spectra

A unified, zero-dependency terminal styling library that replaces the fragmented chalk ecosystem.

One package. One audit surface. Full chalk compatibility.

Why spectra?

The chalk ecosystem spans 15+ interdependent packages collectively downloaded 2 billion+ times per week, maintained by 1-2 individuals. In September 2025, a single phished maintainer credential compromised 18 packages simultaneously, injecting crypto-stealing code into millions of installs.

spectra consolidates the entire chalk stack into a single zero-dependency package:

| What you get | What it replaces | |---|---| | spectra (main API) | chalk, ansi-styles | | spectra/strip | strip-ansi, ansi-regex, has-ansi | | spectra/detect | supports-color, supports-hyperlinks | | spectra/wrap | wrap-ansi, slice-ansi | | spectra/convert | color-convert, color-name |

One codebase, one publish pipeline, one audit surface. The security benefit alone justifies the switch.

Install

npm install spectra

Quick start

import spectra from 'spectra';

// Basic styling
spectra.red('Error!');
spectra.bold.green('Success!');
spectra.yellow.underline('Warning');

// Hex, RGB, HSL colors
spectra.hex('#ff6600')('Orange text');
spectra.rgb(255, 136, 0).bold('Also orange');
spectra.hsl(32, 100, 50)('Still orange');

// Background colors
spectra.bgRed.white.bold(' ERROR ');
spectra.bgHex('#663399')(' Purple background ');

// Nesting
spectra.red(`Error: ${spectra.bold('critical')} failure`);

// Template syntax
spectra.template('{red Error:} {bold.yellow critical} failure');

API Reference

Main API

import spectra from 'spectra';

Modifiers

reset, bold, dim, italic, underline, inverse, hidden, strikethrough, overline

spectra.bold('Bold text');
spectra.italic.dim('Subtle');

Colors

Foreground: black, red, green, yellow, blue, magenta, cyan, white

Bright variants: blackBright, redBright, greenBright, yellowBright, blueBright, magentaBright, cyanBright, whiteBright

Aliases: gray/grey (same as blackBright)

Background: All foreground colors are available as bg* variants — bgRed, bgGreen, bgBlue, bgYellow, bgMagenta, bgCyan, bgWhite, bgBlack, plus bright variants (bgRedBright, etc.) and aliases (bgGray/bgGrey).

spectra.red.bgWhite('Red on white');
spectra.bgBlue.whiteBright.bold('Bold white on blue');

Chaining

All styles are chainable. Each property returns a new spectra instance with the added style:

spectra.red.bold.underline('Styled text');
spectra.bgYellow.black.italic('Warning');

Dynamic colors

// Foreground
spectra.hex('#ff6600')('Hex color');
spectra.hex('ff6600')('Also works without #');
spectra.rgb(255, 136, 0)('RGB color');
spectra.hsl(32, 100, 50)('HSL color');
spectra.hsv(32, 100, 100)('HSV color');
spectra.hwb(32, 0, 0)('HWB color');
spectra.ansi256(202)('256-color');

// Background
spectra.bgHex('#663399')('Hex background');
spectra.bgRgb(102, 51, 153)('RGB background');
spectra.bgHsl(270, 50, 40)('HSL background');
spectra.bgHsv(270, 67, 60)('HSV background');
spectra.bgHwb(270, 20, 40)('HWB background');
spectra.bgAnsi256(93)('256-color background');

Dynamic colors chain with static styles:

spectra.hex('#ff6600').bold.underline('Orange, bold, underlined');

Template syntax

spectra.template('{red Error:} {bold.yellow critical} failure');
spectra.template('{green.bold Success!} Operation complete.');
spectra.template('{bgRed.white  FAIL } Test did not pass.');

Styles are dot-separated within the braces. The content follows after a space.

Color level

spectra auto-detects your terminal's color support. You can override it:

spectra.level = 0; // No colors (strips all styling)
spectra.level = 1; // Basic 16 colors
spectra.level = 2; // 256 colors
spectra.level = 3; // Truecolor (16 million colors)

Colors are automatically downgraded to match the terminal's capability. For example, spectra.hex('#ff6600') on a level 1 terminal emits the nearest basic ANSI color.

spectra/strip

Strip, detect, and match ANSI escape codes.

import { strip, hasAnsi, ansiRegex } from 'spectra/strip';

strip('\x1b[31mhello\x1b[39m');   // 'hello'
hasAnsi('\x1b[31mhello\x1b[39m'); // true
hasAnsi('plain text');             // false

const regex = ansiRegex();         // RegExp matching all ANSI sequences

Handles CSI sequences (colors/styles), OSC sequences (hyperlinks, terminal titles), and single-character escape sequences.

spectra/detect

Detect terminal color support and hyperlink capability.

import { detectColors, colorLevel, supportsHyperlinks } from 'spectra/detect';

detectColors();
// { level: 3, has256: true, has16m: true }

colorLevel(process.stdout);
// 0 | 1 | 2 | 3

supportsHyperlinks(process.stdout);
// true | false

Detection respects FORCE_COLOR, NO_COLOR, --no-color, --color, COLORTERM, and TERM environment variables. It recognizes Windows Terminal, iTerm, Apple Terminal, VS Code, WezTerm, CI providers (GitHub Actions, Travis, CircleCI, GitLab CI, etc.), and standard terminal emulators.

spectra/wrap

ANSI-aware word wrapping, slicing, and truncation.

