[TIL] Node: specifying the versions a package works on

March 5, 2022·1 min readnode, npm

TIL about configuration engines in package.json, which can be used as a best-practice for explicitly specifying under what versions of node and npm a package can be installed:

  "engines": {
    "node": ">= 6.0.0",
    "npm": ">= 3.0.0"
  },

Note:

• This applies only to packages and is related to the moment a package is installed with npm install as package (e.g., from one directory up), and not npm install inside a project (which installs the dependencies of the project).

See:

• package.json - npm documentation
• The package.json guide - Node documentation
• package.json: engines & engineStrict - and how to use them - Marcus Hammarberg