Getting started

Clients & SDKs

Talk to the Zazu API from the terminal, a script, or your app. Every endpoint in these docs shows a request in all ten clients below — this page is how you install and authenticate each one.

The official clients#

Zazu ships nine maintained clients plus plain curl. They all read the same ZAZU_API_KEY / ZAZU_BASE_URL environment variables and target the same REST API, so pick whichever fits your stack. Each is open source on GitHub:

CLI — getzazu/cli
JavaScript / TypeScript — getzazu/zazu-ts
Ruby — getzazu/zazu-ruby
Python — getzazu/zazu-python
Go — getzazu/zazu-go
Rust — getzazu/zazu-rust
Elixir — getzazu/zazu-elixir
Crystal — getzazu/zazu-crystal
PHP — getzazu/zazu-php

Authentication#

Every client authenticates with an API key you generate from Settings → Developer → API Keys. Keep it in the ZAZU_API_KEY environment variable rather than hardcoding it — all eight SDKs and the CLI read it automatically:

.env

export ZAZU_API_KEY="sk_live_..."

Sandbox first

Start with a staging key against the sandbox base URL, then mint a production key and switch ZAZU_BASE_URL when you go live. See the Sandbox & test cards guide.

curl#

No install — every request is a signed HTTP call. Pass your key as a Bearer token:

request.sh

curl "https://zazu.africa/api/entity" \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $ZAZU_API_KEY"

CLI#

View on GitHub

A single self-contained binary (the Bun runtime is bundled — no Node, Bun, or Ruby needed). Install via Homebrew or npm:

install.sh

# Homebrew (macOS / Linux)
brew install getzazu/tap/zazu

# or npm (thin shim that fetches the platform binary)
npm install -g @getzazu/cli

Authenticate once, then call any endpoint:

first-call.sh

# interactive login, or pipe a key in for CI:
printf '%s\n' "$ZAZU_API_KEY" | zazu login --api-key-stdin

zazu accounts list

JavaScript / TypeScript#

View on GitHub

Runtime-agnostic (Node 20+, Bun, Deno, browsers, Workers). Install @getzazu/sdk with your package manager:

install.sh

bun add @getzazu/sdk    # or npm / pnpm / yarn

first-call.ts

import { Zazu } from "@getzazu/sdk";

// On Node/Bun the key is read from ZAZU_API_KEY automatically.
const zazu = new Zazu({ apiKey: process.env.ZAZU_API_KEY });

const accounts = await zazu.accounts.list();

Ruby#

View on GitHub

Published as zazu-ruby on RubyGems but required as zazu in code. Add it to your Gemfile:

Gemfile

gem "zazu-ruby"

first_call.rb

require "zazu"

zazu = Zazu.new(api_key: ENV["ZAZU_API_KEY"])

accounts = zazu.accounts.list

Python#

View on GitHub

Requires Python 3.11+. Install zazu-sdk from PyPI:

install.sh

pip install zazu-sdk

first_call.py

from zazu_sdk import Zazu

# Picks up ZAZU_API_KEY from the environment by default.
client = Zazu(api_key="sk_live_...")

accounts = client.accounts.list()

Go#

View on GitHub

Requires Go 1.24+; no runtime dependencies outside the standard library. Install with go get:

install.sh

go get github.com/getzazu/zazu-go

first_call.go

import zazu "github.com/getzazu/zazu-go"

// Reads ZAZU_API_KEY from the environment by default.
client, err := zazu.New()

accounts, err := client.Accounts.List(ctx, zazu.AccountListParams{})

Rust#

View on GitHub

Install zazu-sdk as a git dependency for now (not yet on crates.io):

Cargo.toml

zazu-sdk = { git = "https://github.com/getzazu/zazu-rust" }

first_call.rs

// Falls back to the ZAZU_API_KEY env var when api_key isn't set.
let client = zazu_sdk::Client::builder()
    .api_key(std::env::var("ZAZU_API_KEY")?)
    .build()?;

let accounts = client.accounts().list(Default::default())?;

Elixir#

View on GitHub

Install :zazu as a GitHub dependency in your mix.exs:

mix.exs

{:zazu, github: "getzazu/zazu-elixir"}

first_call.exs

# :api_key defaults to the ZAZU_API_KEY env var.
{:ok, client} = Zazu.new(api_key: System.fetch_env!("ZAZU_API_KEY"))

{:ok, accounts} = Zazu.Accounts.list(client)

Crystal#

View on GitHub

Install zazu as a GitHub dependency in your shard.yml:

shard.yml

dependencies:
  zazu:
    github: getzazu/zazu-crystal

first_call.cr

require "zazu"

client = Zazu::Client.new # reads ZAZU_API_KEY

accounts = client.accounts.list

PHP#

View on GitHub

Requires PHP 8.2+. Install getzazu/zazu-php with Composer:

install.sh

composer require getzazu/zazu-php

first_call.php

use Zazu\Client;

// apiKey defaults to the ZAZU_API_KEY env var.
$client = new Client(apiKey: getenv('ZAZU_API_KEY'));

$accounts = $client->accounts->list();