Policies - API Docs - Terraform Enterprise | Terraform

Note: Sentinel policies are a paid feature, available as part of the Team & Governance upgrade package. Learn more about Terraform Cloud pricing here.

Sentinel Policy as Code is an embedded policy as code framework integrated with Terraform Cloud.

Policies are configured on a per-organization level and are organized and grouped into policy sets, which define the workspaces on which policies are enforced during runs. In these workspaces, the plan's changes are validated against the relevant policies after the plan step. (For details, see Run States and Stages.)

This page documents the API endpoints to create, read, update, and delete the Sentinel policies in an organization. Use of these endpoints provides a method to manually manage individual policies within Terraform Cloud. To view and manage the results of a specific run's policy check, use the Runs API.

Note: These endpoints are no longer the recommended way to use Sentinel features in Terraform Cloud. We suggest using versioned policy sets, which allows integrating with VCS or uploading policy set data and configuration as a whole. Use the policy sets API to leverage versioned policy sets.

Create a Policy

POST /organizations/:organization_name/policies

Parameter	Description
`:organization_name`	The organization to create the policy in. The organization must already exist in the system, and the token authenticating the API request must have permission to manage policies. ((More about permissions.)

[permissions-citation]: #intentionally-unused---keep-for-maintainers)

This creates a new policy object for the organization, but does not upload the actual policy code. After creation, you must use the Upload a Policy endpoint (below) with the new policy's upload path. (This endpoint's response body includes the upload path in its links.upload property.)

Status	Response	Reason
200	JSON API document (`type: "policies"`)	Successfully created a policy
404	JSON API error object	Organization not found, or user unauthorized to perform action
422	JSON API error object	Malformed request body (missing attributes, wrong types, etc.)

Request Body

This POST endpoint requires a JSON object with the following properties as a request payload.

Properties without a default value are required.

Key path	Type	Default	Description
`data.type`	string		Must be `"policies"`.
`data.attributes.name`	string		The name of the policy, which cannot be modified after creation. Can include letters, numbers, `-`, and `_`.
`data.attributes.description`	string	`null`	A description of the policy's purpose. This field supports Markdown and will be rendered in the Terraform Cloud UI.
`data.attributes.enforce`	array[object]		An array of enforcement configurations which map Sentinel file paths to their enforcement modes. Currently policies only support a single file, so this array will consist of a single element. If the path in the enforcement map does not match the Sentinel policy (`<NAME>.sentinel`), then the default `hard-mandatory` will be used.
`data.attributes.enforce[].path`	string		Must be `<NAME>.sentinel`, where `<NAME>` has the same value as `data.attributes.name`.
`data.attributes.enforce[].mode`	string	`hard-mandatory`	The enforcement level of the policy. Valid values are `"hard-mandatory"`, `"soft-mandatory"`, and `"advisory"`. For more details, see Managing Policies.
`data.relationships.policy-sets.data[]`	array[object]	`[]`	A list of resource identifier objects to define which policy sets the new policy will be a member of. These objects must contain `id` and `type` properties, and the `type` property must be `policy-sets` (e.g. `{ "id": "polset-3yVQZvHzf5j3WRJ1","type": "policy-sets" }`).

Sample Payload

{  "data": {    "attributes": {      "enforce": [        {          "path": "my-example-policy.sentinel",          "mode": "hard-mandatory"        }      ],      "name": "my-example-policy",      "description": "An example policy."    },    "relationships": {      "policy-sets": {        "data": [          { "id": "polset-3yVQZvHzf5j3WRJ1", "type": "policy-sets" }        ]      }    },    "type": "policies"  }}

Sample Request

curl \  --header "Authorization: Bearer $TOKEN" \  --header "Content-Type: application/vnd.api+json" \  --request POST \  --data @payload.json \  https://app.terraform.io/api/v2/organizations/my-organization/policies

Sample Response

{  "data": {    "id":"pol-u3S5p2Uwk21keu1s",    "type":"policies",    "attributes": {      "name":"my-example-policy",      "description":"An example policy.",      "enforce": [        {          "path":"my-example-policy.sentinel",          "mode":"advisory"        }      ],      "policy-set-count": 1,      "updated-at": null    },    "relationships": {      "organization": {        "data": { "id": "my-organization", "type": "organizations" }      },      "policy-sets": {        "data": [          { "id": "polset-3yVQZvHzf5j3WRJ1", "type": "policy-sets" }        ]      }    },    "links": {      "self":"/api/v2/policies/pol-u3S5p2Uwk21keu1s",      "upload":"/api/v2/policies/pol-u3S5p2Uwk21keu1s/upload"    }  }}

Show a Policy

GET /policies/:policy_id

Parameter	Description
`:policy_id`	The ID of the policy to show. Use the "List Policies" endpoint to find IDs.

