MessagePack for JavaScript/ECMA-262

NOTE: This library is a fork of msgpack/msgpack-javascript, with the following changes:

• Improved bigint support. Bigints are no longer solely encoded as int64/uint64, which allows for greater compatibility with other MessagePack libraries. Additional decoding options are available as well.
• Raw string decoding support. When decoding, strings can be decoded as Uint8Arrays. This supports reading non-UTF-8 encoded strings.
• Number and binary map key support with Maps.

The exact changes can be viewed in this comparison.

This library is an implementation of MessagePack for TypeScript and JavaScript, providing a compact and efficient binary serialization format. Learn more about MessagePack at:

https://msgpack.org/

This library serves as a comprehensive reference implementation of MessagePack for JavaScript with a focus on accuracy, compatibility, interoperability, and performance.

Additionally, this is also a universal JavaScript library. It is compatible not only with browsers, but with Node.js or other JavaScript engines that implement ES2015+ standards. As it is written in TypeScript, this library bundles up-to-date type definition files (d.ts).

*Note that this is the second edition of "MessagePack for JavaScript". The first edition, which was implemented in ES5 and never released to npmjs.com, is tagged as classic.

Synopsis

import { deepStrictEqual } from "assert";
import { encode, decode } from "@msgpack/msgpack";

const object = {
  nil: null,
  integer: 1,
  float: Math.PI,
  string: "Hello, world!",
  binary: Uint8Array.from([1, 2, 3]),
  array: [10, 20, 30],
  map: { foo: "bar" },
  timestampExt: new Date(),
};

const encoded: Uint8Array = encode(object);

deepStrictEqual(decode(encoded), object);

Table of Contents

• Synopsis
• Table of Contents
• Install
• API
  • encode(data: unknown, options?: EncoderOptions): Uint8Array
    • EncoderOptions
  • decode(buffer: ArrayLike<number> | BufferSource, options?: DecoderOptions): unknown
    • DecoderOptions
      • IntMode
  • decodeMulti(buffer: ArrayLike<number> | BufferSource, options?: DecoderOptions): Generator<unknown, void, unknown>
  • decodeAsync(stream: ReadableStreamLike<ArrayLike<number> | BufferSource>, options?: DecoderOptions): Promise<unknown>
  • decodeArrayStream(stream: ReadableStreamLike<ArrayLike<number> | BufferSource>, options?: DecoderOptions): AsyncIterable<unknown>
  • decodeMultiStream(stream: ReadableStreamLike<ArrayLike<number> | BufferSource>, options?: DecoderOptions): AsyncIterable<unknown>
  • Reusing Encoder and Decoder instances
• Extension Types
  • ExtensionCodec context
  • Handling BigInt
  • The temporal module as timestamp extensions
• Decoding a Blob
• MessagePack Specification
  • MessagePack Mapping Table
• Prerequisites
  • ECMA-262
  • NodeJS
  • TypeScript Compiler / Type Definitions
• Benchmark
• Distribution
  • NPM / npmjs.com
  • CDN / unpkg.com
• Deno Support
• Maintenance
  • Testing
  • Continuous Integration
  • Release Engineering
  • Updating Dependencies
• License

Install

This library is published to npmjs.com as @msgpack/msgpack.

npm install @msgpack/msgpack

API

encode(data: unknown, options?: EncoderOptions): Uint8Array

It encodes data into a single MessagePack-encoded object, and returns a byte array as Uint8Array. It throws errors if data is, or includes, a non-serializable object such as a function or a symbol.

for example:

import { encode } from "@msgpack/msgpack";

const encoded: Uint8Array = encode({ foo: "bar" });
console.log(encoded);

If you'd like to convert an uint8array to a NodeJS Buffer, use Buffer.from(arrayBuffer, offset, length) in order not to copy the underlying ArrayBuffer, while Buffer.from(uint8array) copies it:

import { encode } from "@msgpack/msgpack";

const encoded: Uint8Array = encode({ foo: "bar" });

// `buffer` refers the same ArrayBuffer as `encoded`.
const buffer: Buffer = Buffer.from(encoded.buffer, encoded.byteOffset, encoded.byteLength);
console.log(buffer);

