Link Embedded Institution Search

With Embedded Institution Search (also known as Embedded Link), you can provide a more seamless transition to the account connectivity experience. For payment experiences in particular, embedding institution search can help guide users to choosing their bank account as a payment method.

Embedded Institution Search and the Auth Database Auth) are both designed to increase adoption of ACH payment methods and are frequently used together. Embedded Institution Search is also fully compatible with other Auth flows, including micro-deposit based flows and Database Auth.

It is highly recommended to use Embedded Institution Search for Link to increase uptake of pay-by-bank if your use case involves a pay-by-bank payments flow where the end user can choose between paying via a credit card and paying via a bank account. If your use case is an account opening or funding flow that requires the customer to use a bank account, or has a surcharge for credit card use, use the standard Link experience instead.

In order to realize the benefits of Embedded Institution Search, you must show it by default when the payments view loads, without requiring the user to first select 'Pay by bank'. If you cannot do this, use the standard Link experience instead.

Embedded Institution Search can be used with the following products: Auth, Identity, Balance, Signal, Transfer, Transactions, Assets, and Liabilities.

Embedded Institution Search is not compatible with Multi-Item Link.

The user will be able to select from a set of institution logos. You can customize which logos will be displayed via the Plaid Dashboard. If a user selects an institution, they will be taken to Link to connect their account.

If the user's institution is not one of the featured institutions, they can search for their institution using the search bar.

Embedded Institution Search is available for all supported integration modes except webviews and Hosted Link. Embedded Institution Search cannot be rendered inside an iFrame.

Before integrating, make sure you are using a version of the SDK that supports Embedded Institution Search.

1. Create a Link token as normal, using /link/token/create; no special parameters are required when making this call to enable Embedded Institution Search. The 'Connect Manually' button rendering is configured with the auth_type_select_enabled boolean in the auth object.
2. Create an embedded view. This should be done before it will be displayed in your app, to minimize latency. Plaid will track when this view is requested and activate the Embedded Search UI. If you are using iOS, call createEmbeddedView, which will return a Result containing a UIView. Once you have the UIView, add it to your ViewController's view. If you are using the web SDK, call Plaid.createEmbedded instead of Plaid.create to open Link. For other platforms, you will create the view as normal.
3. Lay out the view Plaid returns from the configuration. If you are migrating to Embedded Institution Search from traditional Link, delete your old Link presentation in favor of this new one.

1private func setupEmbeddedSearchView(token: String) {
2
3        // Create a configuration like normal.
4        var configuration = LinkTokenConfiguration(
5            token: token,
6            onSuccess: { success in
7                print("success: \(success)")
8            }
9        )
10
11        configuration.onEvent = { event in
12            print("Event: \(event)")
13        }
14
15        configuration.onExit = { exit in
16            print("Exit: \(exit)")
17        }
18
19        // Create a handler with your configuration like normal.
20        let handlerResult = Plaid.create(configuration)
21        switch handlerResult {
22        case .success(let handler):
23
24            // Save a reference to your handler.
25            self.handler = handler
26
27            // Create an embedded view.
28            let embeddedSearchView = handler.createEmbeddedView(presentUsing: .viewController(self))
29
30            // Layout this view
31            embeddedSearchView.translatesAutoresizingMaskIntoConstraints = false
32            view.addSubview(embeddedSearchView)
33
34            NSLayoutConstraint.activate([
35                embeddedSearchView.topAnchor.constraint(equalTo: view.safeAreaLayoutGuide.topAnchor, constant: 8),
36                embeddedSearchView.leadingAnchor.constraint(equalTo: view.leadingAnchor, constant: 25),
37                embeddedSearchView.trailingAnchor.constraint(equalTo: view.trailingAnchor, constant: -25),
38                embeddedSearchView.heightAnchor.constraint(equalToConstant: 360),
39            ])
40
41
42        case .failure(let error):
43            // Error creating handler. Handle like normal.
44            fatalError("\(error)")
45        }
46    }

