An unexpected error occurred: "https://registry.yarnpkg.com/react: unable to get local issuer certificate" while create-react-app

Question

I have the following installed on my windows machine:

Node : v12.18.4

yarn : 1.19.1

create-react-app: 3.4.1

I navigated to the folder c:\temp and then tried to create react app using the following command:

c:\temp>create-react-app react-test --scripts-version 1.1.5

On executing the above command I see the following error:

Creating a new React app in C:\Temp\react-test.

Installing packages. This might take a couple of minutes.
Installing react, react-dom, and react-scripts with cra-template...

yarn add v1.19.1
[1/4] Resolving packages...
error An unexpected error occurred: "https://registry.yarnpkg.com/react: unable to get local issuer certificate".
info If you think this is a bug, please open a bug report with the information provided in "C:\\Temp\\react-test\\yarn-error.log".
info Visit https://yarnpkg.com/en/docs/cli/add for documentation about this command.

Aborting installation.
  yarnpkg add --exact react react-dom react-scripts cra-template --cwd C:\Temp\react-test has failed.

Deleting generated file... package.json
Deleting generated file... yarn.lock
Done.

Can anyone help me here by providing their guidance to fix this issue

Enjoin

Answer 1

Turn off the strict-ssl on yarn/npm config, and try again

yarn config set "strict-ssl" false -g

or

npm config set "strict-ssl" false -g

Woolfolk

Yep. That did the trick. Thank you. – Longfaced

Worked for me thank you. – Clingy

This is CERTAINLY not a good move in the manner of security. Registries should have valid certificates. If they are self-signed, the user should manually verify them, or a good registry with valid certificates should be the way. – Suffer

@Suffer What could be the consequences of registries not having valid certificates? Just want to understand the practical dangers of disabling strict-ssl. – Analog

Why should users permanently disable security if only one package is affected? Please update your answer and describe what the commands do and provide the commands necessary for re-enabling security. – Snowman

Answer 2

Not a big fan disabling strict-ssl.

This worked for me

yarn config set registry https://registry.npmjs.org

Marilumarilyn

Will this work for yarn? I don't see how this answers the Op's question. – Lieutenant

This should be the accepted answer, not blindly disabling strict-ssl. – Aleida

Answer 3

Execute the following commands one by one to resolve the issue.

npm config set registry https://registry.npmjs.org/
npm config set "strict-ssl" false -g
npm config delete registry

Substitute

Answer 4

After try the different options here (safest and unsafest) the problem persist. I solve that cleaning caches, specially Yarn; reboot & try again, and then voila, all works as is expected.

Surfactant

Answer 5

Warning: Any solution that disables global security is a bad idea. You better be able to bet your career and home on this moment of "f'it".

So JUST DONT.

The previous respondents are correct,

npm config set registry https://registry.npmjs.org/

yarn config set registry https://registry.npmjs.org/

Additionally, having exported the NODE_OPTIONS environment variable...

export NODE_OPTIONS=--max-old_space_size=<memory limit>

It also aided in correcting the issue. This was for my Raspberry Pi 3 with Debian GNU/Linux 11

Inroad