EncoderOptions

| Name | Type | Default | | ------------------- | -------------- | ----------------------------- | | extensionCodec | ExtensionCodec | ExtensionCodec.defaultCodec | | context | user-defined | - | | forceBigIntToInt64 | boolean | false | | maxDepth | number | 100 | | initialBufferSize | number | 2048 | | sortKeys | boolean | false | | forceFloat32 | boolean | false | | forceIntegerToFloat | boolean | false | | ignoreUndefined | boolean | false |

decode(buffer: ArrayLike<number> | BufferSource, options?: DecoderOptions): unknown

It decodes buffer that includes a MessagePack-encoded object, and returns the decoded object typed unknown.

buffer must be an array of bytes, which is typically Uint8Array or ArrayBuffer. BufferSource is defined as ArrayBuffer | ArrayBufferView.

The buffer must include a single encoded object. If the buffer includes extra bytes after an object or the buffer is empty, it throws RangeError. To decode buffer that includes multiple encoded objects, use decodeMulti() or decodeMultiStream() (recommended) instead.

for example:

import { decode } from "@msgpack/msgpack";

const encoded: Uint8Array;
const object = decode(encoded);
console.log(object);

NodeJS Buffer is also acceptable because it is a subclass of Uint8Array.

DecoderOptions

| Name | Type | Default | | ----------------------- | -------------- | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ | | extensionCodec | ExtensionCodec | ExtensionCodec.defaultCodec | | context | user-defined | - | | useBigInt64 | boolean | false | | intMode | IntMode | IntMode.AS_ENCODED if useBigInt64 is true or IntMode.UNSAFE_NUMBER otherwise | | rawBinaryStringKeys | boolean | false | | rawBinaryStringValues | boolean | false | | useMap | boolean | false | | supportObjectNumberKeys | boolean | false | | maxStrLength | number | 4_294_967_295 (UINT32_MAX) | | maxBinLength | number | 4_294_967_295 (UINT32_MAX) | | maxArrayLength | number | 4_294_967_295 (UINT32_MAX) | | maxMapLength | number | 4_294_967_295 (UINT32_MAX) | | maxExtLength | number | 4_294_967_295 (UINT32_MAX) |

You can use max${Type}Length to limit the length of each type decoded.

intMode determines whether decoded integers should be returned as numbers or bigints in different circumstances. The possible values are described below.

To skip UTF-8 decoding of strings, one or both of rawBinaryStringKeys and rawBinaryStringValues can be set to true. If enabled, strings are decoded into Uint8Array. rawBinaryStringKeys affects only map keys, while rawBinaryStringValues affect all other string values.

If useMap is enabled, maps are decoded into the Map container instead of plain objects. Map objects support a wider range of key types. Plain objects only support string keys (though you can enable supportObjectNumberKeys to coerce number keys to strings), while Map objects support strings, numbers, bigints, and Uint8Arrays.

IntMode

The IntMode enum defines different options for decoding integers. They are described below:

• IntMode.UNSAFE_NUMBER: Always returns the value as a number. Be aware that there will be a loss of precision if the value is outside the range of Number.MIN_SAFE_INTEGER to Number.MAX_SAFE_INTEGER.
• IntMode.SAFE_NUMBER: Always returns the value as a number, but throws an error if the value is outside of the range of Number.MIN_SAFE_INTEGER to Number.MAX_SAFE_INTEGER.
• IntMode.MIXED: Returns all values inside the range of Number.MIN_SAFE_INTEGER to Number.MAX_SAFE_INTEGER as numbers and all values outside that range as bigints.
• IntMode.AS_ENCODED: Returns all values encoded as int64/uint64 as bigints and all other integers as numbers.
• IntMode.BIGINT: Always returns the value as a bigint, even if it is small enough to safely fit in a number.

decodeMulti(buffer: ArrayLike<number> | BufferSource, options?: DecoderOptions): Generator<unknown, void, unknown>

It decodes buffer that includes multiple MessagePack-encoded objects, and returns decoded objects as a generator. See also decodeMultiStream(), which is an asynchronous variant of this function.

