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

# Kafka Target

The Kafka Target Connector defines the Apache Kafka cluster where your pipelines write output events, enabling Kafka-to-Kafka replication through Popsink. Use it to relay, fan out, or bridge event streams between clusters — for example from an on-premises cluster to a cloud-managed one — while applying Popsink transformations in between. This target only stores the broker connection and authentication for the sink cluster: source topics and consumer groups are configured on the Kafka source connector and on your subscriptions.

## Table of Contents

1. [Compatible versions](#compatible-versions)
2. [Key Features](#key-features)
3. [Prerequisites](#prerequisites)
4. [Configuration](#configuration)
5. [Security Protocols](#security-protocols)

## Compatible versions

| | |
| - | - |
| **Apache Kafka** | 2.1 and later, including 3.x and 4.x |
| **Compatible platforms** | Confluent Platform & Confluent Cloud, Amazon MSK, Aiven for Apache Kafka, Redpanda, Azure Event Hubs (Kafka endpoint, Standard tier or higher) |
| **Protocol** | Kafka wire protocol over `PLAINTEXT`, `SSL`, `SASL_PLAINTEXT`, or `SASL_SSL` |

<Note>Brokers older than 2.1 are not supported — the client negotiates API versions with the cluster and no longer implements the pre-2.1 protocol.</Note>

## Key Features

* **Kafka-to-Kafka pipelines:** bridge event streams between clusters with Popsink transformations applied in flight.
* **Broad authentication support:** PLAINTEXT, SSL, and SASL (PLAIN, SCRAM-SHA-256, SCRAM-SHA-512, OAUTHBEARER, GSSAPI).
* **Topic passthrough:** output topic names follow your subscription configuration — no renaming is imposed by the target.

## Prerequisites

* A reachable Kafka cluster to use as the sink.
* Credentials with permission to **produce** to the target topics (and to create them, if they don't pre-exist and auto-creation is disabled on the cluster).

## Configuration

| Field | Required | Description |
| - | - | - |
| **Bootstrap Servers** | Yes | Comma-separated `host:port` pairs for the target cluster (e.g. `kafka1.example.com:9092,kafka2.example.com:9092`) |
| **Security Protocol** | Yes | `PLAINTEXT`, `SSL`, `SASL_PLAINTEXT`, or `SASL_SSL` |
| **SASL Mechanism** | With SASL | `PLAIN`, `SCRAM-SHA-256`, `SCRAM-SHA-512`, `OAUTHBEARER`, or `GSSAPI` |
| **SASL Username / Password** | With SASL | Credentials for the chosen SASL mechanism |

## Security Protocols

| Protocol | Encryption | Authentication |
| - | - | - |
| `PLAINTEXT` | None | None — development only |
| `SSL` | TLS | TLS client certificates (optional) |
| `SASL_PLAINTEXT` | None | SASL |
| `SASL_SSL` | TLS | SASL — recommended for production |


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