Scalar Express API Reference Plugin

This middleware provides an easy way to render a beautiful API reference based on an OpenAPI/Swagger file with Express.

Installation

npm install @scalar/express-api-reference

Usage

Set up Express and pass an OpenAPI/Swagger spec to the apiReference middleware:

Wait, but how do we get the OpenApiSpecification? 🤔 There are multiple ways to generate an OpenAPI/Swagger file for Express. The most popular way is to use swagger-jsdoc.

import { apiReference } from '@scalar/express-api-reference'

const OpenApiSpecification =
  /* … */

  app.use(
    '/reference',
    apiReference({
      spec: {
        content: OpenApiSpecification,
      },
    }),
  )

If you’re serving an OpenAPI/Swagger file already, you can pass an URL, too:

import { apiReference } from '@scalar/express-api-reference'

app.use(
  '/reference',
  apiReference({
    spec: {
      url: '/openapi.json',
    },
  }),
)

The Express middleware takes our universal configuration object, read more about configuration in the core package README.

Themes

The middleware comes with a custom theme for Express. You can use one of the other predefined themes (alternate, default, moon, purple, solarized) or overwrite it with none. All themes come with a light and dark color scheme.

import { apiReference } from '@scalar/express-api-reference'

app.use(
  '/reference',
  apiReference({
    theme: 'purple',
    spec: {
      content: OpenApiSpecification,
    },
  }),
)

Custom CDN

You can use a custom CDN ，default is https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/npm/@scalar/api-reference.

import { apiReference } from '@scalar/express-api-reference'

app.use(
  '/reference',
  apiReference({
    cdn: 'https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/npm/@scalar/api-reference',
    spec: {
      content: OpenApiSpecification,
    },
  }),
)