This function is not recommended to decode a MessagePack binary via I/O stream including sockets because it's synchronous. Instead, decodeMultiStream() decodes a binary stream asynchronously, typically spending less CPU and memory.

for example:

import { decode } from "@msgpack/msgpack";

const encoded: Uint8Array;

for (const object of decodeMulti(encoded)) {
  console.log(object);
}

decodeAsync(stream: ReadableStreamLike<ArrayLike<number> | BufferSource>, options?: DecoderOptions): Promise<unknown>

It decodes stream, where ReadableStreamLike<T> is defined as ReadableStream<T> | AsyncIterable<T>, in an async iterable of byte arrays, and returns decoded object as unknown type, wrapped in Promise.

This function works asynchronously, and might CPU resources more efficiently compared with synchronous decode(), because it doesn't wait for the completion of downloading.

This function is designed to work with whatwg fetch() like this:

import { decodeAsync } from "@msgpack/msgpack";

const MSGPACK_TYPE = "application/x-msgpack";

const response = await fetch(url);
const contentType = response.headers.get("Content-Type");
if (contentType && contentType.startsWith(MSGPACK_TYPE) && response.body != null) {
  const object = await decodeAsync(response.body);
  // do something with object
} else {
  /* handle errors */
}

decodeArrayStream(stream: ReadableStreamLike<ArrayLike<number> | BufferSource>, options?: DecoderOptions): AsyncIterable<unknown>

It is alike to decodeAsync(), but only accepts a stream that includes an array of items, and emits a decoded item one by one.

for example:

import { decodeArrayStream } from "@msgpack/msgpack";

const stream: AsyncIterator<Uint8Array>;

// in an async function:
for await (const item of decodeArrayStream(stream)) {
  console.log(item);
}

decodeMultiStream(stream: ReadableStreamLike<ArrayLike<number> | BufferSource>, options?: DecoderOptions): AsyncIterable<unknown>

It is alike to decodeAsync() and decodeArrayStream(), but the input stream must consist of multiple MessagePack-encoded items. This is an asynchronous variant for decodeMulti().

In other words, it could decode an unlimited stream and emits a decoded item one by one.

for example:

import { decodeMultiStream } from "@msgpack/msgpack";

const stream: AsyncIterator<Uint8Array>;

// in an async function:
for await (const item of decodeMultiStream(stream)) {
  console.log(item);
}

This function is available since v2.4.0; previously it was called as decodeStream().

Reusing Encoder and Decoder instances

Encoder and Decoder classes are provided to have better performance by reusing instances:

import { deepStrictEqual } from "assert";
import { Encoder, Decoder } from "@msgpack/msgpack";

const encoder = new Encoder();
const decoder = new Decoder();

const encoded: Uint8Array = encoder.encode(object);
deepStrictEqual(decoder.decode(encoded), object);

According to our benchmark, reusing Encoder instance is about 20% faster than encode() function, and reusing Decoder instance is about 2% faster than decode() function. Note that the result should vary in environments and data structure.

Encoder and Decoder take the same options as encode() and decode() respectively.

Extension Types

To handle MessagePack Extension Types, this library provides ExtensionCodec class.

This is an example to setup custom extension types that handles Map and Set classes in TypeScript:

import { encode, decode, ExtensionCodec } from "@msgpack/msgpack";

const extensionCodec = new ExtensionCodec();

// Set<T>
const SET_EXT_TYPE = 0; // Any in 0-127
extensionCodec.register({
  type: SET_EXT_TYPE,
  encode: (object: unknown): Uint8Array | null => {
    if (object instanceof Set) {
      return encode([...object], { extensionCodec });
    } else {
      return null;
    }
  },
  decode: (data: Uint8Array) => {
    const array = decode(data, { extensionCodec }) as Array<unknown>;
    return new Set(array);
  },
});

// Map<T>
const MAP_EXT_TYPE = 1; // Any in 0-127
extensionCodec.register({
  type: MAP_EXT_TYPE,
  encode: (object: unknown): Uint8Array => {
    if (object instanceof Map) {
      return encode([...object], { extensionCodec });
    } else {
      return null;
    }
  },
  decode: (data: Uint8Array) => {
    const array = decode(data, { extensionCodec }) as Array<[unknown, unknown]>;
    return new Map(array);
  },
});

const encoded = encode([new Set<any>(), new Map<any, any>()], { extensionCodec });
const decoded = decode(encoded, { extensionCodec });

Ensure you include your extensionCodec in any recursive encode and decode statements!

