Macaroon Bakery

Macaroon Bakery

Bake custom lnd macaroons so every agent gets only the permissions it needs. Never hand out admin.macaroon in production — bake a scoped one instead.

Quick Start

# Bake a pay-only macaroon
skills/macaroon-bakery/scripts/bake.sh --role pay-only

# Bake an invoice-only macaroon
skills/macaroon-bakery/scripts/bake.sh --role invoice-only

# Bake a read-only macaroon
skills/macaroon-bakery/scripts/bake.sh --role read-only

# Inspect any macaroon
skills/macaroon-bakery/scripts/bake.sh --inspect ~/.lnd/data/chain/bitcoin/mainnet/admin.macaroon

# List all available lnd permissions
skills/macaroon-bakery/scripts/bake.sh --list-permissions

Docker

The litd container is auto-detected. You can also specify --container:

# Auto-detect litd container (default)
skills/macaroon-bakery/scripts/bake.sh --role pay-only

# Explicit container
skills/macaroon-bakery/scripts/bake.sh --role pay-only --container litd

# Inspect a macaroon inside a container
skills/macaroon-bakery/scripts/bake.sh --inspect /root/.lnd/data/chain/bitcoin/testnet/admin.macaroon --container litd

Remote Nodes

To bake macaroons on a remote lnd node, provide the connection credentials:

# Bake a pay-only macaroon on a remote node
skills/macaroon-bakery/scripts/bake.sh --role pay-only \
    --rpcserver remote-host:10009 \
    --tlscertpath ~/remote-tls.cert \
    --macaroonpath ~/remote-admin.macaroon \
    --save-to ~/remote-pay-only.macaroon

You need lncli installed locally and copies of the node's TLS cert and a macaroon with macaroon:generate permission (typically admin.macaroon).

Preset Roles

Baking Custom Macaroons

For permissions not covered by presets, bake a custom macaroon:

# Custom: agent can only pay and check wallet balance
skills/macaroon-bakery/scripts/bake.sh --custom \
    uri:/lnrpc.Lightning/SendPaymentSync \
    uri:/lnrpc.Lightning/DecodePayReq \
    uri:/lnrpc.Lightning/WalletBalance \
    uri:/lnrpc.Lightning/GetInfo

# Custom with explicit output path
skills/macaroon-bakery/scripts/bake.sh --custom \
    uri:/lnrpc.Lightning/AddInvoice \
    uri:/lnrpc.Lightning/GetInfo \
    --save-to ~/my-agent.macaroon

Discovering Permissions

# List all available URI permissions
skills/macaroon-bakery/scripts/bake.sh --list-permissions

# Filter for specific service
skills/macaroon-bakery/scripts/bake.sh --list-permissions | grep -i invoice

# Filter for routing-related permissions
skills/macaroon-bakery/scripts/bake.sh --list-permissions | grep -i router

Inspecting Macaroons

# See what permissions a macaroon has
skills/macaroon-bakery/scripts/bake.sh --inspect <path-to-macaroon>

# Inspect the admin macaroon to see full permissions
skills/macaroon-bakery/scripts/bake.sh --inspect ~/.lnd/data/chain/bitcoin/mainnet/admin.macaroon

Signer Macaroon Scoping

When using the lightning-security-module skill, the credentials bundle includes admin.macaroon by default. For production, bake a signing-only macaroon on the signer machine:

# On the signer container
skills/macaroon-bakery/scripts/bake.sh --role signer-only \
    --container litd-signer --rpc-port 10012

# Or on a native signer
skills/macaroon-bakery/scripts/bake.sh --role signer-only \
    --rpc-port 10012 --lnddir ~/.lnd-signer

# Then re-export the credentials bundle with the scoped macaroon

Macaroon Rotation

Rotate macaroons regularly to limit the window if one is compromised:

# 1. Bake a new macaroon with the same role
skills/macaroon-bakery/scripts/bake.sh --role pay-only --save-to ~/pay-only-v2.macaroon

# 2. Update your agent config to use the new macaroon

# 3. Delete the old macaroon's root key (invalidates it)
skills/lnd/scripts/lncli.sh bakemacaroon --root_key_id 0
# Note: use lncli listmacaroonids and deletemacaroonid for fine-grained control

Best Practices

• One macaroon per agent role. Don't share macaroons between agents with different responsibilities.
• Never use admin.macaroon in production. It's the master key.
• Inspect before deploying. Always verify what a baked macaroon can do.
• Rotate on a schedule. Monthly for production, immediately if compromised.
• Scope signer macaroons too. The remote signer's credentials bundle should use signer-only, not admin.
• Store with 0600 permissions. Macaroons are bearer tokens — treat like passwords.

Common Permission URIs