install node/npm with nvm

 

Installing and Updating

Install & Update Script

To install or update nvm, you should run the install script. To do that, you may either download and run the script manually, or use the following cURL or Wget command:

curl -o- https://raw.githubusercontent.com/nvm-sh/nvm/v0.37.2/install.sh | bash

wget -qO- https://raw.githubusercontent.com/nvm-sh/nvm/v0.37.2/install.sh | bash

Running either of the above commands downloads a script and runs it. The script clones the nvm repository to ~/.nvm, and attempts to add the source lines from the snippet below to the correct profile file (~/.bash_profile, ~/.zshrc, ~/.profile, or ~/.bashrc).

export NVM_DIR="$([ -z "${XDG_CONFIG_HOME-}" ] && printf %s "${HOME}/.nvm" || printf %s "${XDG_CONFIG_HOME}/nvm")"
[ -s "$NVM_DIR/nvm.sh" ] && \. "$NVM_DIR/nvm.sh" # This loads nvm

Additional Notes

• If the environment variable $XDG_CONFIG_HOME is present, it will place the nvm files there.

• You can add --no-use to the end of the above script (...nvm.sh --no-use) to postpone using nvm until you manually use it.

• You can customize the install source, directory, profile, and version using the NVM_SOURCE, NVM_DIR, PROFILE, and NODE_VERSION variables. Eg: curl ... | NVM_DIR="path/to/nvm". Ensure that the NVM_DIR does not contain a trailing slash.

• The installer can use git, curl, or wget to download nvm, whichever is available.

Troubleshooting on Linux

On Linux, after running the install script, if you get nvm: command not found or see no feedback from your terminal after you type command -v nvm, simply close your current terminal, open a new terminal, and try verifying again.

Troubleshooting on macOS

Since OS X 10.9, /usr/bin/git has been preset by Xcode command line tools, which means we can't properly detect if Git is installed or not. You need to manually install the Xcode command line tools before running the install script, otherwise, it'll fail. (see #1782)

If you get nvm: command not found after running the install script, one of the following might be the reason:

• Since macOS 10.15, the default shell is zsh and nvm will look for .zshrc to update, none is installed by default. Create one with touch ~/.zshrc and run the install script again.

• If you use bash, the previous default shell, run touch ~/.bash_profile to create the necessary profile file if it does not exist.

• You might need to restart your terminal instance or run . ~/.nvm/nvm.sh. Restarting your terminal/opening a new tab/window, or running the source command will load the command and the new configuration.

If the above doesn't fix the problem, you may try the following:

• If you use bash, it may be that your .bash_profile (or ~/.profile) does not source your ~/.bashrc properly. You could fix this by adding source ~/<your_profile_file> to it or follow the next step below.

• Try adding the snippet from the install section, that finds the correct nvm directory and loads nvm, to your usual profile (~/.bash_profile, ~/.zshrc, ~/.profile, or ~/.bashrc).

• For more information about this issue and possible workarounds, please refer here

Usage

To download, compile, and install the latest release of node, do this:

nvm install node # "node" is an alias for the latest version

To install a specific version of node:

nvm install 6.14.4 # or 10.10.0, 8.9.1, etc

The first version installed becomes the default. New shells will start with the default version of node (e.g., nvm alias default).

You can list available versions using ls-remote:

nvm ls-remote

And then in any new shell just use the installed version:

nvm use node

Or you can just run it:

nvm run node --version

Or, you can run any arbitrary command in a subshell with the desired version of node:

nvm exec 4.2 node --version

You can also get the path to the executable to where it was installed:

nvm which 5.0

In place of a version pointer like "0.10" or "5.0" or "4.2.1", you can use the following special default aliases with nvm install, nvm use, nvm run, nvm exec, nvm which, etc:

• node: this installs the latest version of node
• iojs: this installs the latest version of io.js
• stable: this alias is deprecated, and only truly applies to node v0.12 and earlier. Currently, this is an alias for node.
• unstable: this alias points to node v0.11 - the last "unstable" node release, since post-1.0, all node versions are stable. (in SemVer, versions communicate breakage, not stability).

Long-term Support

Node has a schedule for long-term support (LTS) You can reference LTS versions in aliases and .nvmrc files with the notation lts/* for the latest LTS, and lts/argon for LTS releases from the "argon" line, for example. In addition, the following commands support LTS arguments:

• nvm install --lts / nvm install --lts=argon / nvm install 'lts/*' / nvm install lts/argon
• nvm uninstall --lts / nvm uninstall --lts=argon / nvm uninstall 'lts/*' / nvm uninstall lts/argon
• nvm use --lts / nvm use --lts=argon / nvm use 'lts/*' / nvm use lts/argon
• nvm exec --lts / nvm exec --lts=argon / nvm exec 'lts/*' / nvm exec lts/argon
• nvm run --lts / nvm run --lts=argon / nvm run 'lts/*' / nvm run lts/argon
• nvm ls-remote --lts / nvm ls-remote --lts=argon nvm ls-remote 'lts/*' / nvm ls-remote lts/argon
• nvm version-remote --lts / nvm version-remote --lts=argon / nvm version-remote 'lts/*' / nvm version-remote lts/argon

Any time your local copy of nvm connects to https://nodejs.org, it will re-create the appropriate local aliases for all available LTS lines. These aliases (stored under $NVM_DIR/alias/lts), are managed by nvm, and you should not modify, remove, or create these files - expect your changes to be undone, and expect meddling with these files to cause bugs that will likely not be supported.

To get the latest LTS version of node and migrate your existing installed packages, use

nvm install 'lts/*' --reinstall-packages-from=current