Best practice for installing Node.js for developers on Mac OS [2023]

There are many ways for you to install and set up Node.js. This guide will show you how you can best set up Node.js on your Mac as a developer.

There are three ways you can do the installation.

1. Using the Node Version Manager (NVM)
2. Using Homebrew
3. Download the installer from the official website.

Recommended

The recommended way I would suggest is to use the Node Version Manager (NVM). The reason is that it allows you to quickly and easily switch between versions of Node.js in your workflow. I have been working with Node.js very actively since v4.X around 2015. You might notice that there have been many major releases since then. From my experience, new major releases often come with breaking changes, particularly with NPM package compatibility.

New major versions are released approximately twice a year! If you are starting a project with a current version, chances are that it will be outdated by your next project. There are LTS (Long Term Support) versions of Node.js that have a longer shelf life. However, even those have compatibility issues between them such as between v14 and v16 (which are both currently in maintenance LTS and active LTS respectively as of this post).

As a developer who had to switch between versions between projects throughout the years, I would suggest installing it using NVM. You could say that it's best to just always keep your code up to date and compatible with the latest LTS versions. However, such a task is not something that can often be prioritized in project development. Furthermore, there are often NPM package incompatibility that are very hard and inconvenient to work around.

Installing using Node Version Manager (NVM)

The easiest way to install NVM is to use Homebrew. Instead of installing Node.js using Homebrew directly. You'll use it to install NVM which then installs the selected Node.js version you need. Run in your terminal the command:

$ brew install nvm

On-screen instructions

Next, just follow the on-screen instructions from Homebrew. The instructions would typically be to:

1. Create the .nvm directory

$ mkdir ~/.nvm

2. Add to ~/.zshrc or your desired shell configuration file:

export NVM_DIR="$HOME/.nvm"
[ -s "/opt/homebrew/opt/nvm/nvm.sh" ] && \. "/opt/homebrew/opt/nvm/nvm.sh"  # This loads nvm
[ -s "/opt/homebrew/opt/nvm/etc/bash_completion.d/nvm" ] && \. "/opt/homebrew/opt/nvm/etc/bash_completion.d/nvm"  # This loads nvm bash_completion

Select a version

You can install and select any version you want. For this, we would just install the latest LTS version. It is often good to standardize to using the current LTS version instead of the latest version as they are active and maintained for longer. It is also good for stopping you or your team from using any new features from the latest version that often break compatibility with previous versions (this happens).

$ nvm install --lts

Now, all you need to do is to check that it is installed and set to the correct version.

$ node -v
v16.15.0

Installing using Homebrew

The other way to install Node.js is to do it directly using Homebrew, instead of using Homebrew to install NVM just for it to install Node.js, as in the previous section. This could also be better if you are new to Node.js development. That is if you find that there are too many versions and you just want something to get you started. In that case, you can just let Homebrew decide the version for you.

This method is extremely simple. Just run:

$ brew install node

Then, just check that you have it installed

$ node -v
v18.2.0

If you do want to switch versions, then you can change in your Homebrew command node to something like node@14. However, do note this way of selecting versions is reportedly buggy. If you are going to go through the hassle of selecting versions this way, you are likely better off using NVM.

Installing using the Official Installer

This last way of installing Node.js is likely the most common. This is for if you like something official and do not want to go through a package manager. It's very simple and I think needs no explanation. Go to the official website, and download the latest LTS version which would download the .pkg file you required. Then, just run it and just follow the instructions for the graphical user interface.

Once that is done, just check in your terminal that it is installed.

$ node -v
v16.15.0

Conclusion

I have outlined the several methods that you can use to install Node.js on Mac OS. The best method if you do plan to work with Node.js or JavaScript a lot would be to install it using NVM for you to switch between versions easily for compatibility. As you work with more projects, you can expect to find that they require different versions, especially considering how frequently they have major releases.