[BUG] npm install will randomly hang forever and cannot be closed when this occurs

[Metritutus]

Is there an existing issue for this?

• I have searched the existing issues

This issue exists in the latest npm version

• I am using the latest npm

Current Behavior

When running npm install it will sometimes hang at a random point. When it does this, it is stuck forever. CTRL+C will do nothing the first time that combination is pressed when this has occurred. Pressing that key combination the second time will make the current line (the one showing the little progress bar) disappear but that's it. No further responses to that key combination are observed.

The CMD (or Powershell) window cannot be closed regardless. The process cannot be killed by Task Manager either (Access Denied, although I'm an Administrator user so I'd assume the real reason is something non-permissions related). The only way I have found to close it is to reboot the machine.

My suspicion is it's some sort of deadlock, but this is a guess and I have no idea how to further investigate this. I've tried using Process Explorer to check for handles to files in the project directory from other processes but there are none. There are handles held by the Node process npm is using, and one for the CMD window hosting it, but that's it.

Even running with log-level silly yields no useful information. When it freezes there are no warnings or errors, it just sits on the line it was on. This is some log output from one of the times when it got stuck (I should again emphasise that the point where it gets stuck seems to be random, so the last line shown here isn't always the one it freezes on):

npm timing auditReport:init Completed in 49242ms
npm timing reify:audit Completed in 55729ms
npm timing reifyNode:node_modules/selenium-webdriver Completed in 54728ms
npm timing reifyNode:node_modules/regenerate-unicode-properties Completed in 55637ms
npm timing reifyNode:node_modules/ajv-formats/node_modules/ajv Completed in 56497ms
npm timing reifyNode:node_modules/@angular-devkit/schematics/node_modules/ajv Completed in 56472ms
[##################] \ reify:ajv: timing reifyNode:node_modules/@angular-devkit/schematics/node_modules/ajv Completed in 564

The only thing that I can think of right now is that Bit Defender (the only other application running) is interfering somehow, however it's the one application I can't turn off.

I've seen this issue occur on different projects, on different network and internet connections, and on different machines. Does anyone have any advice on how to investigate this, or at the very least a way to kill the process when it hangs like this without having to reboot the machine? Being forced to reboot when this issue occurs is perhaps the most frustrating thing in all of this.

Expected Behavior

npm install should either succeed or show an error. If it gets stuck it should either time-out or be closable by the user.

Steps To Reproduce

1. Clear down the node_modules folder (ie with something like rmdir /q /s)
2. Run. npm install
3. Watch and wait.
4. If it succeeds, repeat the above steps until the freeze is observed.

Environment

• npm: 8.1.3
• Node: v16.13.0
• OS: Windows 10 Version 21H1 (OS Build 19043.1288)
• platform: Lenovo ThinkPad
• npm config:

; "builtin" config from C:\Users\<REDACTED>\AppData\Roaming\npm\node_modules\npm\npmrc

prefix = "C:\\Users\\<REDACTED>\\AppData\\Roaming\\npm"

; "user" config from C:\Users\<REDACTED>\.npmrc

//pkgs.dev.azure.com/<REDACTED>/_packaging/<REDACTED>/npm/registry/:_authToken = (protected)

; node bin location = C:\Program Files\nodejs\node.exe
; cwd = C:\Users\<REDACTED>
; HOME = C:\Users\<REDACTED>
; Run `npm config ls -l` to show all defaults.

[Bizzle-Dapp]

If there was ever a linked example on "How to report an issue", this would probably be it.

[LegendaryMediaTV]

I was getting this error last night. It seemed as though all NPM operations were going slow and/or hanging. I tried reinstalling Node/NPM/etc. Not sure if it's related, but last night I also noticed that the NPM site was taking a while to pull up.

It finally seemed to clear itself up about an hour ago and everything has been working for me since. I'm guessing it was something server-side, though NPM's status page doesn't show anything as of yet.

[Metritutus]

I was getting this error last night. It seemed as though all NPM operations were going slow and/or hanging. I tried reinstalling Node/NPM/etc. Not sure if it's related, but last night I also noticed that the NPM site was taking a while to pull up.

It finally seemed to clear itself up about an hour ago and everything has been working for me since. I'm guessing it was something server-side, though NPM's status page doesn't show anything as of yet.

I'm not sure if that's the same thing. If it were network connection related, I'd assume it would time out at some point. I'd certainly expect to be able to cancel out of the process.

[LegendaryMediaTV]

I'm not sure if that's the same thing. If it were network connection related, I'd assume it would time out at some point. I'd certainly expect to be able to cancel out of the process.

I would have expected a network connection timeout too, but I waited well over an hour (for things that normally take a minute or less) and the process just sat frozen with a partial progress bar. I was, however, able to cancel out of the process on Windows Terminal, which seems to be the only difference.

I even tried a different machine with a different version of Node/NPM (on a different network in a different city) during that time and it had similar issues (i.e., taking a couple minutes to run npm outdated which normally takes a few seconds), but I didn't actually try an install.

[danmana]

I've been having the same problem once in a while: npm install is stuck and I can't cancel the process.

For the last few months, this happened rarely, and when it happened I had to restart my laptop to get it working again.

Last week I updated Node from 14 to 16, and npm from 6 to 8. Everything seemed fine until today...

