt wheels ship for:

  • Linux — x86_64, ARM64, ARMv7, s390x, ppc64le (glibc and musl/Alpine)
  • Windows — x64, x86, ARM64
  • macOS — Intel and Apple Silicon
  • Python — CPython 3.8+ (one ABI3 wheel covers them all) and PyPy 3.9/3.10

Get Started