TIL: Forwarding Localhost With ngrok for Webhook Dev

Webhook development has a chicken-and-egg problem. The API needs to call your server, but your server is on localhost. ngrok breaks that loop.

ngrok http 3000

You get a public URL like https://abc123.ngrok.io that forwards to localhost:3000. Put that URL in your API dashboard and webhooks start hitting your machine.

I used this daily at Vonage. Every SMS delivery receipt, every incoming call event, every conversation API webhook went through an ngrok tunnel during development. No deploy step, no ngrok config file, just one terminal tab.

Is ngrok safe for production?

No. It is a development tool. The traffic goes through ngrok’s servers. Use it for testing, not for production traffic.

What if the URL changes every time?

The free plan gives a new URL each session. The paid plan gives fixed subdomains and custom domains.