How to install an npm package from GitHub directly

Asked 7/7, 2013 at 5:55 Answered 5/1 at 12:43

Solved github npm npm-install node-modules

1221

Trying to install modules from GitHub results in this error:

ENOENT error on package.json.

Easily reproduced using express:

npm install https://github.com/visionmedia/express throws error.

npm install express works.

Why can't I install from GitHub?

Here is the console output:

npm http GET https://github.com/visionmedia/express.git
npm http 200 https://github.com/visionmedia/express.git
npm ERR! not a package /home/guym/tmp/npm-32312/1373176518024-0.6586997057311237/tmp.tgz
npm ERR! Error: ENOENT, open '/home/guym/tmp/npm-32312/1373176518024-0.6586997057311237/package/package.json'
npm ERR! If you need help, you may report this log at:
npm ERR!     <http://github.com/isaacs/npm/issues>
npm ERR! or email it to:
npm ERR!     <[email protected]>

npm ERR! System Linux 3.8.0-23-generic
npm ERR! command "/usr/bin/node" "/usr/bin/npm" "install" "https://github.com/visionmedia/express.git"
npm ERR! cwd /home/guym/dev_env/projects_GIT/proj/somename
npm ERR! node -v v0.10.10
npm ERR! npm -v 1.2.25
npm ERR! path /home/guym/tmp/npm-32312/1373176518024-0.6586997057311237/package/package.json
npm ERR! code ENOENT
npm ERR! errno 34
npm ERR!
npm ERR! Additional logging details can be found in:
npm ERR!     /home/guym/dev_env/projects_GIT/proj/somename/npm-debug.log
npm ERR! not ok code 0

Oran answered 7/7, 2013 at 5:55 Comment(3)

Can anyone give the package.json devDependencies format? – Lard 17/9, 2016 at 18:47

@Lard you can add "express": "github:visionmedia/express" to the "dependencies" section of package.json file, then run: npm install (as mentioned below) – Vaughan 5/1, 2018 at 1:48

@danny, that doesn't work for me. i wonder if there was a dist folder in that express repo to enable it. – Lexicography 11/1, 2018 at 17:14

1558

Because https://github.com/visionmedia/express is the URL of a web page and not an npm module. Use this flavor: git+{url}.git

git+https://github.com/visionmedia/express.git

or this flavor if you need SSH:

git+ssh://[email protected]/visionmedia/express.git

or if you need to install a GitHub Enterprise repository:

git+https://<github enterprise url>/<org>/<repo>.git#<branch>

Cummings answered 7/7, 2013 at 6:19 Comment(17)

You can also use git+https://github.com/visionmedia/express.git to use https rather than ssh. – Inductor 7/7, 2013 at 10:36

Note that repository you want to install must be a npm module, it must contain a package.json file or else you will get this error: Error: ENOENT, open 'tmp.tgz-unpack/package.json'. – Franciskus 28/7, 2014 at 14:18

what if I want a specific branch – Lablab 22/10, 2014 at 20:21

Only solution I think of for now is to specify a commit with .../express.git#commit – Zoophilous 8/12, 2014 at 18:23

Worth saying that you might need to escape the # to use a specific branch from the shell, i.e.: npm install git+https://github.com/user/repo.git\#branch – Tirade 7/7, 2015 at 13:57

otherwise it uses master? – Metallo 3/8, 2015 at 20:37

I can't install anything whatsoever from publics repos using the URL structure. I've tried all the formats above. Any ideas? Permission denied (publickey). npm ERR! fatal: Could not read from remote repository. – Eleonoreleonora 12/12, 2015 at 14:55

@Eleonoreleonora troubleshoot your github ssh details according to their docs which include commands you can run to get more clues as to the problem: help.github.com/articles/error-permission-denied-publickey – Cummings 12/12, 2015 at 17:20

@Eleonoreleonora You apparently can't clone other people's repos using ssh unless your public key is added to the project. Use https instead. – Passade 15/12, 2015 at 12:0

How do you require such a module after installing it... the module ends up in a heirarchy like this @githubname/reponame... and I've tried all sort of combinations which gives me Error: Can't find module – Fallonfallout 21/6, 2016 at 9:33

You require it just by its base name the same as if it were from npm: const reponame = require('reponame'). On disk the module does NOT end up in a directory matching the github username, they all just go in a flat list directly in node_modules. – Cummings 21/6, 2016 at 13:52

Note: unlike the normal github clone-url (suggested in the browser ui), you do need the git@ also for the https variant... thus → npm install --save git+https://[email protected]:jakwuh/di-loader.git – Apatetic 8/5, 2017 at 8:52