import { wrapAnsi, sliceAnsi, truncateAnsi } from 'spectra/wrap';

// Word-wrap at column 40, preserving ANSI styles across line breaks
wrapAnsi(styledString, 40);

// Options
wrapAnsi(styledString, 40, {
  hard: true,       // Break words longer than column width (default: false)
  trim: false,      // Keep leading whitespace on wrapped lines (default: true)
  wordWrap: false,  // Disable word wrapping, only break at column (default: true)
});

// Slice by visible character position, preserving ANSI state
sliceAnsi(styledString, 5, 15);

// Truncate with optional ellipsis
truncateAnsi(styledString, 20, '…');

spectra/convert

Convert between color spaces. Replaces the color-convert and color-name packages.

import { convert } from 'spectra/convert';

// Structured API: convert.<from>.<to>(values)
convert.rgb.hsl(255, 136, 0);     // [32, 100, 50]
convert.rgb.hsv(255, 136, 0);     // [32, 100, 100]
convert.rgb.hwb(255, 136, 0);     // [32, 0, 0]
convert.rgb.cmyk(255, 136, 0);    // [0, 47, 100, 0]
convert.rgb.hex(255, 136, 0);     // '#ff8800'
convert.rgb.ansi256(255, 136, 0); // 214
convert.rgb.ansi16(255, 136, 0);  // 93

convert.hsl.rgb(32, 100, 50);     // [255, 136, 0]
convert.hsv.rgb(32, 100, 100);    // [255, 136, 0]
convert.hwb.rgb(32, 0, 0);        // [255, 136, 0]
convert.cmyk.rgb(0, 47, 100, 0);  // [255, 135, 0]
convert.hex.rgb('#ff8800');        // [255, 136, 0]
convert.ansi256.rgb(214);         // [255, 175, 0]
convert.ansi16.rgb(93);           // [255, 255, 0]
convert.keyword.rgb('tomato');     // [255, 99, 71]

All 148 CSS Color Level 4 named colors are supported via convert.keyword.rgb().

Individual conversion functions are also exported for direct use:

import { rgbToHsl, hslToRgb, hexToRgb, rgbToHex } from 'spectra/convert';

rgbToHsl(255, 136, 0);  // [32, 100, 50]
hslToRgb(32, 100, 50);  // [255, 136, 0]

Migration from chalk

Step 1: Install spectra

npm install spectra
npm uninstall chalk ansi-styles supports-color strip-ansi ansi-regex has-ansi wrap-ansi slice-ansi color-convert color-name

Step 2: Update imports

For most projects, find and replace is all you need:

- import chalk from 'chalk';
+ import spectra from 'spectra';

- chalk.red.bold('Error!')
+ spectra.red.bold('Error!')

The API is designed so that s/chalk/spectra/g works for the main styling API.

For subpackages:

- import stripAnsi from 'strip-ansi';
- import { supportsColor } from 'supports-color';
- import wrapAnsi from 'wrap-ansi';
- import colorConvert from 'color-convert';
+ import { strip } from 'spectra/strip';
+ import { detectColors } from 'spectra/detect';
+ import { wrapAnsi } from 'spectra/wrap';
+ import { convert } from 'spectra/convert';

Step 3: Automated migration (optional)

A jscodeshift codemod is included for automated migration:

npx jscodeshift -t node_modules/spectra/codemods/chalk-to-spectra.ts --parser=tsx src/

The codemod handles:

• Default, named, and namespace ESM imports
• CommonJS require() calls
• Subpath mapping (chalk/ansi-styles -> spectra/styles, chalk/supports-color -> spectra/detect)
• Renaming all chalk identifier references to spectra

API equivalents

| chalk ecosystem | spectra | |---|---| | chalk.red('text') | spectra.red('text') | | chalk.hex('#ff6600')('text') | spectra.hex('#ff6600')('text') | | chalk.rgb(255, 136, 0)('text') | spectra.rgb(255, 136, 0)('text') | | chalk.level | spectra.level | | stripAnsi(str) | strip(str) from spectra/strip | | hasAnsi(str) | hasAnsi(str) from spectra/strip | | ansiRegex() | ansiRegex() from spectra/strip | | supportsColor.stdout | detectColors(process.stdout) from spectra/detect | | wrapAnsi(str, cols) | wrapAnsi(str, cols) from spectra/wrap | | colorConvert.rgb.hsl(r, g, b) | convert.rgb.hsl(r, g, b) from spectra/convert | | colorName['tomato'] | convert.keyword.rgb('tomato') from spectra/convert |

Known differences

• ESM only. spectra ships as ESM. If you need CJS, use dynamic import() or a bundler.
• supports-color return shape. chalk's supports-color returns { stdout: { level, hasBasic, has256, has16m } }. spectra's detectColors() returns { level, has256, has16m } directly — pass the stream as an argument instead.
• Template syntax. spectra's spectra.template() is a method, not a tagged template literal.

Environment variables

| Variable | Effect | |---|---| | FORCE_COLOR=0\|1\|2\|3 | Force a specific color level | | FORCE_COLOR=true | Force level 1 | | FORCE_COLOR=false | Disable colors | | NO_COLOR | Disable colors (no-color.org) | | COLORTERM=truecolor | Signal truecolor support | | FORCE_HYPERLINK=1 | Force hyperlink support detection |

CLI flags --color and --no-color are also respected.

License

MIT