← Ssl / ssl / edge-certificates / additional-options / cipher-suites / customize-cipher-suites

Customize cipher suites via API

Cipher suites are a combination of ciphers used to negotiate security settings during the SSL/TLS handshake ↗ (and therefore separate from the SSL/TLS protocol).

Prerequisites

Cipher suite customization requires an Advanced Certificate Manager subscription.

If you are a SaaS provider looking to restrict cipher suites for connections to custom hostnames, this can be configured with a Cloudflare for SaaS subscription. Refer to TLS management instead.

Before you begin

Note that:

Updating the cipher suites will result in certificates being redeployed.
Cipher suites are used in combination with other SSL/TLS settings.
You cannot set specific TLS 1.3 ciphers. Instead, you can enable TLS 1.3 for your entire zone and Cloudflare will use all applicable TLS 1.3 cipher suites.
Each cipher suite also supports a specific algorithm (RSA or ECDSA) so you should consider the algorithms in use by your edge certificates when making your ciphers selection. You can find this information under each certificate listed on the Edge Certificates ↗ page.
It is not possible to configure minimum TLS version nor cipher suites for Cloudflare Pages hostnames.
If you use Windows you might need to adjust the curl syntax, refer to Making API calls on Windows for further guidance.

Steps and API examples

Decide which cipher suites you want to specify and which ones you want to disable (meaning they will not be included in your selection).

Below you will find samples covering the recommended ciphers by security level and compliance standards, but you can also refer to the full list of supported ciphers and customize your choice.
Log in to the Cloudflare dashboard and get your Global API Key in My Profile > API Tokens ↗.
Get the Zone ID from the Overview page ↗ of the domain you want to specify cipher suites for.
Make an API call to either the Edit zone setting endpoint or the Edit TLS setting for hostname endpoint, specifying ciphers in the URL. List your array of chosen cipher suites in the value field.

Required API token permissions

At least one of the following token permissions is required:

Zone Settings Write

Edit zone setting

curl "https://api.cloudflare.com/client/v4/zones/$ZONE_ID/settings/ciphers" \
	--request PATCH \
	--header "Authorization: Bearer $CLOUDFLARE_API_TOKEN" \
	--json '{
		"value": [
				"ECDHE-ECDSA-AES128-GCM-SHA256",
				"ECDHE-ECDSA-CHACHA20-POLY1305",
				"ECDHE-RSA-AES128-GCM-SHA256",
				"ECDHE-RSA-CHACHA20-POLY1305",
				"ECDHE-ECDSA-AES256-GCM-SHA384",
				"ECDHE-RSA-AES256-GCM-SHA384"
		]
	}'

To configure cipher suites per hostname, replace the first two lines by the following:

curl --request PUT \
"https://api.cloudflare.com/client/v4/zones/{zone_id}/hostnames/settings/ciphers/{hostname}" \

Required API token permissions

At least one of the following token permissions is required:

Zone Settings Write

Edit zone setting

curl "https://api.cloudflare.com/client/v4/zones/$ZONE_ID/settings/ciphers" \
	--request PATCH \
	--header "Authorization: Bearer $CLOUDFLARE_API_TOKEN" \
	--json '{
		"value": [
				"ECDHE-ECDSA-AES128-GCM-SHA256",
				"ECDHE-ECDSA-CHACHA20-POLY1305",
				"ECDHE-RSA-AES128-GCM-SHA256",
				"ECDHE-RSA-CHACHA20-POLY1305",
				"ECDHE-ECDSA-AES256-GCM-SHA384",
				"ECDHE-RSA-AES256-GCM-SHA384",
				"ECDHE-ECDSA-AES128-SHA256",
				"ECDHE-RSA-AES128-SHA256",
				"ECDHE-ECDSA-AES256-SHA384",
				"ECDHE-RSA-AES256-SHA384"
		]
	}'

To configure cipher suites per hostname, replace the first two lines by the following:

curl --request PUT \
"https://api.cloudflare.com/client/v4/zones/{zone_id}/hostnames/settings/ciphers/{hostname}" \

Required API token permissions

At least one of the following token permissions is required:

Zone Settings Write

Edit zone setting

curl "https://api.cloudflare.com/client/v4/zones/$ZONE_ID/settings/ciphers" \
	--request PATCH \
	--header "Authorization: Bearer $CLOUDFLARE_API_TOKEN" \
	--json '{
		"value": [
				"ECDHE-ECDSA-AES128-GCM-SHA256",
				"ECDHE-RSA-AES128-GCM-SHA256",
				"ECDHE-ECDSA-AES256-GCM-SHA384",
				"ECDHE-RSA-AES256-GCM-SHA384",
				"ECDHE-ECDSA-CHACHA20-POLY1305",
				"ECDHE-RSA-CHACHA20-POLY1305"
		]
	}'

To configure cipher suites per hostname, replace the first two lines by the following:

curl --request PUT \
"https://api.cloudflare.com/client/v4/zones/{zone_id}/hostnames/settings/ciphers/{hostname}" \

Required API token permissions

At least one of the following token permissions is required:

Zone Settings Write

Edit zone setting

curl "https://api.cloudflare.com/client/v4/zones/$ZONE_ID/settings/ciphers" \
	--request PATCH \
	--header "Authorization: Bearer $CLOUDFLARE_API_TOKEN" \
	--json '{
		"value": [
				"AES128-GCM-SHA256",
				"AES128-SHA",
				"AES128-SHA256",
				"AES256-SHA",
				"AES256-SHA256",
				"DES-CBC3-SHA",
				"ECDHE-ECDSA-AES128-GCM-SHA256",
				"ECDHE-ECDSA-AES128-SHA",
				"ECDHE-ECDSA-AES128-SHA256",
				"ECDHE-ECDSA-AES256-GCM-SHA384",
				"ECDHE-ECDSA-AES256-SHA384",
				"ECDHE-RSA-AES128-GCM-SHA256",
				"ECDHE-RSA-AES128-SHA",
				"ECDHE-RSA-AES128-SHA256",
				"ECDHE-RSA-AES256-GCM-SHA384",
				"ECDHE-RSA-AES256-SHA",
				"ECDHE-RSA-AES256-SHA384"
		]
	}'

To configure cipher suites per hostname, replace the first two lines by the following:

curl --request PUT \
"https://api.cloudflare.com/client/v4/zones/{zone_id}/hostnames/settings/ciphers/{hostname}" \

Reset to default values

To reset to the default cipher suites at zone level, use the Edit zone setting endpoint, specifying ciphers as the setting name in the URL, and send an empty array in the value field.

Required API token permissions

At least one of the following token permissions is required:

Zone Settings Write

Edit zone setting

curl "https://api.cloudflare.com/client/v4/zones/$ZONE_ID/settings/ciphers" \
	--request PATCH \
	--header "Authorization: Bearer $CLOUDFLARE_API_TOKEN" \
	--json '{
		"value": []
	}'

For specific hostname settings, use the Delete TLS setting for hostname endpoint.

Required API token permissions

At least one of the following token permissions is required:

SSL and Certificates Write

Delete TLS setting for hostname

curl "https://api.cloudflare.com/client/v4/zones/$ZONE_ID/hostnames/settings/ciphers/$HOSTNAME" \
	--request DELETE \
	--header "Authorization: Bearer $CLOUDFLARE_API_TOKEN"

For guidance around custom hostnames, refer to TLS settings - Cloudflare for SaaS.