Building and testing Node.js

You can create a continuous integration (CI) workflow to build and test your Node.js project.

In this article

Introduction

This guide shows you how to create a continuous integration (CI) workflow that builds and tests Node.js code. If your CI tests pass, you may want to deploy your code or publish a package.

Prerequisites

We recommend that you have a basic understanding of Node.js, YAML, workflow configuration options, and how to create a workflow file. For more information, see:

Using a Node.js workflow template

To get started quickly, add a workflow template to the .github/workflows directory of your repository.

GitHub provides a workflow template for Node.js that should work for most Node.js projects. The subsequent sections of this guide give examples of how you can customize this workflow template.

  1. On GitHub, navigate to the main page of the repository.

  2. Under your repository name, click Actions.

    Screenshot of the tabs for the "github/docs" repository. The "Actions" tab is highlighted with an orange outline.

  3. If you already have a workflow in your repository, click New workflow.

  4. The "Choose a workflow" page shows a selection of recommended workflow templates. Search for "Node.js".

  5. Filter the selection of workflows by clicking Continuous integration.

  6. On the "Node.js" workflow, click Configure.

  7. Edit the workflow as required. For example, change the Node versions you want to use.

  8. Click Commit changes.

    The node.js.yml workflow file is added to the .github/workflows directory of your repository.

Specifying the Node.js version

The easiest way to specify a Node.js version is by using the setup-node action provided by GitHub. For more information see, setup-node.

The setup-node action takes a Node.js version as an input and configures that version on the runner. The setup-node action finds a specific version of Node.js from the tools cache on each runner and adds the necessary binaries to PATH, which persists for the rest of the job. Using the setup-node action is the recommended way of using Node.js with GitHub Actions because it ensures consistent behavior across different runners and different versions of Node.js. If you are using a self-hosted runner, you must install Node.js and add it to PATH.

The workflow template includes a matrix strategy that builds and tests your code with the Node.js versions listed in node-version. The 'x' in the version number is a wildcard character that matches the latest minor and patch release available for a version. Each version of Node.js specified in the node-version array creates a job that runs the same steps.

Each job can access the value defined in the matrix node-version array using the matrix context. The setup-node action uses the context as the node-version input. The setup-node action configures each job with a different Node.js version before building and testing code. For more information about matrix strategies and contexts, see Workflow syntax for GitHub Actions and Accessing contextual information about workflow runs.

YAML
strategy:
  matrix:
    node-version: ['18.x', '20.x']

steps:
- uses: actions/checkout@v4
- name: Use Node.js ${{ matrix.node-version }}
  uses: actions/setup-node@v4
  with:
    node-version: ${{ matrix.node-version }}

Alternatively, you can build and test with exact Node.js versions.

YAML
strategy:
  matrix:
    node-version: ['10.17.0', '17.9.0']

Or, you can build and test using a single version of Node.js too.

YAML
name: Node.js CI

on: [push]

jobs:
  build:

    runs-on: ubuntu-latest

    steps:
      - uses: actions/checkout@v4
      - name: Use Node.js
        uses: actions/setup-node@v4
        with:
          node-version: '20.x'
      - run: npm ci
      - run: npm run build --if-present
      - run: npm test

If you don't specify a Node.js version, GitHub uses the environment's default Node.js version. For more information, see Using GitHub-hosted runners.

Installing dependencies

GitHub-hosted runners have npm and Yarn dependency managers installed. You can use npm and Yarn to install dependencies in your workflow before building and testing your code. The Windows and Linux GitHub-hosted runners also have Grunt, Gulp, and Bower installed.

You can also cache dependencies to speed up your workflow. For more information, see Caching dependencies to speed up workflows.

Example using npm

This example installs the versions in the package-lock.json or npm-shrinkwrap.json file and prevents updates to the lock file. Using npm ci is generally faster than running npm install. For more information, see npm ci and Introducing npm ci for faster, more reliable builds.

YAML
steps:
- uses: actions/checkout@v4
- name: Use Node.js
  uses: actions/setup-node@v4
  with:
    node-version: '20.x'
- name: Install dependencies
  run: npm ci

Using npm install installs the dependencies defined in the package.json file. For more information, see npm install.

