NPM-CACHE(1) General Commands Manual NPM-CACHE(1)
NAME
npm-cache
Synopsis
<!-- AUTOGENERATED USAGE DESCRIPTIONS -->
Note: This command is unaware of workspaces.
Description
Used to add, list, or clean the npm cache folder.
• add:
Add the specified packages to the local cache. This command is pri-
marily
intended to be used internally by npm, but it can provide a way to
add data to the local installation cache explicitly.
• clean:
Delete all data out of the cache folder. Note that this is typically
unnecessary, as npm's cache is self-healing and resistant to data
corruption issues.
• verify:
Verify the contents of the cache folder, garbage collecting any un-
needed
data, and verifying the integrity of the cache index and all cached
data.
Details
npm stores cache data in an opaque directory within the configured
cache,
named _cacache. This directory is a
cacache-based content-addressable cache that
stores all http request data as well as other package-related data. This
directory is primarily accessed through pacote, the library responsible
for all package fetching as of npm@5.
All data that passes through the cache is fully verified for integrity
on
both insertion and extraction. Cache corruption will either trigger an
error, or signal to pacote that the data must be refetched, which it
will
do automatically. For this reason, it should never be necessary to clear
the cache for any reason other than reclaiming disk space, thus why
clean
now requires --force to run.
There is currently no method exposed through npm to inspect or directly
manage the contents of this cache. In order to access it, cacache must
be
used directly.
npm will not remove data by itself: the cache will grow as new packages
are
installed.
A note about the cache's design
The npm cache is strictly a cache: it should not be relied upon as a
persistent and reliable data store for package data. npm makes no guar-
antee
that a previously-cached piece of data will be available later, and will
automatically delete corrupted contents. The primary guarantee that the
cache makes is that, if it does return data, that data will be exactly
the
data that was inserted.
To run an offline verification of existing cache contents, use npm cache
verify.
Configuration
<!-- AUTOGENERATED CONFIG DESCRIPTIONS -->
See Also
• package spec
• npm folders
• npm config
• npmrc
• npm install
• npm publish
• npm pack
• https://npm.im/cacache
• https://npm.im/pacote
• https://npm.im/@npmcli/arborist
• https://npm.im/make-fetch-happen
9.2.0 May 2024 NPM-CACHE(1)
Generated by dwww version 1.16 on Tue Dec 16 04:51:25 CET 2025.