Wire it once. It runs itself.

1. Get keys. Register a community and receive a sandbox key (ht_test_…) and, on go-live, a production key (ht_live_…).
2. Set tribe size. Keep the 3–5 default or tune with one PATCH /communities/settings call — study pods at 3–4, masterminds at 5–7.
3. Sync members. On Slack/Discord, joins and profile updates are picked up automatically. On your own platform, fire POST /members from your signup and profile events and backfill your existing roster once.
4. Run the first match. Trigger /hytribe match or POST /match. The engine forms tribes, queues anyone it couldn't place strongly yet, and returns a coverage report.
5. Let it run. Anton introduces each tribe, nudges quiet ones and surfaces at-risk ones. Re-run matching on any cadence.

# 1 · Register a community — returns your API key
curl -X POST https://api.hytribe.xyz/communities \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{ "name": "Indie Hackers NYC", "platform": "custom" }'

# 2 · Sync a member (fire from your signup / profile-update)
curl -X POST https://api.hytribe.xyz/members \
  -H "X-API-Key: ht_live_9f2c…" \
  -d '{ "platform_user_id": "U012AB",
        "profile_text": "founder, climbing, AI" }'

# 3 · Run matching — returns tribes
curl -X POST https://api.hytribe.xyz/match \
  -H "X-API-Key: ht_live_9f2c…"

{
  "tribes": [
    { "id": "trb_01", "members": ["U012AB","U023CD","U087QR","U118TT"] },
    { "id": "trb_02", "members": ["U033EF","U041GH","U059IJ"] }
  ],
  "compatibility_score": 0.94,
  "queued": [],
  "processing_time": "132ms"
}

Send authenticated example calls against the Hytribe sandbox and preview responses inline — no signup required. All calls hit synthetic data at sandbox.hytribe.xyz.

curl -X POST https://sandbox.hytribe.xyz/v1/match \
  -H "X-API-Key: ht_test_9f2c_demo" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json"
  -d '{   "min_tribe_size": 3,   "max_tribe_size": 5 }'

All requests are authenticated with a per-community API key in the X-API-Key header over HTTPS. A key is scoped to a single community and can only read or write that community's data. Keys are stored hashed at rest and can be revoked immediately.

Subscribe to events per community. Payloads are signed with HMAC-SHA256; verify the X-Hytribe-Signature header before processing.

Install snippet and a versioned quickstart for each language — every SDK covers the same three endpoints so you can port a proof of concept between stacks without rewriting logic.

# npm
npm install @hytribe/sdk

# bun
bun add @hytribe/sdk

# pnpm
pnpm add @hytribe/sdk

import { Hytribe } from "@hytribe/sdk";
// v1.4.0 · Node 18+, ESM & CJS

const hy = new Hytribe({ apiKey: process.env.HYTRIBE_API_KEY! });

// 1 · Register a community (once)
const community = await hy.communities.create({
  name: "Indie Hackers NYC",
  platform: "custom",
});

// 2 · Sync a member — idempotent on platform_user_id
await hy.members.upsert({
  platform_user_id: "U012AB",
  profile_text: "founder, climbing, AI",
});

// 3 · Run a match — returns tribes + coverage report
const { tribes, embedding_coverage } = await hy.match.run();

// 4 · Subscribe to webhooks (verify HMAC signature)
hy.webhooks.on("tribe.formed", (evt) => console.log(evt.tribe_id));

No SDK? The API is a plain REST surface — every response is JSON, every write accepts an Idempotency-Key, and every list endpoint is cursor-paginated.

• Versioning. URL-versioned (/v1). Backwards-incompatible changes ship under a new version; minimum 12 months' notice before deprecation.
• Changelog. Published monthly. Breaking changes announced 30 days in advance to security and engineering contacts.
• Status. Public status page at status.hytribe.xyz with subscribe-by-email.
• Sandbox parity. Sandbox tracks production within 24 hours of any API change.