Funny thing about the terminology, JWT is just one kind of bearer token. The phrase bearer token in the first place simply means that if you have the token, ass

Funny thing about the terminology, JWT is just one kind of bearer token. The phrase bearer token in the first place simply means that if you have the token, assume you are who you say you are. (It's also shorthand for passing in the authorization HTTP request header with type "Bearer: ") If you have an opaque token, then yes, you save nothing and still require a call to a central service.