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Please be aware that this page covers downstream webhooks. These are webhooks that Kombo sends to your system for events like new integrations or finished syncs. If you try to understand webhooks that Kombo receives from the connected ATS/HRIS such as Personio or Recruitee, check out this page.

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Enable Webhooks

You can configure your Kombo webhooks in the dashboard directly in the webhooks tab. After creating the first webhook, a random webhook secret will be generated and shown. You can learn how to use it in Validate the data.
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Available webhooks

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Data changed

We send a data-changed webhook every time data changes in Kombo. This includes changes from regular syncs as well as updates from upstream webhooks. Read more about the modern fetching approach here.
We trigger this webhook, when we receive a change. To speed up delivery of changes to Kombo, ensure that upstream webhooks are enabled for the integration. If upstream webhooks are not enabled or not supported, notifications are sent after the next scheduled sync (latency equals the sync frequency).
You can use this webhook to keep your database up to date by fetching only the updated data using the updated_after filter. This webhook is useful to fetch data from Kombo into your system. Read more here. We will only ever send you a data-changed webhook if there are changes to the data.
data-changed
{
  "id": "FhghqjnCi9WuAoLT8Z75CFcs",
  "type": "data-changed",
  "data": {
    "integration_id": "bombohr:ats-dev",
    "integration_tool": "bombohr",
    "integration_category": "ATS",
    "changed_models": [
      {
        "name": "ats_applications"
      }
    ]
  }
}
We are debouncing data-changed with a 30-second window by default. This means that you will at most receive one data-changed webhook every 30 seconds. When the webhook is triggered for the first time, we send it out immediately. After that, we will wait 30 seconds, during which we will collect all events and send them as a single webhook, thereby starting another 30-second cooldown window. We do not wait for syncs to finish before sending out the webhook; instead, we may send you multiple webhooks during a single sync to ensure you receive changes as soon as possible.

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Sync finished

The sync-finished webhook is sent every time a sync finishes, regardless of the sync state. Possible values for sync_state are:
  • SUCCEEDED The sync finished successfully.
  • FAILED There was a critical error during the sync and the sync did not finish.
  • PARTIALLY_FAILED There was a non-critical error that needs your attention. Please check the logs for actionable error messages or contact us for support.
  • AUTHENTICATION_FAILED The authentication of the connection is incorrect. Please check the Kombo dashboard for further steps.
This webhook is useful for informing customers about when the last sync ran or if user intervention is required due to authentication issues. This should not be used to trigger data refreshes. Use the data-changed webhook for that.
The sync_started_at field represents when Kombo started syncing data from the connected system, not when you should start fetching from Kombo. Do not use this field as your updated_after parameter when fetching data. Otherwise, you might risk missing data that was created/updated via webhooks before the sync started.
sync-finished
{
  "id": "5gjAtURLPbnTiwgkaBfiA3WJ",
  "type": "sync-finished",
  "data": {
    "sync_id": "B89SCXXho7Yw8PGo8AKJxLn4",
    "sync_state": "SUCCEEDED",
    "sync_started_at": "2021-09-01T12:00:00.000Z",
    "sync_ended_at": "2021-09-01T12:30:00.000Z",
    "sync_duration_seconds": 1800,
    "integration_id": "personio:CBNMt7dSNCzBdnRTx87dev4E",
    "integration_tool": "personio",
    "integration_category": "HRIS",
    "end_user": {
      "origin_id": "36123",
      "creator_email": "user@example.com",
      "organization_name": "Acme, Inc."
    },
    "log_url": "https://app.kombo.dev/env/production/logs/C3xUo6XAsB2sbKC7M1gyXaRX"
  }
}

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Integration created

The integration-created webhook is sent for every integration that is created. Please react to this webhook event by adding the integration to your database or by performing any other business logic that is required when an integration is created.
integration-created
{
  "id": "5gjAtURLPbnTiwgkaBfiA3WJ",
  "type": "integration-created",
  "data": {
    "id": "personio:CBNMt7dSNCzBdnRTx87dev4E",
    "tool": "personio",
    "category": "HRIS",
    "end_user": {
      "origin_id": "36123",
      "creator_email": "user@example.com",
      "organization_name": "Acme, Inc."
    }
  }
}

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Integration deleted

The integration-deleted webhook is sent when an integration is deleted. Please react to this webhook event by removing the integration from your database or by performing any other business logic that is required when an integration is deleted.
integration-deleted
{
  "id": "5gjAtURLPbnTiwgkaBfiA3WJ",
  "type": "integration-deleted",
  "data": {
    "id": "personio:CBNMt7dSNCzBdnRTx87dev4E",
    "tool": "personio",
    "category": "HRIS",
    "end_user": {
      "origin_id": "36123",
      "creator_email": "user@example.com",
      "organization_name": "Acme, Inc."
    },
    "deleted_at": "2022-11-02T10:50:10.242Z"
  }
}