Note that extension types for custom objects must be [0, 127], while [-1, -128] is reserved for MessagePack itself.

ExtensionCodec context

When you use an extension codec, it might be necessary to have encoding/decoding state to keep track of which objects got encoded/re-created. To do this, pass a context to the EncoderOptions and DecoderOptions:

import { encode, decode, ExtensionCodec } from "@msgpack/msgpack";

class MyContext {
  track(object: any) { /*...*/ }
}

class MyType { /* ... */ }

const extensionCodec = new ExtensionCodec<MyContext>();

// MyType
const MYTYPE_EXT_TYPE = 0 // Any in 0-127
extensionCodec.register({
  type: MYTYPE_EXT_TYPE,
  encode: (object, context) => {
    if (object instanceof MyType) {
      context.track(object); // <-- like this
      return encode(object.toJSON(), { extensionCodec, context });
    } else {
      return null;
    }
  },
  decode: (data, extType, context) => {
    const decoded = decode(data, { extensionCodec, context });
    const my = new MyType(decoded);
    context.track(my); // <-- and like this
    return my;
  },
});

// and later
import { encode, decode } from "@msgpack/msgpack";

const context = new MyContext();

const encoded = = encode({myType: new MyType<any>()}, { extensionCodec, context });
const decoded = decode(encoded, { extensionCodec, context });

Handling BigInt

Decoding

This library does not handle decoding BigInt by default, but you have three options to decode using BigInt's:

• Set useBigInt64: true to decode MessagePack's int64/uint64 into a BigInt
• Set intMode to exert greater control over BigInt handling
• Define a custom ExtensionCodec to map bigint to a MessagePack extension type

Encoding

This library will encode a BigInt into a MessagePack int64/uint64 if it is > 32-bit OR you set forceBigIntToInt64 to true. This library will encode a number that is > 32-bit into a MessagePack int64/uint64 if it is > 32-bit.

If you set forceBigIntToInt64 to true note:

• A bigint is encoded in 8 byte binaries even if it's a small integer
• A bigint must be smaller than the max value of the uint64 and larger than the min value of the int64. Otherwise the behavior is undefined.

Custom codec

Alternatively, you can define a custom codec to handle bigint like this:

import { deepStrictEqual } from "assert";
import { encode, decode, ExtensionCodec } from "@msgpack/msgpack";

// to define a custom codec:
const BIGINT_EXT_TYPE = 0; // Any in 0-127
const extensionCodec = new ExtensionCodec();
extensionCodec.register({
  type: BIGINT_EXT_TYPE,
  encode(input: unknown): Uint8Array | null {
    if (typeof input === "bigint") {
      if (input <= Number.MAX_SAFE_INTEGER && input >= Number.MIN_SAFE_INTEGER) {
        return encode(Number(input));
      } else {
        return encode(String(input));
      }
    } else {
      return null;
    }
  },
  decode(data: Uint8Array): bigint {
    const val = decode(data);
    if (!(typeof val === "string" || typeof val === "number")) {
      throw new DecodeError(`unexpected BigInt source: ${val} (${typeof val})`);
    }
    return BigInt(val);
  },
});

// to use it:
const value = BigInt(Number.MAX_SAFE_INTEGER) + BigInt(1);
const encoded: = encode(value, { extensionCodec });
deepStrictEqual(decode(encoded, { extensionCodec }), value);

The temporal module as timestamp extensions

There is a proposal for a new date/time representations in JavaScript:

• https://github.com/tc39/proposal-temporal

This library maps Date to the MessagePack timestamp extension by default, but you can re-map the temporal module (or Temporal Polyfill) to the timestamp extension like this:

import { Instant } from "@std-proposal/temporal";
import { deepStrictEqual } from "assert";
import {
  encode,
  decode,
  ExtensionCodec,
  EXT_TIMESTAMP,
  encodeTimeSpecToTimestamp,
  decodeTimestampToTimeSpec,
} from "@msgpack/msgpack";

