# Test Financial Connections

Learn how to test your integration with simulated Financial Connections accounts.

## Get started using a sandbox

Refer to the [testing](https://docs.stripe.com/testing.md) documentation to learn more about testing your Stripe integration.

To test Financial Connections, follow the relevant [use case guide](https://docs.stripe.com/financial-connections/use-cases.md) using a *sandbox* and its associated test API keys. Accounts and customers that you make in a sandbox are invisible to your live mode integration.

The Financial Connections [authentication flow](https://docs.stripe.com/financial-connections/fundamentals.md#authentication-flow) is subject to change, so we don’t recommend automated client-side testing. Usage of Stripe’s API with sandbox test keys is also strictly [rate limited](https://docs.stripe.com/testing.md#rate-limits), which you must account for in your tests.

## How to use test accounts and institutions

When you provide [Stripe.js](https://docs.stripe.com/js) with a Financial Connections Session token created using sandbox test keys, the [authentication flow](https://docs.stripe.com/financial-connections/fundamentals.md#authentication-flow) exclusively shows a selection of test institutions managed by Stripe. The client can link accounts from any of these institutions without providing credentials.

Features like [balances](https://docs.stripe.com/financial-connections/balances.md), [account ownership](https://docs.stripe.com/financial-connections/ownership.md), and [transactions](https://docs.stripe.com/financial-connections/transactions.md) work the same way as they do in live mode, except they return testing data instead of real account data.

Sandbox *webhooks* are separate from live webhooks. Learn about [testing your webhook integrations](https://docs.stripe.com/webhooks.md#test-webhook).

## Testing different user authentication scenarios

Stripe provides a set of test institutions exercising different success and failure scenarios,
each represented as a bank in the list of featured institutions.

#### Simulating successful authentication

* **Test Institution**: Simulates the user successfully logging into their institution and contains a basic set of test accounts.
* **Test OAuth Institution**: Contains the same test accounts as Test Institution, but instead of authenticating directly with the modal, it opens an OAuth popup for authentication.
* **Ownership Accounts**: Contains test accounts representing different ownership states.
* **Sandbox Bank (OAuth)**: Provides a test institution OAuth popup that allows you to select accounts to link. Sandbox Bank is the most representative of account linking for the majority of live mode institutions.
* **Sandbox Bank (Non-OAuth)**: Provides a Stripe-hosted login form to simulate institutions that don’t support OAuth. Use the following test credentials to proceed:
  - The initial prompt asks for username and password. Entering any input value simulates a successful login.
  - In the password field or any subsequent field, enter `options` (selection from a list), `mfa` (one-time passcode entry), `confirm_mfa` (one-time passcode confirmation), or `security_question` (secret answer entry) to exercise further login prompts.
  - Entering `error` in any field ends the login session; `incorrect` gives you a chance to try again.
* **Invalid Payment Accounts**: Contains test accounts that are unusable for ACH payments.

#### Simulating failed authentication

* **Down Bank (Scheduled)**: The institution’s login API is unavailable for a known time period that the institution communicated to Stripe.
* **Down Bank (Unscheduled)**: The institution’s login API is unavailable without any information about the downtime communicated to Stripe.
* **Down Bank (Error)**: Stripe is experiencing an unknown error communicating with the institution.

We recommend manually testing OAuth and non-OAuth institutions to make sure that both UI flows work within the context your application. See [additional documentation](https://docs.stripe.com/financial-connections/fundamentals.md#how-stripe-links-financial-accounts) about the differences between OAuth and non-OAuth connections.