openreader/docs-site/docs/configure/admin-panel.md

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Admin Panel

The admin panel lets a designated set of users manage shared TTS providers and site-wide feature flags directly from the Settings modal — without touching env vars or redeploying.

It is gated behind authentication, so you must have auth enabled to use it (Auth).

Designating admins

Set ADMIN_EMAILS to a comma-separated list of emails:

AUTH_SECRET=...        # required for auth
BASE_URL=...           # required for auth
ADMIN_EMAILS=alice@example.com,bob@example.com

On every session resolution the server compares the user's email against this list and writes user.is_admin = true (or false for emails removed from the list). No restart is required to demote — the next page load picks it up.

When the logged-in user is an admin, an Admin tab appears in Settings → sidebar with two sub-tabs:

• Shared providers — server-side TTS provider instances visible to all users.
• Site features — runtime-editable replacements for what were previously NEXT_PUBLIC_* build-time flags.

Shared TTS providers

Each shared provider is one named instance bound to one of the four built-in provider types (custom-openai, openai, replicate, deepinfra). The admin form has:

Field	Notes
Slug	URL-safe identifier exposed to users (e.g. kokoro-prod). Must not collide with a built-in id. Lowercase alphanumeric + hyphens.
Display name	Shown in the user's provider dropdown, suffixed with "(shared)".
Provider type	One of the four built-ins. Determines voice/model resolution.
Base URL	Optional. Falls through to the provider type's default when blank.
API key	Encrypted at rest with AES-256-GCM (key derived from AUTH_SECRET via scrypt). On edit, leave blank to keep the existing key.
Default model	Optional. Used as the initial model when a user selects this provider.
Enabled	Toggle to hide the provider from non-admin users without deleting it.

When a non-admin user picks a shared provider in Settings → TTS Provider:

• The API key / base URL fields are hidden — those credentials never leave the server.
• The TTS request still goes through the user's browser, but the server replaces the slug with the matching admin row's decrypted key and base URL before calling the upstream provider.
• The user's per-request x-openai-key / x-openai-base-url headers are ignored for shared slugs.

Whether users can supply their own personal built-in provider keys is controlled by the site feature restrictUserApiKeys:

• true: users are restricted to shared providers only.
• false: users may also use per-user BYOK credentials for built-in providers.

Auto-seeded "default-openai"

On first boot, if admin_providers is empty and the legacy API_KEY env var is set, OpenReader creates a single shared provider with:

• slug default-openai, displayName Default (from env), providerType custom-openai
• baseUrl from API_BASE, apiKey from API_KEY (encrypted)
• defaultModel set to kokoro (you can edit it in Admin → Shared providers)

After this seed runs, the legacy API_KEY / API_BASE env vars are no longer read by the TTS routes — the DB row is authoritative. You can rename, edit, disable, or delete this row like any other from the admin UI, and remove the env vars from your .env when convenient.

:::warning Upgrading from v2.2.0 In v2.2.0 and earlier, API_KEY / API_BASE were read live by the TTS routes on every request. As of v3.0.0 they are one-shot seeds consumed only on the first boot where admin_providers is empty. After upgrading, boot the app once and confirm a default-openai row exists in Settings → Admin → Shared providers with the correct base URL. If it is missing or wrong (e.g. the env vars were not set on first boot, or the table was already non-empty from a pre-release), create or edit the shared provider manually — TTS will not fall back to the env vars. :::

Site features

Runtime-editable settings, one row per key:

Key	What it controls
defaultTtsProvider	Default provider id new users start with (built-in id or shared slug).
changelogFeedUrl	Public changelog manifest URL used by the Settings modal changelog panel.
enableUserSignups	Controls whether new accounts can be created. Existing accounts can still sign in when this is false.
restrictUserApiKeys	Restrict user-supplied API keys/base URLs; when true, only admin shared providers are allowed.
enableTtsProvidersTab	Whether the user-facing TTS Provider tab in Settings is shown.
showAllProviderModels	When false, users are restricted to each provider's default model (shared provider defaultModel or built-in provider default).
enableAudiobookExport	Show the audiobook export entry points on PDF/EPUB pages.
enableDocxConversion	Accept .docx uploads (converted to PDF server-side).
enableDestructiveDeleteActions	Show "Delete all data" buttons in the Documents tab (auth-disabled mode).

Word-by-word highlighting and PDF layout parsing capability are controlled by OPENREADER_COMPUTE_MODE (server env), not an admin runtime flag.

Each row shows a source badge:

• from env — the value was migrated from the corresponding NEXT_PUBLIC_* env var on first boot. Editing it in the UI flips the source to admin.
• admin — explicit admin override. Use Reset on the row to clear it back to the env-default state.
• default — neither env nor admin set; uses the built-in default.

:::warning Security note for restrictUserApiKeys Turning restrictUserApiKeys off allows user-supplied API keys to flow through this server. Use this only for trusted/self-hosted deployments where that tradeoff is acceptable. :::

Migrating off env vars

The future-direction goal is to remove NEXT_PUBLIC_* / API_KEY / API_BASE from your .env entirely. To do that safely:

1. Deploy this version with your existing env values in place.
2. Boot the app once. Open Settings → Admin and verify:
   • Each NEXT_PUBLIC_* setting appears as from env.
   • A default-openai row exists in Shared providers (if you had API_KEY set).
3. Remove the env vars from your .env.
4. Redeploy. Behavior is unchanged — the DB is now the source of truth.

You can keep the env vars indefinitely if you prefer; they're only read on the first boot when the corresponding DB row is absent, so there's no harm in leaving them around.

How keys are protected

• API keys are encrypted in the admin_providers table with AES-256-GCM. The encryption key is derived from AUTH_SECRET via scrypt.
• The masked-list view (GET /api/admin/providers, used by the admin UI itself) returns •••• + last-4 only — never plaintext or ciphertext.
• The public list endpoint (GET /api/tts/shared-providers, called by every user's browser) returns only { slug, displayName, providerType, defaultModel }. Keys and base URLs are never exposed to the client.
• Non-admin users cannot enumerate admin providers' credentials or base URLs through any API.

:::danger Rotating AUTH_SECRET invalidates all stored admin provider keys Because the encryption key for admin_providers is derived from AUTH_SECRET, changing AUTH_SECRET makes every stored API key undecryptable. After rotating it, shared providers will fail to authenticate upstream until you re-enter each provider's API key in Settings → Admin → Shared providers (edit the row and paste the key again). There is no automated re-encryption path. If you must rotate AUTH_SECRET, plan to re-enter admin provider keys immediately afterward. :::

Related

• Auth — required to use the admin panel.
• TTS Providers — built-in provider catalog and per-user behavior.
• Environment Variables — ADMIN_EMAILS and the legacy flags that the admin UI replaces.