Environment Variables

G-RANK uses environment variables for configuration. The backend reads from backend/.env and the frontend reads from frontend/.env.

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Backend — backend/.env

Server

Variable	Required	Default	Description
PORT	No	5000	Port the Express server listens on
NODE_ENV	No	development	Runtime environment: development or production

Database

Variable	Required	Description
MONGO_URI	Yes	Full MongoDB connection string (Atlas or local)

Examples:

# Local MongoDB
MONGO_URI=mongodb://localhost:27017/grank

# MongoDB Atlas
MONGO_URI=mongodb+srv://username:password@cluster0.abcde.mongodb.net/grank?retryWrites=true&w=majority

Authentication (JWT)

Variable	Required	Description
JWT_SECRET	Yes	Secret key for signing and verifying JWT tokens
JWT_EXPIRE	No	Token expiry duration (default: 7d)

Security

JWT_SECRET must be a long, random string. Never reuse a development secret in production. Generate one with:

node -e "console.log(require('crypto').randomBytes(64).toString('hex'))"

JWT_EXPIRE format follows the ms library / jsonwebtoken conventions:

• 7d — 7 days
• 24h — 24 hours
• 3600 — 3600 seconds

Email (Nodemailer / Gmail)

Variable	Required	Description
EMAIL_USER	Yes	Gmail address used to send emails
EMAIL_PASS	Yes	Gmail App Password (not your account password)
EMAIL_FROM	No	Display name and address for outgoing emails

EMAIL_USER=grank.noreply@gmail.com
EMAIL_PASS=abcd efgh ijkl mnop    # 16-character Gmail App Password
EMAIL_FROM=G-Rank <grank.noreply@gmail.com>

Gmail App Passwords

To generate an App Password:

1. Enable 2-Factor Authentication on your Google account
2. Go to Google Account → Security → App Passwords
3. Create a new app password for "Mail"
4. Use the 16-character code as EMAIL_PASS

URLs

Variable	Required	Description
FRONTEND_URL	Yes	Frontend origin for CORS and email links
CLIENT_URL	No	Alias for FRONTEND_URL (some features may use this)

# Development
FRONTEND_URL=http://localhost:5173

# Production
FRONTEND_URL=https://grank.vercel.app

Riot Games API

Variable	Required	Description
RIOT_API_KEY	Yes (for LoL)	Development API key from developer.riotgames.com
RIOT_CLIENT_ID	Yes (for OAuth)	RSO OAuth application client ID
RIOT_CLIENT_SECRET	Yes (for OAuth)	RSO OAuth application client secret
RIOT_REDIRECT_URI	Yes (for OAuth)	OAuth callback URL registered in Riot dev portal

RIOT_API_KEY=RGAPI-xxxxxxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxxxxxxxxxx
RIOT_CLIENT_ID=your-rso-client-id
RIOT_CLIENT_SECRET=your-rso-client-secret
RIOT_REDIRECT_URI=http://localhost:5000/api/riot/oauth/callback

Riot API Keys

Development API keys from developer.riotgames.com expire every 24 hours. For production, apply for a personal or production application key.

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Frontend — frontend/.env

Variable	Required	Description
VITE_API_URL	Yes	Base URL of the backend API (no trailing slash)

# Development
VITE_API_URL=http://localhost:5000

# Production
VITE_API_URL=https://grank-api.railway.app

Important: Vite only exposes variables prefixed with VITE_ to the browser bundle. Other variables remain server-side.

In code, access via:

import.meta.env.VITE_API_URL

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Full Example — backend/.env

# Server
PORT=5000
NODE_ENV=development

# Database
MONGO_URI=mongodb://localhost:27017/grank

# JWT
JWT_SECRET=replace-with-a-very-long-random-string-at-least-64-chars
JWT_EXPIRE=7d

# Email
EMAIL_USER=grank.noreply@gmail.com
EMAIL_PASS=xxxx xxxx xxxx xxxx
EMAIL_FROM=G-Rank <grank.noreply@gmail.com>

# URLs
FRONTEND_URL=http://localhost:5173
CLIENT_URL=http://localhost:5173

# Riot Games
RIOT_API_KEY=RGAPI-xxxxxxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxxxxxxxxxx
RIOT_CLIENT_ID=your-rso-client-id
RIOT_CLIENT_SECRET=your-rso-client-secret
RIOT_REDIRECT_URI=http://localhost:5000/api/riot/oauth/callback

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Full Example — frontend/.env

VITE_API_URL=http://localhost:5000