Titel: Unexpected Basic Auth popup on n8n service after proxy restart

Questions
1

Coolify version: v4.0.0-beta.473
Proxy: Traefik v3.6
Service: n8n (n8nio/n8n:2.10.2)
Problem:
My n8n instance at https://n8n.manuelahamann.de suddenly shows a browser HTTP Basic Auth popup (“Authorization required”). It worked fine this morning. I did not enable Basic Auth anywhere.
What I checked (all clean, no Basic Auth found):

  • Docker Compose file – no auth middleware or labels
  • Environment Variables – no AUTH/BASIC_AUTH variables
  • n8n Service Settings – no Basic Auth toggle
  • Traefik main config (docker-compose.yml) – no auth labels
  • Traefik Dynamic Configurations – only default_redirect_503.yaml
  • n8n container logs – healthy, running fine on port 5678
  • Server Security tab – nothing auth-related
    What I noticed:
  • Proxy was “Proxy Exited” – restarted it, now “Proxy Running”, but Basic Auth popup persists
  • Previously the domain was set to https://n8n.manuelahamann.de:5678, changed it to https://n8n.manuelahamann.de and redeployed
    What I could NOT check yet:
  • docker inspect labels on the running n8n container (SSH/terminal access issues)
  • Dynamic Traefik files on disk (/data/coolify/proxy/dynamic/)
    Question: Does Coolify auto-generate BasicAuth middleware labels on service containers? How can I find and disable it? Is this a known issue with v4.0.0-beta.473?

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What is the error message (if any)?

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Information on your n8n setup

  • n8n version:
  • Database (default: SQLite):
  • n8n EXECUTIONS_PROCESS setting (default: own, main):
  • Running n8n via (Docker, npm, n8n cloud, desktop app):
  • Operating system:
2

@manuela_hamann the popup is almost certainly coming from n8n itself, not Traefik — n8n 2.10.2 has built-in basic auth that activates when N8N_BASIC_AUTH_ACTIVE=true is set anywhere in the env. check for that variable (plus N8N_BASIC_AUTH_USER and N8N_BASIC_AUTH_PASSWORD) in your Coolify env editor, the docker-compose, and the running container’s env via docker inspect <container>. could have been auto-injected by a Coolify default that kicked in on the proxy restart.

if it’s set, flip N8N_BASIC_AUTH_ACTIVE to false (or remove all three vars) and restart the container. popup goes away. the user/password were likely whatever Coolify generated, also visible in the env if you want to recover the creds before turning it off.

worth upgrading off 2.10.2 too — that version’s pretty old and the built-in basic auth got removed in newer releases since n8n added proper user accounts.

3

n8n v2 and onwards doesn’t have such a variable, and there is no way to enable basic auth there.

4

hello @manuela_hamann, welcome to the n8n community!
exposing port :5678 on the public domain may have left some old config/middleware associated with the previous router in Traefik. look for traefik.http.middlewares, traefik.http.routers, basicauth in docker inspect <container_n8n>. it’s a proxy possibility