@OhenepeePeps it may be that your npm package requires a build step (i.e. npm run build) in order to generate binaries/package files (or if not a build file that generates binaries, some other post-installation step to build artefacts not in the git source repository) it is likely that the requiring module cannot find those artefacts that are not installed/created from the original npm install. – Wolbrom 17/9, 2017 at 12:19

sadly this does not work with 'npm config proxy' configuration. So behind a proxy you are not able to install from github – Interweave 19/9, 2017 at 9:8

I've used this with self-hosted Gitea as well. For me it only worked using the git+ssh: scheme and a tagged release slug following .git#. Repo must also have a package manifest. – Aril 12/2, 2019 at 13:58

How do you specify a specific version? – Moth 22/2, 2022 at 14:58

How do you do such a build step @lol? – Nordau 5/8, 2022 at 12:20

846

To install from GitHub, you can also do

npm install visionmedia/express

npm install visionmedia/express#branch

There is also support for installing directly from a Gist, Bitbucket, GitLab, and a number of other specialized formats. Look at the npm install documentation for them all.

Stillness answered 20/2, 2014 at 20:15 Comment(14)

What, without specifying URL? How does npm know which flavor hosting service you're using? – Devoirs 8/9, 2014 at 15:39

@Jake Rayson: it's possible since version 1.1.65 and works for github.com only. – Pittman 30/9, 2014 at 13:3

Didn't work for me on Windows - it just tried to install from a subfolder of my current directory. – Cholera 4/12, 2014 at 22:54

Note this doesn't work on global installs (i.e. npm i repo/pkg -g) as of npm 1.4.28 – Chophouse 23/5, 2015 at 15:16

@Chophouse Global installs seem to be working in npm 3.3.8. – Fence 23/10, 2015 at 7:34

Note that you need a package.json file in there. – Pegmatite 28/10, 2015 at 17:33

this shorthand syntax appears to use https. is that intended? – Marney 25/8, 2016 at 23:25

@JakeRayson it works because npm converts it to github:user/project#branch, I added the --save option and that's what it produced. It defaults to github appently. – Endorse 14/9, 2017 at 19:43

@Chophouse This now seems to work for global installs. At least did for me. – Gaddy 23/3, 2019 at 14:29

Doesn't work for me - npm just hands. I'm on Windows with npm version 6.10.2 – Schreck 16/8, 2019 at 16:26

Note that these packages will never be updated automatically. Though it is possible to use a semver version number instead of the branch name if there's a matching release in the repo, wildcards like ^ won't work. – Beckwith 13/12, 2019 at 10:58

How do you update a package that's been installed this way? – Glum 12/2, 2021 at 22:1

Is there a way to do this so I can edit the node package source code, commit and push my edits and still have node automatically build the library as part of the parent project? – Hypocotyl 17/6, 2022 at 19:33

I attempted this and was prompted to sign in... – Actinic 16/12, 2023 at 17:57

222

If Git is not installed, we can try:

npm install --save https://github.com/Amitesh/gulp-rev-all/tarball/master

Strive answered 7/9, 2015 at 10:15 Comment(6)

You can also use tag names in place of master. Probably safer to do it that way. – Ranchman 14/1, 2016 at 19:30

Yes. It will be more safer. Thank you to bring this in focus. – Strive 15/1, 2016 at 4:27

Nice for when you are working with branches, you should modify your answer to include a general format answer, i didn't notice the /tarball/ at first – Sanmiguel 11/4, 2016 at 4:46

This is the only answer which worked for me when installing a dependency from within a Docker container. – Discourteous 18/4, 2019 at 13:6

This is also perfect for not requiring the entire repo to be downloaded. Thanks! – Banka 4/2, 2020 at 12:54

This is a method which instead of installing compiled artifacts, installs the source code for the repo. Depends on what you need, but this was exactly what I wanted. Thanks! – Talley 4/1 at 14:25

As of September 2016, installing from vanilla HTTPS GitHub URLs now works:

npm install https://github.com/fergiemcdowall/search-index.git

You can't do this for all modules because you are reading from a source control system, which may well contain invalid/uncompiled/buggy code. So to be clear (although it should go without saying): given that the code in the repository is in an npm-usable state, you can now quite happily install directly from GitHub.

In October 2019, we are now living through "peak TypeScript/React/Babel", and therefore JavaScript compilation has become quite common. If you need to take compilation into account, look into prepare. That said, NPM modules do not need to be compiled, and it is wise to assume that compilation is not the default, especially for older node modules (and possibly also for very new, bleeding-edge "ESNext"-y ones).

