Personally, I have needed to contribute to a project that supports a Node version between 10.16 and 12 while my machine ran version 14 at the time. In this case, you want to switch back and forth between different Node versions, and the easiest way to do this is using a Node version manager.Įvery Node project also tends to have requirements of the version it supports.

There are also instances when you could use a higher version of Node when a project specifically requires an older version.įor instance, you might use an SPFx application or an SPFx solution that uses Node LTS v14, but you are simultaneously working on another Node application like cli-microsoft356, which works on a higher Node version. You won’t be surprised that running npm install or yarn install to download the Node modules in this example displays errors regarding deprecated packages. However, while everything works perfectly well, a few months later a feature may need updating, and the machine used for development runs version 14 of Node. Why Node.js developers need NVMĭevelopers who work with Node often encounter this scenario: working with version 12 of Node while building a project, for example, and completing and hosting the project. This also means you can install multiple Node versions onto your machine at the same time and switch among them if needed. Think of it as npm or Yarn that helps manage Node packages, but instead of packages, NVM manages Node versions.

Node Version Manager is a tool that helps us manage Node versions and is a convenient way to install Node. In this article, we’ll focus on Node.js and Node Version Manager (NVM), a tool that allows users to quickly install Node versions directly from the CLI and effortlessly switch between versions. As developers, working on multiple projects simultaneously is normal, but switching between different versions of software can become painstaking and annoying. When tech evolves, especially in development, versioning issues can arise. I love building stuff with great technology. Precious Luke Follow Open source crusader.

Install nvm on mac