> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://docs.conduktor.io/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

# Kafka self-service — topic requests and governed access

> Enable dev teams to create Kafka topics and manage access through a governed self-service portal. Conduktor enforces policies, ACLs, and ownership.

Conduktor Self-service lets application teams request Kafka topics and access without going through the platform team for every change. Platform teams set the rules upfront; everything else flows from there.

## How it works

Self-service introduces two roles:

* **Platform teams** — assign application's owner a set of resources and define the governance rules they will be restricted by.
* **Application teams** — create resources within their ownership scope, approve access requests, and subscribe to other teams' topics. Approved requests are applied automatically without platform team intervention for each change.

Topic creation is a direct API call that passes if the request is policy-compliant — no approval workflow needed. Access requests between teams go through the owning application team, not the platform team:

```mermaid theme={null}
flowchart LR
    AT[Application team] -- "create topic (policy-compliant)" --> GW[Gateway / Kafka]
    AT2[Other app team] -- "request access" --> AT
    AT -- "approve" --> GW
```

Every change goes into Git. You get a full history and can review anything before it lands on Kafka.

## Key concepts

| Concept          | Description                                                                                                                                                                                                                   |
| ---------------- | ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| Application      | A logical grouping for a team or service — owns its topics and ACLs                                                                                                                                                           |
| Application team | Group of people interacting with an application's resources, organized into ApplicationGroups with explicit resource and instance permissions (e.g., support team with read access, devOps team with API key creation rights) |
| Access request   | A request for read or write access to a topic owned by another application                                                                                                                                                    |
| Policy           | Rules that constrain what teams can request (e.g., max partitions, naming conventions)                                                                                                                                        |
| Ownership        | Each resource has a declared owner. Access management (requesting and granting) is delegated to ApplicationGroup members with the appropriate instance permissions                                                            |

## Benefits

* **Less bottleneck** — teams don't wait on platform for routine requests
* **Guardrails, not gatekeeping** — policies constrain what can be requested, not who can work
* **Full audit trail** — every change is in Git, reviewable and revertible
* **Explicit ownership** — each resource has a declared owner, so access requests go to the right person
* **Data discovery** — Kafka is made to open access to data. Our data catalog is here for that and exposes topics metadata to add context

<Info>
  **From our blog:** [No Kafka data platform without ownership](https://www.conduktor.io/blog/no-kafka-data-platform-without-ownership) Why ownership is the foundation self-service, autonomy, and scale are built on.
</Info>

## Related resources

* [Use Self-service](/guide/use-cases/self-service)
* [Check out the quick start tutorial](/guide/tutorials/get-started-with-self-service)
* [Start from the Self-service reference template](https://github.com/conduktor/self-service-template) <Icon icon="up-right-from-square" /> — a production-ready GitHub repository layout with CODEOWNERS, scope-based CI/CD workflows, and example ResourcePolicies
* [View resource reference](/guide/reference/self-service-reference)
* [Give us feedback/request a feature](https://conduktor.io/roadmap) <Icon icon="up-right-from-square" />