CODEWITHSUNDEEP
node.jsnpmnpx
Daniel Kaplan
Daniel Kaplan

Reputation: 67474

Why do `npx node -v` and `node -v` return different versions?

I ran these commands and the output confused me:

$ npx node -v
Need to install the following packages:
[email protected]

$ node -v
v22.13.0

$ npm list | grep node
├── @rollup/[email protected]
├── @types/[email protected]
├── [email protected]

$ ls -a node_modules/.bin/node*
node_modules/.bin/node-which  node_modules/.bin/node-which.cmd  node_modules/.bin/node-which.ps1

These are the only dependencies in my package.json that have node in their name, and I am not using the engine property:

    "@rollup/plugin-node-resolve": "16.0.0",
    "@types/node": "22.10.10",
    "ts-node": "10.9.2",

Why do npx node -v and node -v return different versions?

I happen to be using cygwin, but type node references the Windows install. I didn't find anything when I ran find / -maxdepth 3 -name 'node*' -type f -print (root dir) or find . -name 'node*' -type f -print (project dir). This makes me think the Windows install is the only node executable on my system.

This question looks very similar to node -v and nodejs -v shows different versions, but their question is asking about two different commands. I'm asking about the same command (node) run directly on the CLI or run through npx, that's the major difference.

Upvotes: -1

Views: 44

Answers (1)

Anush
Anush

Reputation: 1

  1. node -v checks the globally installed Node.js version. This command directly runs node.js binary installed on system

  2. npx node -v might use a locally installed version of Node.js. This command runs actually from npm packages

Upvotes: -1

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