Where does npm install packages?

Question

Can someone tell me where can I find the Node.js modules, which I installed using npm?

Answer 1

If you're trying to access your global dir from code, you can backtrack from process.execPath. For example, to find wsproxy, which is in {NODE_GLOBAL_DIR}/bin/wsproxy, you can just:

path.join(path.dirname(process.execPath), 'wsproxy')

There's also how the npm cli works @ ec9fcc1/lib/npm.js#L254 with:

path.resolve(process.execPath, '..', '..')

See also ec9fcc1/lib/install.js#L521:

var globalPackage = path.resolve(npm.globalPrefix,
                                 'lib', 'node_modules', moduleName(pkg))

Where globalPrefix has a default set in ec9fcc1/lib/config/defaults.js#L92-L105 of:

if (process.env.PREFIX) {
    globalPrefix = process.env.PREFIX
} else if (process.platform === 'win32') {
    // c:\node\node.exe --> prefix=c:\node\
    globalPrefix = path.dirname(process.execPath)
} else {
    // /usr/local/bin/node --> prefix=/usr/local
    globalPrefix = path.dirname(path.dirname(process.execPath))

    // destdir only is respected on Unix
    if (process.env.DESTDIR) {
        globalPrefix = path.join(process.env.DESTDIR, globalPrefix)
    }
}

Answer 2

Global libraries

You can run npm list -g to see which global libraries are installed and where they're located. Use npm list -g | head -1 for truncated output showing just the path. If you want to display only main packages not its sub-packages which installs along with it - you can use - npm list --depth=0 which will show all packages and for getting only globally installed packages, just add -g i.e. npm list -g --depth=0.

On Unix systems they are normally placed in /usr/local/lib/node or /usr/local/lib/node_modules when installed globally. If you set the NODE_PATH environment variable to this path, the modules can be found by node.

Windows XP - %USERPROFILE%\AppData\npm\node_modules
Windows 7, 8 and 10 - %USERPROFILE%\AppData\Roaming\npm\node_modules

Non-global libraries

Non-global libraries are installed the node_modules sub folder in the folder you are currently in.

You can run npm list to see the installed non-global libraries for your current location.

When installing use -g option to install globally

npm install -g pm2 - pm2 will be installed globally. It will then typically be found in /usr/local/lib/node_modules (Use npm root -g to check where.)

npm install pm2 - pm2 will be installed locally. It will then typically be found in the local directory in /node_modules

Answer 3

If you are looking for the executable that npm installed, maybe because you would like to put it in your PATH, you can simply do

npm bin

or

npm bin -g

Answer 4

Expanding upon other answers.

npm list -g

will show you the location of globally installed packages.

If you want to output that list to a file that you can then easily search in your text editor:

npm list -g > ~/Desktop/npmfiles.txt

Answer 5

I was beginning to going mad searching the real configuration, so here is the all list of configuration files on linux:

• /etc/npmrc
• /home/youruser/.npmrc
• /root/.npmrc

on windows: - c/Program\ Files/nodejs/node_modules/npm/npmrc

Then in the file the prefix is configured:

prefix=/usr

The prefix is defaulted to /usr in linux, to ${APPDATA}\npm in windows

The node modules are under $prefix tree, and the path should contain $prefix/bin

There may be a problem :

• When you install globally, you use "sudo su" then the /root/.npmrc may be used!
• When you use locally without sudo: for your user its the /home/youruser/.npmrc.
• When your path doesn't represent your prefix
• When you use npm set -g prefix /usr it sets the /etc/npmrc global, but doesn't override the local

Here is all the informations that were missing to find what is configured where. Hope I have been exhaustive.

Answer 6

In earlier versions of NPM modules were always placed in /usr/local/lib/node or wherever you specified the npm root within the .npmrc file. However, in NPM 1.0+ modules are installed in two places. You can have modules installed local to your application in /.node_modules or you can have them installed globally which will use the above.

More information can be found at https://github.com/isaacs/npm/blob/master/doc/install.md