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NVM On Windows

Installation​

Find the nvm-setup.zip at the nvm-windows github repo. Download and extract the zip file. There should be a single nvm-setup.msi file. This should be run as administrator.

Usage​

When running nvm as a user, you'll likely get an access denied return of some kind. This is because of some symlink trickery that nvm is using in the Windows environment. There are two workaround for this:

  • The first is to run nvm use from a cmd.exe or Powershell running as administrator. Note: You only need to run the nvm use command here. Other command consoles will reflect the change from this.

  • As reported from Damir's Corner - Using nvm on Windows, a second option is to use Windows' version of sudo. The gist:

Start-Process -Verb RunAs nvm -Args "use 12.22.7"

When ever you run that command, you'll likely need to accept a security dialog.

If you want to turn that Start-Process command into a convienent cmdlet in PowerShell, you can create a function like the following:

Function Nvm-Use12
{
    Start-Process -Verb RunAs nvm -Args "use 12.22.7"
}

Other Observations​

When using nvm use on Windows, you have to be explicit about the version you want to use. On linux I can nvm use 12 where on Windows you must specify nvm use 12.22.7. Because of this, its to your advantage to imprint nvm list in your head so you can query the version specifiers whenever you plan to switch node installs.

After getting nvm up and running, I almost always immediately install yarn. When using yarn in Windows 10, you can ensure that you can run it as a unsigned script by running Set-ExecutionPolicy Unrestricted in a console as Admin. I don't know the correct thing to do to make yarn work securely, but this got me past my immediate blocker.