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esm.sh allows you to import JavaScript modules from http URLs, no installation/build steps needed.
import * as mod from "https://esm.sh/PKG[@SEMVER][/PATH]";
With import maps, you can even use bare import specifiers intead of URLs:
<script type="importmap">
{
"imports": {
"react": "https://esm.sh/[email protected]",
"react-dom/": "https://esm.sh/[email protected]/"
}
}
</script>
<script type="module">
import React from "react"; // → https://esm.sh/[email protected]
import { render } from "react-dom/client"; // → https://esm.sh/[email protected]/client
</script>
More details about the import map usages can be found in the Using Import Maps section.
- NPM:
// Examples import React from "https://esm.sh/react"; // latest import React from "https://esm.sh/react@17"; // 17.0.2 import React from "https://esm.sh/react@beta"; // latest beta import { renderToString } from "https://esm.sh/react-dom/server"; // sub-modules
- JSR (starts with
/jsr/
):// Examples import { encodeBase64 } from "https://esm.sh/jsr/@std/[email protected]/base64"; import { Hono } from "https://esm.sh/jsr/@hono/hono@4";
- GitHub (starts with
/gh/
):// Examples import tslib from "https://esm.sh/gh/microsoft/tslib"; // latest import tslib from "https://esm.sh/gh/microsoft/[email protected]"; // the version '2.6.0' is a git tag
By default, esm.sh rewrites import specifiers based on the package dependencies. To specify the version of these
dependencies, you can add ?deps=PACKAGE@VERSION
to the import URL. To specify multiple dependencies, separate them with commas, like this: [email protected],[email protected]
.
import React from "https://esm.sh/[email protected]";
import useSWR from "https://esm.sh/[email protected]";
You can also alias dependencies by adding ?alias=PACKAGE:ALIAS
to the import URL. This is useful when you want to use a different package for a dependency.
import useSWR from "https://esm.sh/swr?alias=react:preact/compat";
in combination with ?deps
:
import useSWR from "https://esm.sh/swr?alias=react:preact/compat&[email protected]";
By default, esm.sh exports a module with all its exported members. However, if you want to import only a specific set of
members, you can specify them by adding a ?exports=foo,bar
query to the import statement.
import { __await, __rest } from "https://esm.sh/tslib"; // 7.3KB
import { __await, __rest } from "https://esm.sh/tslib?exports=__await,__rest"; // 489B
By using this feature, you can take advantage of tree shaking with esbuild and achieve a smaller bundle size. Note, this feature doesn't work with CommonJS modules.
By default, esm.sh bundles sub-modules that ain't declared in the exports
field.
Bundling sub-modules can reduce the number of network requests for performance. However, it may bundle shared modules
repeatedly. In extreme case, it may break the side effects of the package, or change the import.meta.url
semantics. To
avoid this, you can add ?bundle=false
to disable the default bundling behavior:
import "https://esm.sh/@pyscript/core?bundle=false";
For package authors, you can override the bundling strategy by adding the esm.sh
field to package.json
:
{
"name": "foo",
"esm.sh": {
"bundle": false // disables the default bundling behavior
}
}
esm.sh also supports ?bundle=all
query to bundle the module with all external dependencies(except in peerDependencies
) into a single JS file.
import { Button } from "https://esm.sh/antd?bundle=all";
import React from "https://esm.sh/react?dev";
With the ?dev
option, esm.sh builds a module with process.env.NODE_ENV
set to "development"
or based on the
condition development
in the exports
field. This is useful for libraries that have different behavior in development
and production. For example, React uses a different warning message in development mode.
By default, esm.sh checks the User-Agent
header to determine the build target. You can also specify the target
by
adding ?target
, available targets are: es2015 - es2022, esnext, deno, denonext, and node.
