Kaizen #2 - OAuth2.0 and Self Client #API

Kaizen #2 - OAuth2.0 and Self Client #API

Hi everyone!

Welcome back to another week of Kaizen! 

In this post, we will shed some light on the OAuth2.0 protocol and how you can use Zoho's Self Client option to authenticate your application and generate the tokens.

What is OAuth2.0?
OAuth 2.0 is an industry standard protocol specification that enables third-party applications (clients) to gain delegated access to protected resources in Zoho via an API.

Why should we use OAuth2.0?
  • Clients are not required to support password authentication or store user credentials.
  • Clients gain delegated access, i.e., access only to resources authenticated by the user.
  • Users can revoke client's delegated access anytime.
  • OAuth access tokens expire after a set time. If the client faces a security breach, user data will be compromised only until the access token is valid.

To use the Zoho CRM APIs, you must authenticate the application to make API calls on your behalf with an access token.

The access token, in return, must be obtained from a grant token (authorization code).

Zoho CRM APIs use the authorization code grant type to provide access to protected resources.
In this type,
  1. The web application redirects the user to the OAuth server.
  2. The user sees the authorization prompt and approves the app's request as shown in the below image.

  3. The user is redirected back to the application with an authorization code in the query string.

  4. The application exchanges the authorization code for an access token.
As you can see, this involves user intervention while authorizing your application.

When should you use Self Client?

If your application is a stand-alone application that performs only back-end jobs like data-sync(without any manual intervention), you cannot use this authorization code flow. 

In the below example image, the data sync happens between Zoho CRM and your legacy Product Management system. So, it is perfect to use the Self Client option as it does not need an UI for this type of application. Using this flow, you can generate the grant token, access, and refresh tokens.


How to use Self Client?
1. Go to Zoho Developer Console and log in with your Zoho CRM username and password.

2. Choose Self Client from the list of client types.


3. Click Create on the Create New Client page and click OK in the pop up to enable a self client for your account.

4. Now, your client ID and secret is displayed under the Client Secret tab.


5. Click the Generate Code tab to generate the Grant token.
The grant token is a temporary token generated by the authorization server (Zoho CRM, here) to generate access and refresh tokens.
Before generating the grant token, you must decide the scope you need. Scope decide the level of access a client can have to a resource.
Refer to our list of scopes, for more details.

a. Click the Generate Code tab and enter the required scope separated by commas.
b. Select the Time Duration for which the grant token is valid. Please note that after this time, the grant token expires.
c. Enter a description and click Generate.
d. The generated code for the specified scope is displayed. Copy the grant token.
e. Please note that generating grant token is a one-time process, provided you generate the access and refresh tokens within the time the grant token is valid for.

6. Generate the Access and Refresh tokens using Postman or any REST client.
a. Open Postman.
b. Make a POST request with the following URL.
"{{accounts-domain}}/oauth/v2/token"
{{accounts-domain}} is the domain-specific URL in which you registered your client.
c. Pass the below keys and their values in the body of the request.



d. Hit Send. The access and refresh tokens are displayed in the response.

 e. The access token is valid for an hour from generation. 
 f. The refresh token does not expire. You can use this to refresh your access token when they expire.

Quick tip: Enter all the required keys and values in Postman before you generate the token. This way, you will only have to paste the grant token after its generation, thereby reducing the risk of its expiration before you generate the tokens.

7. Store the access and refresh tokens and use the access token when you make API calls.

​8. Write a script that will call the below token refresh URL before the time the access token expires.
"{{accounts-domain}}/oauth/v2/token?client_id={{client_id}}&client_secret={[client_secret}}&refresh_token={{generated_refresh_token}}&grant_type=refresh_token"


Other useful links:
Bulk Read API to export data in bulk from CRM
Bulk Write API to import data from a database to CRM

We will meet you next week with another exciting topic!


Cheers!






    • Sticky Posts

    • Kaizen #217 - Actions APIs : Tasks

      Welcome to another week of Kaizen! In last week's post we discussed Email Notifications APIs which act as the link between your Workflow automations and you. We have discussed how Zylker Cloud Services uses Email Notifications API in their custom dashboard.

    • Kaizen #216 - Actions APIs : Email Notifications

      Welcome to another week of Kaizen! For the last three weeks, we have been discussing Zylker's workflows. We successfully updated a dormant workflow, built a new one from the ground up and more. But our work is not finished—these automated processes are

    • Kaizen #152 - Client Script Support for the new Canvas Record Forms

      Hello everyone! Have you ever wanted to trigger actions on click of a canvas button, icon, or text mandatory forms in Create/Edit and Clone Pages? Have you ever wanted to control how elements behave on the new Canvas Record Forms? This can be achieved

    • Kaizen #142: How to Navigate to Another Page in Zoho CRM using Client Script

      Hello everyone! Welcome back to another exciting Kaizen post. In this post, let us see how you can you navigate to different Pages using Client Script. In this Kaizen post, Need to Navigate to different Pages Client Script ZDKs related to navigation A.

