Package Managers: npm vs yarn

npm and yarn are package managers that help you easily install, update, and manage dependencies for your projects. They both do the same job, but with some differences in performance, security, and functionality. This comparison will help you decide which one to use for your next project.

Development Toolspackage managerjavascriptdependenciesproject management

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Similar Packages

pnpm

90%

pnpm is a package manager that allows you to easily install and manage packages for your project. It's similar to npm and yarn, but with some unique features like faster installation and better disk space management.

pnpm is a good alternative to npm and yarn because it's faster and more efficient. It also has a unique feature called 'content-addressed storage' that helps reduce disk space usage. If you're working on a large project with many dependencies, pnpm might be a better choice.

Package Manager

bun

80%

bun is a fast and lightweight package manager that's designed to be a replacement for npm and yarn. It's written in Zig and has a very small binary size, making it very fast.

bun is a good alternative to npm and yarn because it's extremely fast and lightweight. It's also very easy to use and has a simple CLI. If you're looking for a package manager that's fast and easy to use, bun might be a better choice.

Package Manager

volta

70%

volta is a package manager that's designed to be fast and easy to use. It's similar to npm and yarn, but with some unique features like automatic package versioning and a simple CLI.

volta is a good alternative to npm and yarn because it's very easy to use and has some unique features. It's also very fast and has a small binary size. If you're looking for a package manager that's easy to use and has some advanced features, volta might be a better choice.

Package Manager

No README available

<a href="https://yarnpkg.com/"> <img alt="Yarn" src="https://github.com/yarnpkg/assets/blob/master/yarn-kitten-full.png?raw=true" width="546"> </a> Fast, reliable, and secure dependency management. <a href="https://circleci.com/gh/yarnpkg/yarn"><img alt="Circle Status" src="https://circleci.com/gh/yarnpkg/yarn.svg?style=shield&circle-token=5f0a78473b0f440afb218bf2b82323cc6b3cb43f"></a> <a href="https://ci.appveyor.com/project/kittens/yarn/branch/master"><img alt="Appveyor Status" src="https://ci.appveyor.com/api/projects/status/0xdv8chwe2kmk463?svg=true"></a> <a href="https://dev.azure.com/yarnpkg/yarn/_build"><img alt="Azure Pipelines status" src="https://dev.azure.com/yarnpkg/yarn/_apis/build/status/Yarn%20Acceptance%20Tests"></a> <a href="https://discord.gg/yarnpkg"><img alt="Discord Chat" src="https://img.shields.io/discord/226791405589233664.svg"></a> <a href="http://commitizen.github.io/cz-cli/"><img alt="Commitizen friendly" src="https://img.shields.io/badge/commitizen-friendly-brightgreen.svg"></a>

Fast: Yarn caches every package it has downloaded, so it never needs to download the same package again. It also does almost everything concurrently to maximize resource utilization. This means even faster installs.

Reliable: Using a detailed but concise lockfile format and a deterministic algorithm for install operations, Yarn is able to guarantee that any installation that works on one system will work exactly the same on another system.

Secure: Yarn uses checksums to verify the integrity of every installed package before its code is executed.

Features

Offline Mode. If you've installed a package before, then you can install it again without an internet connection.
Deterministic. The same dependencies will be installed in the same exact way on any machine, regardless of installation order.
Network Performance. Yarn efficiently queues requests and avoids request waterfalls in order to maximize network utilization.
Network Resilience. A single request that fails will not cause the entire installation to fail. Requests are automatically retried upon failure.
Flat Mode. Yarn resolves mismatched versions of dependencies to a single version to avoid creating duplicates.
More emojis. 🐈

Installing Yarn

Read the Installation Guide on our website for detailed instructions on how to install Yarn.

Using Yarn

Read the Usage Guide on our website for detailed instructions on how to use Yarn.

Contributing to Yarn

Contributions are always welcome, no matter how large or small. Substantial feature requests should be proposed as an RFC. Before contributing, please read the code of conduct.

See Contributing.

Prior art

Yarn wouldn't exist if it wasn't for excellent prior art. Yarn has been inspired by the following projects:

Credits

Thanks to Sam Holmes for donating the npm package name!

Package Managers: npm vs yarn

Development Toolspackage managerjavascriptdependenciesproject management

	Stars	Issues	Version	UpdatedⓘLast publish date	CreatedⓘPackage creation date	SizeⓘMinified + Gzipped size
N npm	9,257	634	11.6.2	a month ago	12 years ago	install size 2.7 KB
Y yarn	41,542	2,069	1.22.22	18 months ago	13 years ago	install size N/A

Stars

Issues

Version

UpdatedⓘLast publish date

CreatedⓘPackage creation date

SizeⓘMinified + Gzipped size

npm

9,257

634

11.6.2

a month ago

12 years ago

install size 2.7 KB

yarn

41,542

2,069

1.22.22

18 months ago

13 years ago

install size N/A

Similar Packages

pnpm

90%

Package Manager

bun

80%

bun is a fast and lightweight package manager that's designed to be a replacement for npm and yarn. It's written in Zig and has a very small binary size, making it very fast.