Status	Response	Reason
200	JSON API document (`type: "policies"`)	The request was successful
404	JSON API error object	Policy not found or user unauthorized to perform action

Sample Request

curl --request GET \  -H "Authorization: Bearer $TOKEN" \  -H "Content-Type: application/vnd.api+json" \  https://app.terraform.io/api/v2/policies/pol-oXUppaX2ximkqp8w

Sample Response

{  "data": {    "id": "pol-oXUppaX2ximkqp8w",    "type": "policies",    "attributes": {      "name": "my-example-policy",      "description":"An example policy.",      "enforce": [        {          "path": "my-example-policy.sentinel",          "mode": "soft-mandatory"        }      ],      "policy-set-count": 1,      "updated-at": "2018-09-11T18:21:21.784Z"    },    "relationships": {      "organization": {        "data": { "id": "my-organization", "type": "organizations" }      },      "policy-sets": {        "data": [          { "id": "polset-3yVQZvHzf5j3WRJ1", "type": "policy-sets" }        ]      }    },    "links": {      "self": "/api/v2/policies/pol-oXUppaX2ximkqp8w",      "upload": "/api/v2/policies/pol-oXUppaX2ximkqp8w/upload",      "download": "/api/v2/policies/pol-oXUppaX2ximkqp8w/download"    }  }}

Upload a Policy

PUT /policies/:policy_id/upload

Parameter	Description
`:policy_id`	The ID of the policy to upload code to. Use the "List Policies" endpoint (or the response to a "Create Policy" request) to find IDs.

This endpoint uploads code to an existing Sentinel policy.

Note: This endpoint does not use JSON-API's conventions for HTTP headers and body serialization.

Note: This endpoint limits the size of uploaded policies to 10MB. If a larger payload is uploaded, an HTTP 413 error will be returned, and the policy will not be saved. Consider refactoring policies into multiple smaller, more concise documents if you reach this limit.

Request Body

This PUT endpoint requires the text of a valid Sentinel policy, with a Content-Type of application/octet-stream.

See Defining Policies for details about writing Sentinel code.

Sample Payload

main = rule { true }

Sample Request

curl \  --header "Authorization: Bearer $TOKEN" \  --header "Content-Type: application/octet-stream" \  --request PUT \  --data-binary @payload.sentinel \  https://app.terraform.io/api/v2/policies/pol-u3S5p2Uwk21keu1s/upload

Update a Policy

PATCH /policies/:policy_id

Parameter	Description
`:policy_id`	The ID of the policy to update. Use the "List Policies" endpoint to find IDs.

This endpoint can update the enforcement mode of an existing policy. To update the policy code itself, use the upload endpoint.

Status	Response	Reason
200	JSON API document (`type: "policies"`)	Successfully updated the policy
404	JSON API error object	Policy not found, or user unauthorized to perform action
422	JSON API error object	Malformed request body (missing attributes, wrong types, etc.)

Request Body

This PATCH endpoint requires a JSON object with the following properties as a request payload.

Properties without a default value are required.

Key path	Type	Default	Description
`data.type`	string		Must be `"policies"`.
`data.attributes.name`	string	(Current name)	Ignored if present.
`data.attributes.description`	string	`null`	A description of the policy's purpose. This field supports Markdown and will be rendered in the Terraform Cloud UI.
`data.attributes.enforce`	array[object]		An array of enforcement configurations which map Sentinel file paths to their enforcement modes. Currently policies only support a single file, so this array will consist of a single element. The value provided replaces the enforcement map. To make an incremental update, you can first fetch the current value of this map from the show endpoint and modify it. If the path in the enforcement map does not match the Sentinel policy (`<NAME>.sentinel`), then the default `hard-mandatory` will be used.
`data.attributes.enforce[].path`	string		Must be `<NAME>.sentinel`, where `<NAME>` matches the original value of `data.attributes.name`.
`data.attributes.enforce[].mode`	string	`hard-mandatory`	The enforcement level of the policy. Valid values are `"hard-mandatory"`, `"soft-mandatory"`, and `"advisory"`. For more details, see Managing Policies.