YAML
steps:
- uses: actions/checkout@v4
- name: Use Node.js
  uses: actions/setup-node@v4
  with:
    node-version: '20.x'
- name: Install dependencies
  run: npm install

Example using Yarn

This example installs the dependencies defined in the yarn.lock file and prevents updates to the yarn.lock file. For more information, see yarn install.

YAML
steps:
- uses: actions/checkout@v4
- name: Use Node.js
  uses: actions/setup-node@v4
  with:
    node-version: '20.x'
- name: Install dependencies
  run: yarn --frozen-lockfile

Alternatively, you can install the dependencies defined in the package.json file.

YAML
steps:
- uses: actions/checkout@v4
- name: Use Node.js
  uses: actions/setup-node@v4
  with:
    node-version: '20.x'
- name: Install dependencies
  run: yarn

Example using a private registry and creating the .npmrc file

You can use the setup-node action to create a local .npmrc file on the runner that configures the default registry and scope. The setup-node action also accepts an authentication token as input, used to access private registries or publish node packages. For more information, see setup-node.

To authenticate to your private registry, you'll need to store your npm authentication token as a secret. For example, create a repository secret called NPM_TOKEN. For more information, see Using secrets in GitHub Actions.

In the example below, the secret NPM_TOKEN stores the npm authentication token. The setup-node action configures the .npmrc file to read the npm authentication token from the NODE_AUTH_TOKEN environment variable. When using the setup-node action to create an .npmrc file, you must set the NODE_AUTH_TOKEN environment variable with the secret that contains your npm authentication token.

Before installing dependencies, use the setup-node action to create the .npmrc file. The action has two input parameters. The node-version parameter sets the Node.js version, and the registry-url parameter sets the default registry. If your package registry uses scopes, you must use the scope parameter. For more information, see npm-scope.

YAML
steps:
- uses: actions/checkout@v4
- name: Use Node.js
  uses: actions/setup-node@v4
  with:
    always-auth: true
    node-version: '20.x'
    registry-url: https://registry.npmjs.org
    scope: '@octocat'
- name: Install dependencies
  run: npm ci
  env:
    NODE_AUTH_TOKEN: ${{ secrets.NPM_TOKEN }}

The example above creates an .npmrc file with the following contents:

//registry.npmjs.org/:_authToken=${NODE_AUTH_TOKEN}
@octocat:registry=https://registry.npmjs.org/
always-auth=true

Example caching dependencies

You can cache and restore the dependencies using the setup-node action.

The following example caches dependencies for npm.

YAML
steps:
- uses: actions/checkout@v4
- uses: actions/setup-node@v4
  with:
    node-version: '20'
    cache: 'npm'
- run: npm install
- run: npm test

The following example caches dependencies for Yarn.

YAML
steps:
- uses: actions/checkout@v4
- uses: actions/setup-node@v4
  with:
    node-version: '20'
    cache: 'yarn'
- run: yarn
- run: yarn test

The following example caches dependencies for pnpm (v6.10+).

YAML
# This workflow uses actions that are not certified by GitHub.
# They are provided by a third-party and are governed by
# separate terms of service, privacy policy, and support
# documentation.

# NOTE: pnpm caching support requires pnpm version >= 6.10.0

steps:
- uses: actions/checkout@v4
- uses: pnpm/action-setup@0609f0983b7a228f052f81ef4c3d6510cae254ad
  with:
    version: 6.10.0
- uses: actions/setup-node@v4
  with:
    node-version: '20'
    cache: 'pnpm'
- run: pnpm install
- run: pnpm test

If you have a custom requirement or need finer controls for caching, you can use the cache action. For more information, see Caching dependencies to speed up workflows.

Building and testing your code

You can use the same commands that you use locally to build and test your code. For example, if you run npm run build to run build steps defined in your package.json file and npm test to run your test suite, you would add those commands in your workflow file.

YAML
steps:
- uses: actions/checkout@v4
- name: Use Node.js
  uses: actions/setup-node@v4
  with:
    node-version: '20.x'
- run: npm install
- run: npm run build --if-present
- run: npm test

Packaging workflow data as artifacts

You can save artifacts from your build and test steps to view after a job completes. For example, you may need to save log files, core dumps, test results, or screenshots. For more information, see Storing and sharing data from a workflow.

Publishing to package registries

You can configure your workflow to publish your Node.js package to a package registry after your CI tests pass. For more information about publishing to npm and GitHub Packages, see Publishing Node.js packages.