# Authentication

The Sofar API uses token-based authentication. To get started using the Sofar API, you'll need to retrieve or generate an authentication token.

{% hint style="info" %}
Get your authentication token [**here**](https://spotter.sofarocean.com/api)**.**
{% endhint %}

The authentication token is tied to your account, and will grant API access to all resources owned by or shared with your account. You can regenerate the authentication token at any time at [spotter.sofarocean.com/api](https://spotter.sofarocean.com/api), but this will invalidate all previous tokens.

All of the Sofar APIs will accept a valid API token in the `token` query string parameter of each request. The Spotter Sensor and Wave Spectra API will also accept a `token` in the request's HTTP header.