// to define a custom codec
const extensionCodec = new ExtensionCodec();
extensionCodec.register({
  type: EXT_TIMESTAMP, // override the default behavior!
  encode(input: unknown): Uint8Array | null {
    if (input instanceof Instant) {
      const sec = input.seconds;
      const nsec = Number(input.nanoseconds - BigInt(sec) * BigInt(1e9));
      return encodeTimeSpecToTimestamp({ sec, nsec });
    } else {
      return null;
    }
  },
  decode(data: Uint8Array): Instant {
    const timeSpec = decodeTimestampToTimeSpec(data);
    const sec = BigInt(timeSpec.sec);
    const nsec = BigInt(timeSpec.nsec);
    return Instant.fromEpochNanoseconds(sec * BigInt(1e9) + nsec);
  },
});

// to use it
const instant = Instant.fromEpochMilliseconds(Date.now());
const encoded = encode(instant, { extensionCodec });
const decoded = decode(encoded, { extensionCodec });
deepStrictEqual(decoded, instant);

This will become default in this library with major-version increment, if the temporal module is standardized.

Decoding a Blob

Blob is a binary data container provided by browsers. To read its contents, you can use Blob#arrayBuffer() or Blob#stream(). Blob#stream() is recommended if your target platform support it. This is because streaming decode should be faster for large objects. In both ways, you need to use asynchronous API.

async function decodeFromBlob(blob: Blob): unknown {
  if (blob.stream) {
    // Blob#stream(): ReadableStream<Uint8Array> (recommended)
    return await decodeAsync(blob.stream());
  } else {
    // Blob#arrayBuffer(): Promise<ArrayBuffer> (if stream() is not available)
    return decode(await blob.arrayBuffer());
  }
}

MessagePack Specification

This library is compatible with the "August 2017" revision of MessagePack specification at the point where timestamp ext was added:

• [x] str/bin separation, added at August 2013
• [x] extension types, added at August 2013
• [x] timestamp ext type, added at August 2017

The living specification is here:

https://github.com/msgpack/msgpack

Note that as of June 2019 there're no official "version" on the MessagePack specification. See https://github.com/msgpack/msgpack/issues/195 for the discussions.

MessagePack Mapping Table

The following table shows how JavaScript values are mapped to MessagePack formats and vice versa.

The mapping of integers varies on the setting of intMode.

| Source Value | MessagePack Format | Value Decoded | | --------------------- | -------------------- | ---------------------- | | null, undefined | nil | null (*1) | | boolean (true, false) | bool family | boolean (true, false) | | number (53-bit int) | int family | number or bigint (*2) | | number (64-bit float) | float family | number (64-bit float) | | bigint | int family | number or bigint (*2) | | string | str family | string (*3) | | ArrayBufferView | bin family | Uint8Array (*4) | | Array | array family | Array | | Object | map family | Object (*5) | | Date | timestamp ext family | Date (*6) | | bigint | int family | bigint |

• *1 Both null and undefined are mapped to nil (0xC0) type, and are decoded into null
• *2 MessagePack ints are decoded as either numbers or bigints depending on the IntMode used during decoding.
• *3 If you'd like to skip UTF-8 decoding of strings, enable one of rawBinaryStringKeys or rawBinaryStringValues. In that case, strings are decoded into Uint8Array.
• *4 Any ArrayBufferViews including NodeJS's Buffer are mapped to bin family, and are decoded into Uint8Array
• *5 In handling Object, it is regarded as Record<string, unknown> in terms of TypeScript
• *6 MessagePack timestamps may have nanoseconds, which will lost when it is decoded into JavaScript Date. This behavior can be overridden by registering -1 for the extension codec.

If you set useBigInt64: true, the following mapping is used:

| Source Value | MessagePack Format | Value Decoded | | --------------------------------- | -------------------- | --------------------- | | null, undefined | nil | null | | boolean (true, false) | bool family | boolean (true, false) | | number (32-bit int) | int family | number | | number (except for the above) | float family | number | | bigint | int64 / uint64 | bigint (*5) | | string | str family | string | | ArrayBufferView | bin family | Uint8Array | | Array | array family | Array | | Object | map family | Object | | Date | timestamp ext family | Date |

• *6 If the bigint is larger than the max value of uint64 or smaller than the min value of int64, then the behavior is undefined.

