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Nostr Developer Guide

Build on Nostr. Libraries, patterns, and best practices for developers.

Overview​

This guide covers:

  • Protocol fundamentals
  • Client development
  • Relay implementation
  • NIP compliance
  • Best practices

Quick Start​

npm install nostr-tools
import { generateSecretKey, getPublicKey, finalizeEvent } from 'nostr-tools';

// Generate identity
const sk = generateSecretKey();
const pk = getPublicKey(sk);

// Create an event
const event = finalizeEvent({
  kind: 1,
  created_at: Math.floor(Date.now() / 1000),
  tags: [],
  content: 'Hello, Nostr!'
}, sk);

console.log(event);

Libraries​

JavaScript/TypeScript​

  • nostr-tools — Full-featured library
  • nostr-components — Web components

Other Languages​

  • rust-nostr — Rust
  • python-nostr — Python
  • go-nostr — Go

Key Concepts​

Events​

Everything is an event — a signed JSON object:

{
  "id": "<sha256 hash>",
  "pubkey": "<hex public key>",
  "created_at": 1234567890,
  "kind": 1,
  "tags": [["p", "..."], ["e", "..."]],
  "content": "message",
  "sig": "<schnorr signature>"
}

Kinds​

KindPurpose
0Profile metadata
1Text note
3Contact list
4Encrypted DM
5Deletion
7Reaction

Tags​

Tags add metadata and enable referencing:

  • ["p", "<pubkey>"] — Mention a user
  • ["e", "<event-id>"] — Reference an event
  • ["t", "hashtag"] — Hashtag

Relay Communication​

WebSocket protocol with simple message types:

// Subscribe
["REQ", "sub-id", { kinds: [1], limit: 10 }]

// Publish
["EVENT", { /* event */ }]

// Close subscription
["CLOSE", "sub-id"]

See Also​