nodearchive

nodearchive packs and unpacks .nar, .zip, .tar, .tgz, .tar.gz, and .gz from one package surface for ESM, CommonJS, Bun, and the nar CLI. Use it when a JavaScript build, release, or vendor-import flow needs one archive tool instead of a stack of one-format packages.

Install

npm install @nodearchive/nodearchive
pnpm add @nodearchive/nodearchive
yarn add @nodearchive/nodearchive
bun add @nodearchive/nodearchive

Global CLI:

npm install --global @nodearchive/nodearchive
# or
bun add --global @nodearchive/nodearchive

Run once without a global install:

npx @nodearchive/nodearchive pack --help
bunx @nodearchive/nodearchive unpack --help

Quick start

CLI:

npm i -g @nodearchive/nodearchive
nar --help

nar pack ./src ./app.nar
nar unpack ./incoming.zip ./vendor

Code:

import { pack, unpack } from '@nodearchive/nodearchive'

await pack({ literalPath: ['src'], destinationPath: './app.nar' })
await unpack({ path: './incoming.zip', destinationPath: './vendor' })

CommonJS:

const { pack, unpack } = require('@nodearchive/nodearchive')

async function main() {
  const archive = await pack({ blob: 'hello world' })
  const restored = await unpack({ blob: archive })

  console.log(Buffer.from(restored).toString('utf8'))
}

main()

Formats and runtime support

• Writes: .nar, .zip, .tar, .tgz, .tar.gz, and .gz
• Reads: .nar, .zip, .tar, .tgz, .tar.gz, and .gz
• Runtimes: Node >= 18 and Bun
• Package entry points: ESM import and CommonJS require()
• CLI: nar
• Inputs: glob paths, exact paths, and in-memory bytes
• Outputs: filesystem writes or memory return values

Examples

Filesystem output

import { pack, unpack } from '@nodearchive/nodearchive'

await pack({
  literalPath: ['src', 'package.json'],
  destinationPath: './dist/app.nar',
  force: true,
})

await unpack({
  path: './dist/app.nar',
  destinationPath: './out',
  force: true,
})

In-memory bytes

import { pack, unpack } from '@nodearchive/nodearchive'

const archive = await pack({ blob: 'hello world' })
const restored = await unpack({ blob: archive })

console.log(Buffer.from(restored).toString('utf8'))

CommonJS

const { pack, unpack } = require('@nodearchive/nodearchive')

async function main() {
  const archive = await pack({ literalPath: ['src'] })
  const restored = await unpack({ blob: archive })

  console.log(restored.entries.length)
}

main()

Alternative output formats

import { pack } from '@nodearchive/nodearchive'

await pack({
  literalPath: ['src'],
  destinationPath: './dist/app.zip',
  outFormat: 'zip',
})

await pack({
  literalPath: ['src'],
  destinationPath: './dist/app.tgz',
})

Incoming zip or tarball

import { unpack } from '@nodearchive/nodearchive'

await unpack({
  path: './vendor/release.tar.gz',
  destinationPath: './vendor/release',
  force: true,
})

CLI

nar pack ./src ./dist/app.nar --passThru
nar pack ./src ./dist/app.zip --outFormat zip --passThru
nar unpack ./dist/app.nar ./out --force --passThru
nar unpack ./incoming.zip ./out --force
nar pack --help
npx @nodearchive/nodearchive pack --help
bunx @nodearchive/nodearchive unpack --help

Behavior

• pack() writes .nar, .zip, .tar, .tgz, .tar.gz, and .gz.
• unpack() reads .nar, .zip, .tar, .tgz, .tar.gz, and .gz.
• outFormat selects the output archive type. destinationPath also infers the format from supported extensions.
• .gz output is limited to a single input. update is limited to native .nar output.
• In-memory mode accepts strings, blobs, typed arrays, ArrayBuffer, and SharedArrayBuffer.
• path uses glob expansion through fast-glob; literalPath stays exact.
• Validation failures throw NodearchiveError codes such as ARCHIVE_INPUT_REQUIRED, ARCHIVE_INVALID_FORMAT, ARCHIVE_DESTINATION_EXISTS, and ARCHIVE_ENTRY_PATH_INVALID.
• Unsafe extraction paths and unsupported entry types are rejected instead of being silently rewritten.

Reference

• Landing page: https://nodearchive.github.io/nodearchive/
• In-depth guide: https://nodearchive.github.io/nodearchive/in-depth/
• Coverage report: https://nodearchive.github.io/nodearchive/coverage/

Quality signals

• Suite: unit + integration (Node), E2E (Playwright), Bun smoke
• Matrix: Node 18 / 20 / 22; Chromium / Firefox / WebKit plus mobile emulation
• Coverage: c8 at 100% statements, branches, functions, and lines
• Reports: coverage/lcov.info and coverage/index.html

Benchmarks

Command: npm run bench Environment: Node v22.14.0 on win32 x64

| Benchmark | Result | | ---------------- | ---------------------------- | | pack blob | 3,170.28 ops/s (126.17 ms) | | unpack blob | 3,306.20 ops/s (120.98 ms) | | pack directory | 309.35 ops/s (387.91 ms) | | unpack archive | 4,109.76 ops/s (29.20 ms) |

Results vary by machine.

License

Apache-2.0