• *7 If the bigint is larger than the max value of uint64 or smaller than the min value of int64, then the behavior is undefined.

Prerequisites

This is a universal JavaScript library that supports major browsers and NodeJS.

ECMA-262

• ES2015 language features
• ES2018 standard library, including:
  • Typed arrays (ES2015)
  • Async iterations (ES2018)
  • Features added in ES2015-ES2022
• whatwg encodings (TextEncoder and TextDecoder)

ES2022 standard library used in this library can be polyfilled with core-js.

IE11 is no longer supported. If you'd like to use this library in IE11, use v2.x versions.

NodeJS

NodeJS v14 is required.

TypeScript Compiler / Type Definitions

This module requires type definitions of AsyncIterator, SourceBuffer, whatwg streams, and so on. They are provided by "lib": ["ES2021", "DOM"] in tsconfig.json.

Regarding the TypeScript compiler version, only the latest TypeScript is tested in development.

Benchmark

Run-time performance is not the only reason to use MessagePack, but it's important to choose MessagePack libraries, so a benchmark suite is provided to monitor the performance of this library.

V8's built-in JSON has been improved for years, esp. JSON.parse() is significantly improved in V8/7.6, it is the fastest deserializer as of 2019, as the benchmark result bellow suggests.

However, MessagePack can handles binary data effectively, actual performance depends on situations. You'd better take benchmark on your own use-case if performance matters.

Benchmark on NodeJS/v18.1.0 (V8/10.1)

| operation | op | ms | op/s | | ------------------------------------------------- | ------: | ---: | -----: | | buf = Buffer.from(JSON.stringify(obj)); | 902100 | 5000 | 180420 | | obj = JSON.parse(buf.toString("utf-8")); | 898700 | 5000 | 179740 | | buf = require("msgpack-lite").encode(obj); | 411000 | 5000 | 82200 | | obj = require("msgpack-lite").decode(buf); | 246200 | 5001 | 49230 | | buf = require("@msgpack/msgpack").encode(obj); | 843300 | 5000 | 168660 | | obj = require("@msgpack/msgpack").decode(buf); | 489300 | 5000 | 97860 | | buf = /_ @msgpack/msgpack / encoder.encode(obj); | 1154200 | 5000 | 230840 | | obj = / @msgpack/msgpack _/ decoder.decode(buf); | 448900 | 5000 | 89780 |

Note that JSON cases use Buffer to emulate I/O where a JavaScript string must be converted into a byte array encoded in UTF-8, whereas MessagePack modules deal with byte arrays.

Distribution

NPM / npmjs.com

The NPM package distributed in npmjs.com includes both ES2015+ and ES5 files:

• dist/ is compiled into ES2019 with CommomJS, provided for NodeJS v10
• dist.es5+umd/ is compiled into ES5 with UMD
  • dist.es5+umd/msgpack.min.js - the minified file
  • dist.es5+umd/msgpack.js - the non-minified file
• dist.es5+esm/ is compiled into ES5 with ES modules, provided for webpack-like bundlers and NodeJS's ESM-mode

If you use NodeJS and/or webpack, their module resolvers use the suitable one automatically.

CDN / unpkg.com

This library is available via CDN:

<script crossorigin src="https://unpkg.com/@msgpack/msgpack"></script>

It loads MessagePack module to the global object.

Deno Support

You can use this module on Deno.

See example/deno-*.ts for examples.

deno.land/x is not supported yet.

Maintenance

Testing

For simple testing:

npm run test

Continuous Integration

This library uses Travis CI.

test matrix:

• TypeScript targets
  • target=es2019 / target=es5
• JavaScript engines
  • NodeJS, browsers (Chrome, Firefox, Safari, IE11, and so on)

See test:* in package.json and .travis.yml for details.

Release Engineering

# run tests on NodeJS, Chrome, and Firefox
make test-all

# edit the changelog
code CHANGELOG.md

# bump version
npm version patch|minor|major

# run the publishing task
make publish

Updating Dependencies

npm run update-dependencies

License

Copyright 2019 The MessagePack community.

This software uses the ISC license:

https://opensource.org/licenses/ISC

See LICENSE for details.