Node.js check if file exists

Question

How do i check the existence of a file?

In the documentation for the module fs there\'s a description of the method fs.exists(path, cal

Answer 1

Why not just try opening the file ? fs.open('YourFile', 'a', function (err, fd) { ... }) anyway after a minute search try this :

var path = require('path'); 

path.exists('foo.txt', function(exists) { 
  if (exists) { 
    // do something 
  } 
}); 

// or 

if (path.existsSync('foo.txt')) { 
  // do something 
} 

For Node.js v0.12.x and higher

Both path.exists and fs.exists have been deprecated

*Edit:

Changed: else if(err.code == 'ENOENT')

to: else if(err.code === 'ENOENT')

Linter complains about the double equals not being the triple equals.

Using fs.stat:

fs.stat('foo.txt', function(err, stat) {
    if(err == null) {
        console.log('File exists');
    } else if(err.code === 'ENOENT') {
        // file does not exist
        fs.writeFile('log.txt', 'Some log\n');
    } else {
        console.log('Some other error: ', err.code);
    }
});

Answer 2

There are a lot of inaccurate comments about fs.existsSync() being deprecated; it is not.

https://nodejs.org/api/fs.html#fs_fs_existssync_path

Note that fs.exists() is deprecated, but fs.existsSync() is not.

Answer 3

Old Version before V6: here's the documentation

  const fs = require('fs');    
  fs.exists('/etc/passwd', (exists) => {
     console.log(exists ? 'it\'s there' : 'no passwd!');
  });
// or Sync

  if (fs.existsSync('/etc/passwd')) {
    console.log('it\'s there');
  }

UPDATE

New versions from V6: documentation for fs.stat

fs.stat('/etc/passwd', function(err, stat) {
    if(err == null) {
        //Exist
    } else if(err.code == 'ENOENT') {
        // NO exist
    } 
});

Answer 4

Edit: Since node v10.0.0we could use fs.promises.access(...)

Example async code that checks if file exists:

async function checkFileExists(file) {
  return fs.promises.access(file, fs.constants.F_OK)
           .then(() => true)
           .catch(() => false)
}

---

An alternative for stat might be using the new fs.access(...):

minified short promise function for checking:

s => new Promise(r=>fs.access(s, fs.constants.F_OK, e => r(!e)))

Sample usage:

let checkFileExists = s => new Promise(r=>fs.access(s, fs.constants.F_OK, e => r(!e)))
checkFileExists("Some File Location")
  .then(bool => console.log(´file exists: ${bool}´))

expanded Promise way:

// returns a promise which resolves true if file exists:
function checkFileExists(filepath){
  return new Promise((resolve, reject) => {
    fs.access(filepath, fs.constants.F_OK, error => {
      resolve(!error);
    });
  });
}

or if you wanna do it synchronously:

function checkFileExistsSync(filepath){
  let flag = true;
  try{
    fs.accessSync(filepath, fs.constants.F_OK);
  }catch(e){
    flag = false;
  }
  return flag;
}

Answer 5

async/await version using util.promisify as of Node 8:

const fs = require('fs');
const { promisify } = require('util');
const stat = promisify(fs.stat);

describe('async stat', () => {
  it('should not throw if file does exist', async () => {
    try {
      const stats = await stat(path.join('path', 'to', 'existingfile.txt'));
      assert.notEqual(stats, null);
    } catch (err) {
      // shouldn't happen
    }
  });
});

describe('async stat', () => {
  it('should throw if file does not exist', async () => {
    try {
      const stats = await stat(path.join('path', 'to', 'not', 'existingfile.txt'));
    } catch (err) {
      assert.notEqual(err, null);
    }
  });
});

Answer 6

You can use fs.stat to check if target is a file or directory and you can use fs.access to check if you can write/read/execute the file. (remember to use path.resolve to get full path for the target)

Documentation:

• path.resolve
• fs.stat
• fs.access

Full example (TypeScript)

import * as fs from 'fs';
import * as path from 'path';

const targetPath = path.resolve(process.argv[2]);

function statExists(checkPath): Promise<fs.Stats> {
  return new Promise((resolve) => {
    fs.stat(checkPath, (err, result) => {
      if (err) {
        return resolve(undefined);
      }

      return resolve(result);
    });
  });
}

function checkAccess(checkPath: string, mode: number = fs.constants.F_OK): Promise<boolean> {
  return new Promise((resolve) => {
    fs.access(checkPath, mode, (err) => {
      resolve(!err);
    });
  });
}

(async function () {
  const result = await statExists(targetPath);
  const accessResult = await checkAccess(targetPath, fs.constants.F_OK);
  const readResult = await checkAccess(targetPath, fs.constants.R_OK);
  const writeResult = await checkAccess(targetPath, fs.constants.W_OK);
  const executeResult = await checkAccess(targetPath, fs.constants.X_OK);
  const allAccessResult = await checkAccess(targetPath, fs.constants.F_OK | fs.constants.R_OK | fs.constants.W_OK | fs.constants.X_OK);

  if (result) {
    console.group('stat');
    console.log('isFile: ', result.isFile());
    console.log('isDir: ', result.isDirectory());
    console.groupEnd();
  }
  else {
    console.log('file/dir does not exist');
  }

  console.group('access');
  console.log('access:', accessResult);
  console.log('read access:', readResult);
  console.log('write access:', writeResult);
  console.log('execute access:', executeResult);
  console.log('all (combined) access:', allAccessResult);
  console.groupEnd();

  process.exit(0);
}());