Have you added CORS, Helmet and rate limiting to your Express API?

My API works fine on my laptop. I don't know what it still needs before real traffic hits it.

Intermediate to advancedRead 6 minDoing: a few hours7 steps

What you'll have at the end

An Express app with Helmet's security headers, a CORS origin allowlist, and a rate limiter on the login route, confirmed with curl

Before you start

You need

A running Express API with a route that accepts a username and password, already reachable over HTTP, plus the ability to install npm packages and send it test requests with real header values.

Not covered

Locking the account itself after repeated failures, showing a CAPTCHA, or blocking traffic at a proxy or CDN before it ever reaches Node: those are separate decisions from capping the rate a route can be called at.

Leans on

7 steps

Where to go next

Keeping .env secrets out of git

For storing the allowed frontend address and any store credentials as environment variables instead of writing them into the code.

Moving Express sessions off MemoryStore

For hardening the session store behind this same sign-in route, once its request rate is already capped.

Checked 25 Aug 2026

Part of the Express.js cookbook