npm command-line interface

# npm-ls

List installed packages

## Table of contents

- Synopsis
- Description
- Note: Design Changes Pending
- Configuration

- `all`
- `json`
- `long`
- `parseable`
- `global`
- `depth`
- `omit`
- `link`
- `unicode`
- `workspace`
- `workspaces`

- See Also

### Synopsis

    npm ls [[<@scope>/]<pkg> ...]

    aliases: list, la, ll

### Description

This command will print to stdout all the versions of packages that are installed, as well as their dependencies when `--all` is specified, in a tree structure.

Note: to get a “bottoms up” view of why a given package is included in the tree at all, use `npm explain`.

Positional arguments are `name@version-range` identifiers, which will limit the results to only the paths to the packages named. Note that nested packages will also show the paths to the specified packages. For example, running `npm ls promzard` in npm’s source tree will show:

    npm@7.15.1 /path/to/npm
    └─┬ init-package-json@0.0.4
      └── promzard@0.1.5

It will print out extraneous, missing, and invalid packages.

If a project specifies git urls for dependencies these are shown in parentheses after the name@version to make it easier for users to recognize potential forks of a project.

The tree shown is the logical dependency tree, based on package dependencies, not the physical layout of your `node_modules` folder.

When run as `ll` or `la`, it shows extended information by default.

### Note: Design Changes Pending

The `npm ls` command’s output and behavior made a ton of sense when npm created a `node_modules` folder that naively nested every dependency. In such a case, the logical dependency graph and physical tree of packages on disk would be roughly identical.

With the advent of automatic install-time deduplication of dependencies in npm v3, the `ls` output was modified to display the logical dependency graph as a tree structure, since this was more useful to most users. However, without using `npm ls -l`, it became impossible show where a package was actually installed much of the time!

With the advent of automatic installation of `peerDependencies` in npm v7, this gets even more curious, as `peerDependencies` are logically “underneath” their dependents in the dependency graph, but are always physically at or above their location on disk.

Also, in the years since npm got an `ls` command (in version 0.0.2!), dependency graphs have gotten much larger as a general rule. Therefore, in order to avoid dumping an excessive amount of content to the terminal, `npm ls` now only shows the top level dependencies, unless `--all` is provided.

A thorough re-examination of the use cases, intention, behavior, and output of this command, is currently underway. Expect significant changes to at least the default human-readable `npm ls` output in npm v8.

### Configuration

#### `all`

- Default: false
- Type: Boolean

When running `npm outdated` and `npm ls`, setting `--all` will show all outdated or installed packages, rather than only those directly depended upon by the current project.

#### `json`

- Default: false
- Type: Boolean

Whether or not to output JSON data, rather than the normal output.

Not supported by all npm commands.

#### `long`

- Default: false
- Type: Boolean

Show extended information in `ls`, `search`, and `help-search`.

#### `parseable`

- Default: false
- Type: Boolean

Output parseable results from commands that write to standard output. For `npm search`, this will be tab-separated table format.

#### `global`

- Default: false
- Type: Boolean

Operates in “global” mode, so that packages are installed into the `prefix` folder instead of the current working directory. See folders for more on the differences in behavior.

- packages are installed into the `{prefix}/lib/node_modules` folder, instead of the current working directory.
- bin files are linked to `{prefix}/bin`
- man pages are linked to `{prefix}/share/man`

#### `depth`

- Default: `Infinity` if `--all` is set, otherwise `1`
- Type: null or Number

The depth to go when recursing packages for `npm ls`.

If not set, `npm ls` will show only the immediate dependencies of the root project. If `--all` is set, then npm will show all dependencies by default.

#### `omit`

- Default: ‘dev’ if the `NODE_ENV` environment variable is set to ‘production’, otherwise empty.
- Type: “dev”, “optional”, or “peer” (can be set multiple times)

Dependency types to omit from the installation tree on disk.

Note that these dependencies are still resolved and added to the `package-lock.json` or `npm-shrinkwrap.json` file. They are just not physically installed on disk.

If a package type appears in both the `--include` and `--omit` lists, then it will be included.

If the resulting omit list includes `'dev'`, then the `NODE_ENV` environment variable will be set to `'production'` for all lifecycle scripts.

#### `link`

- Default: false
- Type: Boolean

If true, then local installs will link if there is a suitable globally installed package.

Note that this means that local installs can cause things to be installed into the global space at the same time. The link is only done if one of the two conditions are met:

- The package is not already installed globally, or
- the globally installed version is identical to the version that is being installed locally.

When used with `npm ls`, only show packages that are linked.

#### `unicode`

- Default: false on windows, true on mac/unix systems with a unicode locale, as defined by the `LC_ALL`, `LC_CTYPE`, or `LANG` environment variables.
- Type: Boolean

When set to true, npm uses unicode characters in the tree output. When false, it uses ascii characters instead of unicode glyphs.

#### `workspace`

- Default:
- Type: String (can be set multiple times)

Enable running a command in the context of the configured workspaces of the current project while filtering by running only the workspaces defined by this configuration option.

Valid values for the `workspace` config are either:

- Workspace names
- Path to a workspace directory
- Path to a parent workspace directory (will result to selecting all of the nested workspaces)

When set for the `npm init` command, this may be set to the folder of a workspace which does not yet exist, to create the folder and set it up as a brand new workspace within the project.

This value is not exported to the environment for child processes.

#### `workspaces`

- Default: false
- Type: Boolean

Enable running a command in the context of all the configured workspaces.

This value is not exported to the environment for child processes.

### See Also

- npm explain
- npm config
- npmrc
- npm folders
- npm explain
- npm install
- npm link
- npm prune
- npm outdated
- npm update