elaan.io / docs
Get started
Documentation

Integrate Elaan in an afternoon

One API for an in-app inbox, email, and push. Drop a component into your frontend, trigger events from your backend, and Elaan handles rendering, delivery, and real-time updates across every channel.

All documentation
Getting started
Overview Quickstart SDK packages
Frontend
React Vue Svelte React Native Web Components Headless & theming Real-time
Backend API
Authentication Templates Trigger & status Contacts & preferences
More
Self-hosting MCP server Reference

Overview

Elaan is real-time notification infrastructure. You model notification types and templates once, then trigger a single event whenever something happens. Elaan fans it out to each channel the recipient has enabled (in-app inbox, email, mobile push, browser push), rendering per-brand templates and delivering asynchronously.

Integrating takes three pieces, and these docs cover all of them:

How it works

  1. Your backend mints a contact token. Call POST /v1/contacts/tokens with your service key and a contact's external_id. You get back a short-lived token scoped to that one contact.
  2. Your frontend renders the UI. Hand the SDK a tokenProvider that fetches that token from your own endpoint. Drop in <NotificationBell />, <NotificationFeed />, and <Preferences />.
  3. Your backend triggers events. When something happens, call POST /v1/notifications with a type key, one or more recipients' external_ids, and any template variables. Elaan accepts it (202) and delivers to each recipient asynchronously.
  4. Elaan delivers & streams. The inbox updates in real time over SSE (with polling fallback); email and push are sent by background workers.
The SDK never sees your API key. Only your backend holds the service key; the browser only ever receives a short-lived, contact-scoped token.

Prerequisites

  • An Elaan account. Sign up at console.elaan.io; the first sign-up provisions your account and a default brand.
  • A service key (sk_…) from the console, used by your backend to authenticate. Keep it server-side.
  • At least one notification type and a template for the channels you want to send, created in the console.

The API base is https://api.elaan.io/v1 (self-hosted installs use your own host; see Self-hosting).

All documentation

Start with the Quickstart for a complete working integration, then go deeper on the piece you need.

QuickstartA complete working integration, copy-pasteable, in four steps. SDK packagesWhich package for which stack, and what each one ships. ReactComponents, hooks and realtime options for React apps. VueComponents and composables for Vue 3. SvelteNative stores, headless, you own the markup. React NativeNative components, plus registering device push tokens. Web ComponentsCustom elements for plain HTML, Angular, Rails or Laravel. Headless & themingYour own UI on the core stores, plus the CSS token list. Real-timeSSE, the polling fallback, and why the inbox is the source of truth. AuthenticationService keys, contact tokens, and the tokenProvider contract. TemplatesLiquid slots, loops for line items, filters, escaping, and variant fallback. Trigger & statusThe trigger endpoint, template variables, status and retries. Contacts & preferencesSyncing recipients, template attributes, and the preference matrix. Self-hostingRunning Elaan on your own infrastructure, and what differs. MCP serverDrive Elaan from Claude or any MCP client, and what it deliberately cannot reach. ReferenceEndpoint table, package list and glossary.