> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://stytch.com/docs/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

# Start of a session

> A session starts after successful authentication.

## User session

A user session begins after any authentication endpoint (e.g. [authenticate magic link](/api-reference/consumer/api/magic-links/authenticate)) is called with a specified `session_duration_minutes`.
If you do not pass in a `session_duration_minutes` parameter, a session will not be created.

These endpoints mint a [User Session](/api-reference/consumer/api/sessions/session-object) and return a `session_token` and `session_jwt` in the response, which can be forwarded to the client and stored:

<Accordion title="Sample authenticate response & session object">
  ```json Response 200 expandable theme={null}
  {
    "method_id": "email-test-81bf03a8-86e1-4d95-bd44-bb3495224953",
    "request_id": "request-id-test-b05c992f-ebdc-489d-a754-c7e70ba13141",
    "reset_sessions": false,
    "session": "{...}",
    "session_token": "mZAYn5aLEqKUlZ_Ad9U_fWr38GaAQ1oFAhT8ds245v7Q",
    "session_jwt": "eyJ...",
    "status_code": 200,
    "user": {...},
    "user_id": "user-test-16d9ba61-97a1-4ba4-9720-b03761dc50c6" 
  }
  ```

  ```json Object 200 expandable theme={null}
  {
    "session": {
      "attributes": {
          "ip_address": "",
          "user_agent": ""
      },
      "authentication_factors": [
        {
          "created_at": "2025-01-09T07:41:52Z",
          "delivery_method": "email",
          "email_factor": {
            "email_address": "sandbox@stytch.com",
            "email_id": "email-test-81bf03a8-86e1-4d95-bd44-bb3495224953"
          },
          "last_authenticated_at": "2025-01-09T07:41:52Z",
          "updated_at": "2025-01-09T07:41:52Z",
          "type": "magic_link"
        },
        {
          "created_at": "2025-01-09T08:41:52Z",
          "delivery_method": "knowledge",
          "last_authenticated_at": "2025-01-09T08:41:52Z",
          "type": "password",
          "updated_at": "2025-01-09T08:41:52Z"
        }
      ],
      "custom_claims": {
        "claim1": "value1",
        "claim2": "value2"
      },
      "expires_at": "2025-04-22T08:00:00Z",
      "last_accessed_at": "2025-04-22T07:41:52Z",
      "started_at": "2025-04-22T07:00:00Z",
      "session_id": "session-test-fe6c042b-6286-479f-8a4f-b046a6c46509",
      "user_id": "user-test-16d9ba61-97a1-4ba4-9720-b03761dc50c6"
    }
  }
  ```
</Accordion>

Before performing any action that requires authorization, [authenticate the user session](/consumer-auth/manage-sessions/validate-session) to ensure that the session is valid.