    • Kaizen #210 - Answering your Questions | Event Management System using ZDK CLI

      Hello Everyone, Welcome back to yet another post in the Kaizen Series! As you already may know, for the Kaizen #200 milestone, we asked for your feedback and many of you suggested topics for us to discuss. We have been writing on these topics over the

    • Recent Topics

    • Zoho Desk Training

      Hello, We've had Zoho desk for a while now, but we run into issues occasionally, and I was wondering if there was a customer who currently uses it and really enjoys the functionality, that would be wiling to chat with us?

    • Advanced Customization of the Help Center using JavaScript

      Hello everyone, The Help Center in Zoho Desk can be customized by using HTML and CSS to provide structure and enhance the page's appearance—but what if you want to add interactive and dynamic elements? You can add these effects with JavaScript, a programming

    • Exciting Updates to the Kiosk Studio Feature in Zoho CRM!

      Hello Everyone, We are here again with a series of new enhancements to Kiosk Studio, designed to elevate your experience and bring even greater efficiency to your business processes. These updates build upon our ongoing commitment to making Kiosk a powerful

    • Edit default "We are here to help you" text in chat SalesIQ widget

      Does anyone know how this text can be edited? I can't find it anywhere in settings. Thanks!

    • PO Based Advance payment to Vendor

      We recommend to introduce a provision at PO to make advance payment to vendors and auto apply that advance paid later at the time of Vendor Bill submission for that PO. This will help us track PO-wise Total Payments.

    • Converting Customer Invoice to Purchase Bill

      Hi, In my service-based business, I sometimes create the customer invoice first, and later I receive the purchase bill from the vendor for the same job. Is there any option in Zoho Books to: Convert a customer invoice into a purchase bill, or Link/associate

    • Getting Project Template List using the REST API

      I am trying to confirm that I can use the REST API to create a project using a project template. The API documentation indicates this is possible by providing the Template ID, but it is not clear at all how to get a list of available Project Templates

    • How to get Quickbooks Desktop Info into Zoho?

      Our team has used Quickbooks desktop for years and is looking at switching to Zoho books in 2026. I want to bring all old sales history over since we use Zoho CRM. I can export Item sales history and generic sales orders from Quickbooks desktop. How do

    • ZeptoMail API Request

      We tried to send mail using ZeptoMail using Django. Following is my payload {'from': {'address': 'abc@abc.com'}, 'to': [{'email_address': {'address': 'xyz@xyz.in', 'name': 'Bhavik'}}], 'subject': 'Report Name', 'htmlbody': '<p>Test</p>'} Following is

    • Zoho Inventory - Allow Update of Marketplace Generated Sales Orders via API

      Hi Inventory Team, I was recently asked by a client to create an automation which updated a Zoho Inventory Sales Order if a Shopify Order was updated. I have created the script but I found that the request is blocked as the Sales Order was generated by

    • Admin asked me for Backend Details when I wanted to verify my ZeptoMail Account

      Please provide the backend details where you will be adding the SMTP/API information of ZeptoMail Who knows what this means?

    • Mass import of documents into Zoho Writer

      I'm using Google's word processor at the moment but feel that Zoho does a better job (on the online apps market). Iwant to move my documents (about 50-70) to Zoho but it seems to me that I have to import them seperately. Is it already possible to upload several documents at a time or is this a forthcoming feature? Cheers Rolli :?:

    • When will it be possible to edit Subform records via either views or tabular reports?

      Hey there, data maintenance often requires mass update of quite a lot of records. While this is a piece of cake via either List view or Zoho sheet view, the same cannot be carried out for subform records yet. When one of the two options will be made available?

    • Add System Pre-Defined Lookup Field to Subform?

      Hi there! New to using Zoho, so this may already exist, but I'm having trouble figuring it out. Is there a way to get the system pre-defined Account Lookup field (in our case, renamed to Company Name), as the starting point for a subform? In our company,

    • Duplicating and referencing datasets

      I am moving from PowerBI to Zoho Analytics and while I find Zoho easier to use in many ways, there is one function that I use in PowerBI that I have not been able to find in Zoho.   I have several data sets that I need to modify in different ways to get

    • How we cut CRM updates from ~20 minutes down to 2, our real workflow

      Updating the Zoho CRM after every call used to be one of the biggest time sucks for our team. By the time you write your notes, clean them up, fill in the fields, and log everything properly… you’ve easily lost 15–20 minutes per call. We started experimenting

    • Add home page or dashboard in CRM customer portal

      is it possible to add home page or dashboard in CRM customer portal?

    • User Tips: How to change the the label display name of a system defined field

      Most users know how to change field label names via Settings > Modules & Fields but if you want to change the name of a system defined field you can’t as there is no “edit properties” option.  However with a simple hack you can edit any system defined

    • Search not working!

      I have items in my notebook tagged but when I search for a tag nothing comes up! Any fix for this?