Sample Payload

{  "data": {    "attributes": {      "enforce": [        {          "path": "my-example-policy.sentinel",          "mode": "soft-mandatory"        }      ],    },    "type":"policies"  }}

Sample Request

curl \  --header "Authorization: Bearer $TOKEN" \  --header "Content-Type: application/vnd.api+json" \  --request PATCH \  --data @payload.json \  https://app.terraform.io/api/v2/policies/pol-u3S5p2Uwk21keu1s

Sample Response

{  "data": {    "id":"pol-u3S5p2Uwk21keu1s",    "type":"policies",    "attributes": {      "name":"my-example-policy",      "description":"An example policy.",      "enforce": [        {          "path":"my-example-policy.sentinel",          "mode":"soft-mandatory"        }      ],      "policy-set-count": 0,      "updated-at":"2017-10-10T20:58:04.621Z"    },    "relationships": {      "organization": {        "data": { "id": "my-organization", "type": "organizations" }      },    },    "links": {      "self":"/api/v2/policies/pol-u3S5p2Uwk21keu1s",      "upload":"/api/v2/policies/pol-u3S5p2Uwk21keu1s/upload",      "download":"/api/v2/policies/pol-u3S5p2Uwk21keu1s/download"    }  }}

List Policies

GET /organizations/:organization_name/policies

Parameter	Description
`:organization_name`	The organization to list policies for.

Status	Response	Reason
200	Array of JSON API documents (`type: "policies"`)	Success
404	JSON API error object	Organization not found, or user unauthorized to perform action

Query Parameters

This endpoint supports pagination with standard URL query parameters; remember to percent-encode [ as %5B and ] as %5D if your tooling doesn't automatically encode URLs.

Parameter	Description
`page[number]`	Optional. If omitted, the endpoint will return the first page.
`page[size]`	Optional. If omitted, the endpoint will return 20 policies per page.
`search[name]`	Optional. Allows searching the organization's policies by name.

Sample Request

curl \  --header "Authorization: Bearer $TOKEN" \  https://app.terraform.io/api/v2/organizations/my-organization/policies

Sample Response

{  "data": [    {      "attributes": {        "enforce": [          {            "mode": "advisory",            "path": "my-example-policy.sentinel"          }        ],        "name": "my-example-policy",        "description": "An example policy.",        "policy-set-count": 0,        "updated-at": "2017-10-10T20:52:13.898Z"      },      "id": "pol-u3S5p2Uwk21keu1s",      "relationships": {        "organization": {          "data": { "id": "my-organization", "type": "organizations" }        },      },      "links": {        "download": "/api/v2/policies/pol-u3S5p2Uwk21keu1s/download",        "self": "/api/v2/policies/pol-u3S5p2Uwk21keu1s",        "upload": "/api/v2/policies/pol-u3S5p2Uwk21keu1s/upload"      },      "type": "policies"    }  ]}

Delete a Policy

DELETE /policies/:policy_id

Parameter	Description
`:policy_id`	The ID of the policy to delete. Use the "List Policies" endpoint to find IDs.

Status	Response	Reason
204	Nothing	Successfully deleted the policy
404	JSON API error object	Policy not found, or user unauthorized to perform action

Sample Request

curl \  --header "Authorization: Bearer $TOKEN" \  --header "Content-Type: application/vnd.api+json" \  --request DELETE \  https://app.terraform.io/api/v2/policies/pl-u3S5p2Uwk21keu1s

The GET endpoints above can optionally return related resources, if requested with the include query parameter. The following resource types are available:

Resource Name	Description
`policy_sets`	Policy sets that any returned policies are members of.

Policies API

Create a Policy

Request Body

Sample Payload

Sample Request

Sample Response

Show a Policy

Sample Request

Sample Response

Upload a Policy

Request Body

Sample Payload

Sample Request

Update a Policy

Request Body

Sample Payload

Sample Request

Sample Response

List Policies

Query Parameters

Sample Request

Sample Response

Delete a Policy

Sample Request

Available Related Resources