Package Manager

volta

70%

volta is a package manager that's designed to be fast and easy to use. It's similar to npm and yarn, but with some unique features like automatic package versioning and a simple CLI.

Package Manager

Dependencies Comparison

npm

Dependencies

ms^2.1.2

ini^5.0.0

tar^7.5.1

glob^11.0.3

nopt^8.1.0

read^4.1.0

ssri^12.0.0

archy~1.0.0

chalk^5.6.2

p-map^7.0.3

which^5.0.0

abbrev^3.0.1

pacote^21.0.3

semver^7.7.3

cacache^20.0.1

ci-info^4.3.1

is-cidr^6.0.1

minipass^7.1.1

node-gyp^11.4.2

proc-log^5.0.0

libnpmorg^8.0.1

minimatch^10.0.3

treeverse^3.0.0

@npmcli/fs^4.0.0

libnpmdiff^8.0.9

libnpmexec^10.1.8

libnpmfund^7.0.9

libnpmpack^9.0.9

libnpmteam^8.0.2

text-table~0.2.0

cli-columns^4.0.0

fs-minipass^3.0.3

graceful-fs^4.2.11

npm-profile^12.0.0

libnpmaccess^10.0.3

libnpmsearch^9.0.1

@sigstore/tuf^4.0.0

libnpmpublish^11.1.2

libnpmversion^8.0.2

@npmcli/config^10.4.2

@npmcli/redact^3.2.2

supports-color^10.2.2

hosted-git-info^9.0.2

npm-package-arg^13.0.1

qrcode-terminal^0.12.0

@npmcli/arborist^9.1.6

npm-audit-report^6.0.0

init-package-json^8.2.2

make-fetch-happen^15.0.2

minipass-pipeline^1.2.4

npm-pick-manifest^11.0.1

npm-user-validate^3.0.0

@npmcli/run-script^10.0.0

npm-install-checks^7.1.2

npm-registry-fetch^19.0.0

tiny-relative-date^2.0.2

fastest-levenshtein^1.0.16

parse-conflict-json^4.0.0

@npmcli/package-json^7.0.1

@npmcli/promise-spawn^8.0.3

spdx-expression-parse^4.0.0

@npmcli/map-workspaces^5.0.0

validate-npm-package-name^6.0.2

@isaacs/string-locale-compare^1.1.0

json-parse-even-better-errors^4.0.0

Dev Dependencies

ajv^8.12.0

tap^16.3.9

diff^8.0.2

nock^13.4.0

spawk^1.7.1

remark^15.0.1

rimraf^6.0.1

cli-table3^0.6.4

remark-gfm^4.0.1

@npmcli/git^7.0.0

ajv-formats^3.0.1

@npmcli/docs^1.0.0

npm-packlist^10.0.2

remark-github^12.0.0

@tufjs/repo-mock^4.0.0

@npmcli/mock-globals^1.0.0

@npmcli/template-oss4.25.1

@npmcli/eslint-config^5.1.0

@npmcli/mock-registry^1.0.0

ajv-formats-draft2019^1.6.1

Peer Dependencies

yarn

Dependencies

Dev Dependencies

Peer Dependencies

Features

Offline Mode. If you've installed a package before, then you can install it again without an internet connection.

Deterministic. The same dependencies will be installed in the same exact way on any machine, regardless of installation order.

Network Performance. Yarn efficiently queues requests and avoids request waterfalls in order to maximize network utilization.

Network Resilience. A single request that fails will not cause the entire installation to fail. Requests are automatically retried upon failure.

Flat Mode. Yarn resolves mismatched versions of dependencies to a single version to avoid creating duplicates.

More emojis. 🐈

Package Managers: npm vs yarn

Similar Packages

pnpm

bun

volta

Features

Installing Yarn

Using Yarn

Contributing to Yarn

Prior art

Credits

Package Managers: npm vs yarn

Who's Using These Packages

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pnpm

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volta

Dependencies Comparison

npm

Dependencies

Dev Dependencies

Peer Dependencies

yarn

Dependencies

Dev Dependencies

Peer Dependencies

Features

Installing Yarn

Using Yarn

Contributing to Yarn

Prior art

Credits

Dependencies Comparison

npm

Dependencies

Dev Dependencies

Peer Dependencies

yarn

Dependencies

Dev Dependencies

Peer Dependencies

Who's Using These Packages

npm

sails

OverVue

graaljs

pixel-editor

LaTeX.js

yarn

gatsby-themes

hiui

wener

DanmakuCraft2