    • Zoho CRM Community Digest - October 2025 | Part 1

      Hello Everyone! Here's a quick recap of first two weeks of October! Product Updates: Zoho CRM Android App Update: Surveys, Blueprints, and Smarter Mobile Features! Zoho CRM’s Android app just got a useful upgrade. You can now share records, upload your

    • Add Custom Field Inside Parts Section

      How to Add Custom Field Inside Parts Section in Workorder like Category and Sub- Category

    • Automate onboarding emails with CRM Workflow and Accounts module

      We’re a B2B SaaS company selling to public-sector organisations. Each organisation is stored as an Account in Zoho CRM, and each organisation typically has multiple associated Contacts. Our backend syncs product-usage data (setup status, user activity,

    • Using a CRM Client Script Button to create a Books Invoice

      Hello, I need help handling error messages returned to my client script from a function. The scenario I have setup a client script button which is available from each Deal. This CS executes a crm function, which in turn creates an invoice based on the

    • Important update: Enhanced security measures for account operations in Zoho Cliq

      Greetings from the Zoho Cliq team! We’d like to share an important security update that has an influence on some admin actions such as password reset, MFA reset, and MFA backup code generation. What’s changing? With our latest security enhancements, these

    • Read webpage - MSXML2.ServerXMLHTTP

      I have the following VBA script, put together from various sources (mainly zoho forum/help/support, so it once worked, I guess): private Sub GetListOfSheets() Dim url As String Dim xmlhttp As Object Dim parameters As String Dim html As String range("B1").value

    • Sales Receipts Duplicating when I run reports why and how do we rectify this and any other report if this happens

      find attached extract of my report

    • Can I execute two 'functions' when completing a mail merge from CRM?

      Hi, I have set up a mail merge from CRM Deals to a template. I want a copy of this to be saved in Workdrive, and then a copy also saved back into the deal record from which the merge occurred. I can do both independent of each other, and managed to get

    • No Functional Autosave or Manual Save Button

      Application : Zoho Notebook So I wanted to try Zoho Notebook(On Ubuntu) as an application, I installed the application and went solving my LeetCode problems visually(Drawing mode), at one point the app just stopped saving anything... Every time I tried

    • Enterprise subscription support

      My organization sells subscription services to enterprise customers, which is a different model from the consumer subscription model that Zoho Billing has been designed to support and I beleve this capability should be added. An enterprise subscription

    • Issue with Creator's IF logic

      Hi, I found the following code produces unexpected results: if(-1.0 < 0.0000000) {       info "True"; } else {       info "False"; } if(-1.0 < 0.000000) {       info "True"; } else {       info "False"; } The output returned is: False True However, the

    • Need option to send Package PDF in shipment email (Shipment PDF is missing Lot info)

      Is there any way to automatically attach the Package PDF instead of (or alongside) the Shipment PDF in the notification emails? We really need this feature because the default Shipment PDF creates a blind spot for our customers. It does not display Batch/Lot

    • zoho creator view is not present in the workspace and blank reports

      Hi Support,  Users who have "write" permissions keep getting this error for all of our embedded reports all of a sudden. See screen shot below: Meanwhile, my developer permissions account sees a blank screen in view and edit mode as shown in the screenshots

    • Customize portal email template

      Can i fetch only first name of the user in portal email template instead of the below code Hi ${User.FULL_NAME}

    • Can't we let users decide which options they'd like to add at embed widget?

      It seems embed widget DOES NOT offer a feature, where users can choose options upon subscribing plans. What Zoho has instead, is that admins have to manually create plan with options. How come no one in Zoho dev team never raised issue about usability

    • Reupload and rename from one field to another field (file upload)

      Hi Everyone, Sorry, i have question to use invoke url for rename and reupload attachments file to another field. Tested on development mode. Zoho C6. Refer to https://www.zoho.com/creator/help/api/v2/upload-file.html look my error notification. Does anyone

    • Printing Multi-Page Reports (PDF Export)

      Hi, I am moving a report from Google's Looker Studio to Zoho Analytics and trying to reproduce the Looker page by page dashboard editing experience. With Google, what you see is what you get when you print to PDF. But I can't seem to create the same experience

    • Resume Harvester: New Enhancements for Faster Sourcing

      We’re excited to share a set of enhancements to Resume Harvester that make sourcing faster and more flexible. These updates help you cut down on repetitive steps, manage auto searches more efficiently, and review candidate profiles with ease. Why we built

    • I NEED TO NUMBER TO TEXT NO HERE

      =NUMBERTEXT NEEED

    • Error: View is not present in the workspace

      When saving a dashboard, user receives a popup with the following error. "View is not present in the workspace" What does this mean or refer to? There is no further insight given.

    • Dear Zoho CEO: Business Growth is about how you prioritise!

      All of us in business know that when you get your priorities right, your business grows. Zoho CRM and Zoho Books are excellent products, but sadly, Zoho Inventory continues to lag behind. Just this morning, I received yet another one-sided email about

    • Next Page