Vaginate answered 14/9, 2016 at 12:7 Comment(13)

@DanDascalescu could you be more specific? The relevance of that link is unclear in this context. – Vaginate 18/10, 2016 at 10:30

You can't install any npm package you want from its GitHub source, unless the repo includes a dist folder, and most don't. The issue I linked to is an npm bug - the prebuild step is not run when installing from GitHub. As an example, try installing node-influx/node-influx. – Cyst 18/10, 2016 at 18:31

Repos without dist folders CAN be installed from GitHub, for example: npm install https://github.com/fergiemcdowall/search-index-adder works perfectly. – Vaginate 19/10, 2016 at 8:50

Right, because you have the directly usabel source in /lib (as if you had a dist folder). My point is that just including the GitHub URL of a repo in package.jons isn't guaranteed to work for installing that repo. Modules written in TypeScript, for example, need push their transpiled code into the repo. They typically don't do this, but rather use a prepublish script to dump the .JS code into a dist folder, which gets uploaded to npmjs.com. – Cyst 19/10, 2016 at 10:30

All npm modules should have an entry-point that is a javascript file defined by main in package.json. So yes, if that is not set up correctly, then the module wont work as intended, but that is a separate issue, and I think we are getting into the weeds here. Or am I totally missing something? – Vaginate 19/10, 2016 at 11:9

I know this is a bit late, but the trick is actually npm does not have a 1-to-1 mapping to Git repositories. Some projects build their source files before publishing rather than before committing, meaning they are NOT in the Git repo, but would be in the npm package - projects doing this will not work right from Git. Another example of how this can fail is macro repositories - Babel's GitHub project, for example, includes hundreds of individual npm packages in subfolders. They can be published individually because npm does not map directly to Git. npm publishes whatever is in your directory. – Cadastre 10/1, 2017 at 19:3

Yes, of course: when installing directly from GitHub, the cloned module has to be in a useable state. – Vaginate 11/1, 2017 at 11:10

Note that in NPM 5 this "little bit broken": it fixes your GitHub package commit hash, so now there are no difference between using a package published on NPM vs GitHub. We were using GitHub packages for development but @rebecca-turner seems to break that now :-( – Ns 27/7, 2017 at 18:18

For anyone who stumbles upon this later... As of npm5, npm will run any prepare script for bare "installs", which includes git deps. Which means the above comments around compilation and dist folders is out of date. Any package that properly sets their compilation to run on prepare will work just fine as a git dep without committing any compiled assets into git. – Sanctimony 10/11, 2017 at 5:37

Thats a good point @Sanctimony but it bears repeating that a node module doesn't have to be compiled- it can be plain old vanilla boring js, and structured in anyway the author sees fit SO LONG AS THE ENTRY POINT IS CORRECTLY DEFINED IN main. – Vaginate 14/11, 2017 at 11:22

@Vaginate A huge number of npm packages rely on a build step to produce code that is usable by a consuming app/library, so yes, the prepare script is a very important addition that allows equivalent behavior to the prepublish script for installs via git (as mentioned in my answer from July 2017). – Fillian 25/6, 2019 at 7:0

@Fillian Yes prepare is very nice. Compile modules that need to be compiled. Don't compile modules that don't need to be compiled. Avoid assumptions about the need for compilation. – Vaginate 25/6, 2019 at 7:48

@DanDascalescu prepare is the correct way. If the repo is setup correctly it will generate missing dist/ files. Just watch out when using .gitignore as it can seem broken. #48288276 – Fauces 12/5, 2021 at 17:52

The methods are covered pretty well now in npm's install documentation as well as the numerous other answers here.

npm install git+ssh://[email protected]:<githubname>/<githubrepo.git[#<commit-ish>]
npm install git+ssh://[email protected]:<githubname>/<githubrepo.git>[#semver:^x.x]
npm install git+https://[email protected]/<githubname>/<githubrepo.git>
npm install git://github.com/<githubname>/<githubrepo.git>
npm install github:<githubname>/<githubrepo>[#<commit-ish>]

However, something notable that has changed recently is npm adding the prepare script to replace the prepublish script. This fixes a long-standing problem where modules installed via Git did not run the prepublish script and thus did not complete the build steps that occur when a module is published to the npm registry. See Run prepublish for Git URL packages #3055.

Of course, the module authors will need to update their package.json file to use the new prepare directive for this to start working.