import React from "https://esm.sh/react?target=esnext";
Other supported options of esbuild:
- Conditions
import foo from "https://esm.sh/foo?conditions=custom1,custom2";
- Keep names
import foo from "https://esm.sh/foo?keep-names";
- Ignore annotations
import foo from "https://esm.sh/foo?ignore-annotations";
esm.sh supports ?worker
query to load the module as a web worker:
import createWorker from "https://esm.sh/monaco-editor/esm/vs/editor/editor.worker?worker";
// create a worker
const worker = createWorker();
// rename the worker by adding the `name` option for debugging
const worker = createWorker({ name: "editor.worker" });
// inject code into the worker
const worker = createWorker({ inject: "self.onmessage = (e) => self.postMessage(e.data)" });
You can import any module as a worker from esm.sh with the ?worker
query. Plus, you can access the module's exports in the
inject
code. For example, uing the xxhash-wasm
to hash strings in a worker:
import createWorker from "https://esm.sh/[email protected]?worker";
// variable '$module' is the imported 'xxhash-wasm' module
const inject = `
const { default: xxhash } = $module
self.onmessage = async (e) => {
const hasher = await xxhash()
self.postMessage(hasher.h64ToString(e.data))
}
`;
const worker = createWorker({ inject });
worker.onmessage = (e) => console.log("hash is", e.data);
worker.postMessage("The string that is being hashed");
Note: The
inject
parameter must be a valid JavaScript code, and it will be executed in the worker context.
<link rel="stylesheet" href="https://esm.sh/monaco-editor?css">
This only works when the package imports CSS files in JS directly.
esm.sh supports importing wasm modules in JS directly, to do that, you need to add ?module
query to the import URL:
import wasm from "https://esm.sh/@dqbd/[email protected]/tiktoken_bg.wasm?module";
const { exports } = new WebAssembly.Instance(wasm, imports);
Note: The
*.wasm?module
pattern requires the top-level-await feature to be supported by the browser.
Import Maps has been supported by most modern browsers and Deno natively.
This allows bare import specifiers, such as import React from "react"
, to work.
esm.sh introduces the ?external
for specifying external dependencies. By employing this query, esm.sh maintains the import specifier intact, leaving it to the browser/Deno to resolve based on the import map. For example:
<script type="importmap">
{
"imports": {
"preact": "https://esm.sh/[email protected]",
"preact/": "https://esm.sh/[email protected]/",
"preact-render-to-string": "https://esm.sh/[email protected]?external=preact"
}
}
</script>
<script type="module">
import { h } from "preact";
import { useState } from "preact/hooks";
import { render } from "preact-render-to-string";
</script>
Alternatively, you can mark all dependencies as external by adding a *
prefix before the package name:
{
"imports": {
"preact": "https://esm.sh/[email protected]",
"preact-render-to-string": "https://esm.sh/*[email protected]",
"swr": "https://esm.sh/*[email protected]",
"react": "https://esm.sh/[email protected]/compat"
}
}
Import maps supports trailing slash that can
not work with URL search params friendly. To fix this issue, esm.sh provides a special format for import URL that allows
you to use query params with trailing slash: change the query prefix ?
to &
and put it after the package version.
{
"imports": {
"react-dom": "https://esm.sh/[email protected]?dev",
"react-dom/": "https://esm.sh/[email protected]&dev/"
}
}
In rare cases, you may want to request JS source files from packages, as-is, without transformation into ES modules. To
do so, you need to add a ?raw
query to the request URL.
<script src="https://esm.sh/p5/lib/p5.min.js?raw"></script>
You may alternatively use
raw.esm.sh/<PATH>
as the origin, which is equivalent toesm.sh/<PATH>?raw
, that transitive references in the raw assets will also be raw requests.
esm.sh is a Deno-friendly CDN that resolves Node's built-in modules (such as fs, os, net, etc.), making it compatible with Deno.
import express from "https://esm.sh/express";
const app = express();
app.get("/", (req, res) => {
res.send("Hello World");
});
app.listen(3000);
Deno supports type definitions for modules with a types
field in their package.json
file through the
X-TypeScript-Types
header. This makes it possible to have type checking and auto-completion when using those modules
in Deno. (link).
In case the type definitions provided by the X-TypeScript-Types
header is incorrect, you can disable it by adding the
?no-dts
query to the module import URL:
import unescape from "https://esm.sh/lodash/unescape?no-dts";
This will prevent the X-TypeScript-Types
header from being included in the network request, and you can manually
specify the types for the imported module.
Node.js and Bun don't currently support http modules.
We highly recommend Reejs as the runtime with esm.sh that works both in Node.js and Bun.
The Global CDN of esm.sh is provided by Cloudflare, one of the world's largest and fastest cloud network platforms.
To host esm.sh by yourself, check the hosting documentation.