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Connection flow failed

The connection-flow-failed webhook is sent whenever an error occurs during the connection flow. These errors could, for example, originate from a user entering incorrect credentials or from a mismatch between the required and supplied API permissions. This is not an alert-type webhook, but should instead be used to collect data and get insights into user behavior. The connection flow can still be successfully completed after this webhook is sent. You can check whether the connection flow ended successfully by following the link under log_url. Additionally, the log will display the exact errors your customer ran into, which you can use to provide support if needed.
connection-flow-failed
{
  "id": "5gjAtURLPbnTiwgkaBfiA3WJ",
  "type": "connection-flow-failed",
  "data": {
    "integration_tool": "personio",
    "integration_category": "HRIS",
    "end_user": {
      "origin_id": "36123",
      "creator_email": "user@example.com",
      "organization_name": "Acme, Inc."
    },
    "log_url": "https://app.kombo.dev/env/production/logs/C3xUo6XAsB2sbKC7M1gyXaRX"
  }
}

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Assessment order received

The assessment:order-received webhook is sent every time an assessment is ordered for a candidate from within an end-customer’s tool.
assessment:order-received
{
  "id": "B5KQKhAgTv6ZwzrfAbqbhipd",
  "integration_id": "workday:CBNMt7dSNCzBdnRTx87dev4E",
  "package_id": "typescript_test",
  "status": "OPEN",
  "candidate": {
    "email": "john.doe@gmail.com",
    "first_name": "John",
    "last_name": "Doe",
    "phone": "+1 123 456 7890",
    "remote_id": "26vafvWSRmbhNcxJYqjCzuJg"
  },
  "application": {
    "remote_id": "HAQ9uCfC1zi3TLbB1n5cyHgP"
  },
  "job": {
    "remote_id": "A1KQKhAgTv6ZwzrfAbqbhcde",
    "name": "Engineering Manager",
    "location": {
      "city": "Berlin",
      "country": "DE",
      "raw": "Berlin, Germany",
      "state": "Berlin",
      "street_1": "Lohmühlenstraße 65",
      "street_2": null,
      "zip_code": "12435"
    },
    "hiring_team": [
      {
        "first_name": "Jane",
        "last_name": "Doe",
        "remote_id": "26vafvWSRmbhNcxJYqjCzuJr",
        "email": "jane.doe@gmail.com",
        "hiring_team_roles": ["RECRUITER"]
      }
    ]
  }
}

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Integration state changed

The integration-state-changed webhook is sent when the status of the integration changes. Use this to detect stale credentials and to reconnect your customer. Possible values for the "state" key include:
  • ACTIVE The integration is active and working.
  • INVALID The connection requires reconnection in order to work again.
  • INACTIVE Upon your request, Kombo support can mark the integration as inactive.
integration-state-changed
{
  "id": "5gjAtURLPbnTiwgkaBfiA3WJ",
  "type": "integration-state-changed",
  "data": {
    "integration_tool": "personio",
    "integration_category": "HRIS",
    "integration_id": "personio:CBNMt7dSNCzBdnRTx87dev4E",
    "end_user": {
      "origin_id": "36123",
      "creator_email": "user@example.com",
      "organization_name": "Acme, Inc."
    },
    "qa_status": "PASSED",
    "state": "ACTIVE",
    "updated_at": "2021-09-01T12:00:00.000Z"
  }
}

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Validate the data

Anyone could post data to your webhook URL. That’s why we’re signing each request with a secret specific to your Kombo account. This secret is called the Kombo Webhook Secret and you can find it on the Kombo dashboard. Each valid webhook POST request from us will include the X-Kombo-Signature header. To validate it, carefully follow these steps:
  1. Decode the X-Kombo-Signature header from base64url encoding (without padding) to raw bytes.
  2. Compute the HMAC-SHA256 over the raw JSON request body (Kombo encodes this using two-space indentation) with your Kombo Webhook Secret as raw bytes.
  3. Compare the decoded signature bytes to the computed HMAC bytes using a constant-time comparison function (like Node.js’s timingSafeEqual) to protect against timing attacks.
If you’re stuck trying to get the signatures to match, please verify that:
  1. You’re using the Webhook Secret of the correct Kombo environment (e.g., production or development).
  2. You’re using the raw JSON request body. If your framework already parses the JSON body for you, make sure to re-encode it with two-space indentation (e.g., JSON.stringify(body, null, 2) in JavaScript).
  3. You’re decoding the signature header from base64url (not standard base64) and comparing raw bytes (not re-encoding the computed HMAC for string comparison).
Here are some examples of how you could achieve this in a few different languages: 
import { createHmac, timingSafeEqual } from 'node:crypto'

const signatureHeader = req.headers['x-kombo-signature']

// Get the raw UTF-8-encoded string body because this was used for signing
const body = request.body

// Or if you use a framework that parses the body for you, you can use this.
// Note: This is not the same as JSON.stringify(request.body)
const body = JSON.stringify(request.body, null, 2)

const expected = createHmac('sha256', KOMBO_WEBHOOK_SECRET)
.update(body, 'utf8')
.digest()

// Decode and compare in constant time
const provided = Buffer.from(signatureHeader, 'base64url')
const isValidRequest =
provided.length === expected.length && timingSafeEqual(expected, provided)

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Testing webhooks

The list of all created webhooks has two buttons on the right. One is for deleting the webhook, the other is for sending a test request. This test request will contain dummy data but will use the correct data schema. Be careful when using this feature in production! It will send invalid data to your webhook.

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Testing locally

For local development, you can use a service like localtunnel or ngrok. These tools allow you to expose a local port through a public URL provided by them. The setup is very straightforward: Once you’ve started a tunnel, simply add the provided URL as a webhook in the Kombo dashboard. You can then send test requests to validate that your endpoint is working properly.
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