Fillian answered 18/7, 2017 at 2:47 Comment(4)

Watch out for issues with .gitignore files! #48288276 – Fauces 12/5, 2021 at 17:53

Note that the git:// protocol is no longer supported (it was when this answer was written) – Unbecoming 2/11, 2021 at 19:17

This answer is excessive here and duplicates the previous answers. – Haemic 19/8, 2023 at 17:17

@SergeyNevmerzhitsky I wrote this answer 6 years ago and was the first to mention npm's prepare script addition in the context of installing directly from a github repo. Not sure what's excessive about including the basic install commands, links to various documentation, and very specific info about the prepare directive. – Fillian 22/8, 2023 at 4:25

There's also npm install https://github.com/{USER}/{REPO}/tarball/{BRANCH} to use a different branch.

Tsui answered 18/5, 2016 at 9:38 Comment(4)

I ran into this issue...github.com/yarnpkg/yarn/issues/2738 I was able to change the registry to the github tarball registry and it worked.. Thanks! – Funky 17/7, 2017 at 21:51

This resolved some major performance issues for me. Using {USER}/{REPO}.git#{BRANCH} was very slow. – Amylene 22/10, 2017 at 12:35

THIS ^^^^ is what I'd been looking for. My library relies on a build step and didn't have a prepare script. I was just trying to install a branch of the whole repo in a test repo, but since the built code wasn't checked into GitHub, all that got installed was package.json and the readme. This tarball approach using the full URL installed all the source files, which is what I needed. – Misunderstood 20/9, 2020 at 23:14

@Misunderstood You do not need to check your compiled code into git to use the prepare method! You just need to watch out for issues from also including a .gitignore: #48288276 – Fauces 12/5, 2021 at 17:58

The current top answer by Peter Lyons is not relevant with recent NPM versions. For example, using the same command that was criticized in this answer is now fine.

npm install https://github.com/visionmedia/express

If you have continued problems it might be a problem with whatever package you were using.

Hetaera answered 2/5, 2016 at 16:8 Comment(1)

It also redirects to github.com/expressjs/express automatically now when you use this command :) – Hetaera 2/5, 2016 at 16:10

This works for me and it is less typing.

npm i github:<UserName>/<RepoName>

package.json

{
    "dependencies": {
        "name": "github:<UserName>/<RepoName>"
    }
}

Lamonica answered 9/10, 2021 at 2:31 Comment(3)

This way is baller! – Reich 20/1, 2022 at 1:20

This works with yarn. – Gabey 29/3, 2022 at 11:19

This also works with pnpm. Great. – Dietsche 7/9, 2023 at 7:36

The general form of the syntax is

<protocol>://[<user>[:<password>]@]<hostname>[:<port>][:][/]<path>[#<commit-ish> | #semver:<semver>]

which means for your case it will be

npm install git+ssh://[email protected]/visionmedia/express.git

From npmjs docs:

npm install :

Installs the package from the hosted git provider, cloning it with git. For a full git remote url, only that URL will be attempted.
<protocol>://[<user>[:<password>]@]<hostname>[:<port>][:][/]<path>[#<commit-ish>
| #semver:] is one of git, git+ssh, git+http, git+https, or git+file.

If # is provided, it will be used to clone exactly that commit. If the commit-ish has the format #semver:, can be any valid semver range or exact version, and npm will look for any tags or refs matching that range in the remote repository, much as it would for a registry dependency. If neither # or

semver: is specified, then master is used.

If the repository makes use of submodules, those submodules will be cloned as well.

If the package being installed contains a prepare script, its dependencies and devDependencies will be installed, and the prepare script will be run, before the package is packaged and installed.

The following git environment variables are recognized by npm and will be added to the environment when running git:

GIT_ASKPASS

GIT_EXEC_PATH

GIT_PROXY_COMMAND

GIT_SSH

GIT_SSH_COMMAND

GIT_SSL_CAINFO GIT_SSL_NO_VERIFY

See the git man page for details.