1// Register a callback for an Activity Result like normal (must be done from an Activity)
2 private val linkAccountToPlaid =
3   registerForActivityResult(OpenPlaidLink()) { result ->
4      when (result) {
5        is LinkSuccess -> /* handle LinkSuccess */
6        is LinkExit -> /* handle LinkExit (from LinkActivity) */
7      }
8    }
9
10// Create a linkTokenConfiguration like normal
11val linkTokenConfiguration = LinkTokenConfiguration.Builder().token(token).build()
12
13// Create the view with a trailing lambda for handling LinkExits from the Embedded View
14val embeddedView = Plaid.createLinkEmbeddedView(
15this /*Activity context*/,
16linkTokenConfiguration,
17linkAccountToPlaid) {
18exit: LinkExit -> /* handle LinkExit (from Embedded View) */
19  }
20)
21
22// Add this embeddedView to a view in your layout
23binding.embeddedViewContainer.addView(embeddedView)

1<div id="plaid-embedded-link-container"></div>

1// The container at `#plaid-embedded-link-container` will need to be sized in order to
2// control the size of the embedded Plaid module
3const embeddedLinkOpenTarget = document.querySelector('#plaid-embedded-link-container');
4
5Plaid.createEmbedded(
6    {
7      token: 'GENERATED_LINK_TOKEN',
8      onSuccess: (public_token, metadata) => {},
9      onLoad: () => {},
10      onExit: (err, metadata) => {},
11      onEvent: (eventName, metadata) => {},
12    },
13    embeddedLinkOpenTarget,
14);

1import React, { useCallback } from 'react';
2import { PlaidEmbeddedLink } from 'react-plaid-link';
3
4const App = props => {
5  const onSuccess = useCallback(
6    (token, metadata) => console.log('onSuccess', token, metadata),
7    []
8  );
9
10  const onEvent = useCallback(
11    (eventName, metadata) => console.log('onEvent', eventName, metadata),
12    []
13  );
14
15  const onExit = useCallback(
16    (err, metadata) => console.log('onExit', err, metadata),
17    []
18  );
19
20  const config = {
21    token: "plaid-token-123",
22    onSuccess,
23    onEvent,
24    onExit,
25  };
26
27  return (
28    <PlaidEmbeddedLink
29      {...config}
30      style={{
31        height: '350px',
32        width: '350px',
33      }}
34    />
35  );
36};
37
38export default App;

Embedded Institution Search cannot be used in update mode; to update a user's Item, launch a regular update mode session instead.

You can customize the Embedded Institution Search user experience to match your application's needs.

The embedded Link module will responsively scale to display between four and fifteen institutions, depending on the height and width of the module.

On the web, the embedded Plaid module will attempt to use 100% of the height and width of its container. To modify the size of the Plaid module, or to render the Plaid module responsively, you should set the size of the container. We recommend using the largest container that will comfortably fit in your UI, with a minimum width of 240px. The larger the container, the more institution logos will be shown. A user seeing their institution's logo on the embedded Link screen has been shown to increase adoption of pay-by-bank.

You can optionally display a success state in the embedded Link module after the user has successfully connected their account. This success state will replace the Embedded Institution Search view with a visualization of the linked account. To enable this feature, talk to your Plaid account manager.

The institutions displayed in Link Embedded Search are based on your Institution Select settings, which you can optionally customize in the Dashboard. For most customers, it is recommended to use the default settings.

Embedded Institution Search is compatible with the Institution Select Shortcut: If you already know which institution the user wants to connect to before initializing Link, you can pass routing_number into the institution_data request field in the /link/token/create endpoint. The matched institution will be listed first (top left position) in the embedded institution grid.

The Embedded Institution Search experience can be further optimized for users who have already connected a financial account with Plaid.

When a user's device is recognized or the phone number is provided via /link/token/create, Plaid will check to see if they are a returning user. If they are detected as a returning user, Plaid Link will run a security check on the session in the background. If this check passes, the user will be shown a list of previously connected accounts in the embedded module.

The user can then verify the phone number using a one-time password and complete the account linking if the previously linked institutions do not require re-authentication. For more details on the returning user flow, see Returning user experience.

In order to test the returning user experience in Embedded Institution Search, use the phone numbers listed in Testing returning user experience in Sandbox.

User chooses an institution directly from embedded search

• onEvent: OPEN – view_name: "CONSENT"
• onEvent: SELECT_INSTITUTION
• onEvent: TRANSITION_VIEW – view_name: "CONSENT"
• onEvent: TRANSITION_VIEW – view_name: "CREDENTIAL" or "OAUTH" - user selects Continue on the ConsentPane

See Increasing pay-by-bank adoption for recommendations on displaying Embedded Institution Search within your app for pay-by-bank use cases.