Examples:
npm install git+ssh://[email protected]:npm/npm.git#v1.0.27
npm install git+ssh://[email protected]:npm/npm#semver:^5.0
npm install git+https://[email protected]/npm/npm.git
npm install git://github.com/npm/npm.git#v1.0.27
GIT_SSH_COMMAND='ssh -i ~/.ssh/custom_ident' npm install git+ssh://[email protected]:npm/npm.git npm install

Herbart answered 6/8, 2017 at 0:12 Comment(0)

You can do:

npm install git://github.com/foo/bar.git

Or in package.json:

"dependencies": {
  "bar": "git://github.com/foo/bar.git"
}

Lina answered 26/1, 2017 at 0:6 Comment(0)

Install it directly:

npm install visionmedia/express

Alternatively, you can add "express": "github:visionmedia/express" to the "dependencies" section of package.json file, then run:

npm install

Jamie answered 6/7, 2016 at 5:19 Comment(0)

Sometimes I need to install from a specific branch or commit. To make things simple I just use https://gitpkg.vercel.app/

Amiens answered 13/4, 2022 at 10:47 Comment(0)

You could also do

npm i alex-cory/fasthacks

npm i github:alex-cory/fasthacks

Basically:

npm i user_or_org/repo_name

Jaret answered 7/6, 2016 at 21:54 Comment(0)

You can directly install a GitHub repository by the npm install command, like this:

npm install https://github.com/futurechallenger/npm_git_install.git --save

NOTE: In the repository which will be installed by npm command:

maybe you have to have a dist folder in you repository, according to Dan Dascalescu's comment.
You definitely have to have a package.json in your repository! Which I forget add.

Mackie answered 7/3, 2017 at 3:5 Comment(1)

You do not need a dist folder or any build code in your repo. You just need to use a prepare script in package.json. – Fauces 25/2, 2020 at 9:3

Simple:

npm install *GithubUrl*.git --save

Example:

npm install https://github.com/visionmedia/express.git --save

Creasy answered 8/7, 2019 at 7:40 Comment(0)

Below piece of code worked for me to install from github repository:

npm install git+ssh://<your_repository_ssh_clone_link>#<branch_name_if_any>

You can get ssh clone link as below:

So for above screenshot repository, you may need to import as below,

npm install git+ssh://[email protected]:Siddhu2/calculator-chatbot.git#master

where master is my branch and it is optional since I have only one branch.

Drucie answered 10/10, 2021 at 15:40 Comment(0)

No need to do much; this helped me:

Yarn add <git_name>:<github_name>/<Repository_name>.git

Example:

yarn add [email protected]:myGitHub/dynamic-checkbox-input.git

And if you want to add some specific commit or branch name then add #.

Example:

yarn add [email protected]:myGitHub/dynamic-checkbox-input.git#master

Example:

yarn add [email protected]:myGitHub/dynamic-checkbox-input.git#c978U57

Tadzhik answered 29/4, 2022 at 8:27 Comment(0)

I tried npm install git+https://github.com/visionmedia/express but that took way too long and I wasn't sure that would work.

What did work for me was - yarn add git+https://github.com/visionmedia/express.

Tchad answered 21/8, 2019 at 10:36 Comment(0)

If you get something like this:

npm ERR! enoent undefined ls-remote -h -t https://github.com/some_repo/repo.git

Make sure you update to the latest npm and that you have permissions as well.

Mcmath answered 24/2, 2021 at 17:1 Comment(0)

The only command that worked for me was npm i MY_PACKAGE_NAME:MY_REPOSITORY#BRANCH_NAME

Privateer answered 14/12, 2021 at 20:54 Comment(0)

Consider one final resolution that could prove beneficial.

If you encounter difficulties, it's possible that an incorrect package URL is present in the package.json under dependencies or devDependencies.

Remove any such entries and attempt the operation again. For an improved troubleshooting experience, temporarily remove both dependencies and devDependencies and then retry:

npm i git+https://github.com/visionmedia/express.git

Estoppel answered 18/12, 2023 at 10:33 Comment(0)

Yarn 2 requires the package name along with the Github repository. Read the documentation of Yarn's CLI.

Example: yarn add <package_name>[email protected]:<owner_name>/<package_name>.git

Ostosis answered 22/1, 2023 at 19:42 Comment(0)

Can also update your packages.json as:

"dependencies": {
    ...
    "express": "github:visionmedia/express",
    ...
}

Then execute npm update or pnpm update if you have pnpm installed.

Bibliotheca answered 5/1 at 12:43 Comment(0)

-4

Try this command:

 npm install github:[Organisation]/[Repository]#[master/BranchName] -g

This command worked for me:

 npm install github:BlessCSS/bless#3.x -g

Aligarh answered 11/7, 2016 at 10:33 Comment(2)

The version is the tag / branch name or the package.json version ? – Deluxe 25/8, 2016 at 13:56

Why two commands? Should both be used (in that order). Or only one or the other? This is not clear. Can you elaborate? Please respond by editing (changing) your answer, not here in comments (without "Edit:", "Update:", or similar - the answer should appear as if it was written today). – Hornswoggle 18/7, 2021 at 21:55

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