However, today I can't get npm install to finish, not even once.
I've tried restarting my laptop about a dozen times, but it doesn't help.
I've tried npm cache clear --force and deleting node_modules - nothing helps.

I tried npm install --verbose, but I don't get any more info than this:

npm http fetch GET 200 https://registry.npmjs.org/@types/lodash/-/lodash-4.14.168.tgz 38952ms (cache miss)
npm timing reifyNode:node_modules/@sealsystems/mongo/node_modules/@types/lodash Completed in 45927ms
npm timing reifyNode:node_modules/@sealsystems/assert-mongo-error/node_modules/@types/lodash Completed in 45946ms

Note: it's not always the same dependency that it gets stuck at.

What I've found that seems strange is that as it fetches dependencies it starts getting progressively slower, until it gets stuck (when the timing gets about 30-45 seconds).
Here are some lines from the logs (the lines are in order, but I skipped a lot of them in between)

npm http fetch GET 200 https://registry.npmjs.org/figures 216ms (cache miss)
npm http fetch GET 200 https://registry.npmjs.org/has-symbols/-/has-symbols-1.0.2.tgz 6802ms (cache miss)
npm http fetch GET 200 https://registry.npmjs.org/p-locate/-/p-locate-2.0.0.tgz 9951ms (cache miss)
npm http fetch GET 200 https://registry.npmjs.org/decamelize-keys/-/decamelize-keys-1.1.0.tgz 11129ms (cache miss)
npm http fetch GET 200 https://registry.npmjs.org/function-bind/-/function-bind-1.1.1.tgz 18008ms (cache miss)
npm http fetch GET 200 https://registry.npmjs.org/@types/stringify-object/-/stringify-object-3.3.0.tgz 26988ms (cache miss)
npm http fetch GET 200 https://registry.npmjs.org/@types/lodash/-/lodash-4.14.168.tgz 38952ms (cache miss)

Maybe relevant - I have a few private scoped packages configured in npmrc

@myprivatescope:registry = "https://npm.pkg.github.com/"
//npm.pkg.github.com/:_authToken=ghp_***

though it doesn't seem to get stuck on them

npm http fetch GET 200 https://npm.pkg.github.com/@myprivatescope%2fconsul 515ms (cache miss)

I've tried setting npm config set registry http://registry.npmjs.org/, it seems to move a bit faster in the beginning, but still ends up stuck.

It seems today is not a good day for developing 😢

Windows 10 21H1 build 19043.1348
Node: v16.13.0
NPM: tried with 8.1.3, 8.1.4, 7.19.1 none work
Bitdefender Endpoint Security tools 7.2.2.101 (not sure if this is the issue)

Edit: tried uninstalling node completely, cleaning everything up and reinstalling, but it didn't work ... still stuck

[danmana]

After trying all day to reinstall and make npm work I ended up:

1. installing Ubuntu WSL
2. installing node in ubuntu
3. Copying my settings to ~/.npmrc

This actually worked, although slowly, it never got stuck npm timing reify Completed in 315565ms

I have no idea why even after purging every reference to node or npm from my laptop and doing a fresh install, it still didn't work on Windows.

[CFT-Chris]

I've been running into this as well. Happens on reifyNode in the npm output.

npm is latest version (8.3)
platform is ubuntu 21.10

I did just recently update from npm 6.x to latest. One thing I note is the warning message saying package-lock.json is out of date and needs to be rewritten (one-time operation).

For smaller projects, it squeaks by but only after many periods of CPU lock ups and spending more time than it used to with npm version 6.x.

For bigger projects, the only new observation I can add is that the number of node processes running simultaneously explodes, and they are all hogging the CPU and memory. So now memory swap processes enter the mix and the whole computer grinds to a halt.

Eventually I have to killall node if the computer isn't completely locked up, otherwise I have to do a hard reset. I still haven't succeeded to complete the "npm install" on larger projects.

[bernwong]

I'm having a similar issue after upgrading to node 16.13.1 and npm 8.3.0 (running on centos 7)
As others have mentioned, "npm install" gets progressively slower on the fetches to a point where it completely hangs.

After I downgraded npm back to version 6.14.15 ( npm install -g npm@6 ), the "npm install" completes quickly and successfully.

[CFT-Chris]

With 8.3.0, I got by installing all the dependencies of my larger projects by running npm install in small subsets of said dependencies, until all were installed.

It appears if you try to install multiple large dependencies at once, there is a greater probability of parallel npm install processes of the subdependencies causing an out-of-memory condition on the computer, which I eventually had to kill in order to gain control of the computer again.

[tekumara]

In my case it was network related. I had a private registry in npm config and I wasn't on the VPN to access it.

[darkartswizard]

Seeing this as well on a Mac.
Might be network dropouts.
EDIT: Downgraded to 6.14.15
Restarted machine, cleared cache, removed all packages, deleted node_modules, deleted package-lock.
Then we started putting Dependancies and devDependancies packages back a few at a time.
Eventually got it to build without error.

[begroff]

I am getting this error as well on a windows PC using the command prompt (cmd.exe). I've tried the following combinations and was able to reproduce the stuckness each time (I was using nvm for windows to switch versions):

node v16.13.1 / npm 8.1.2
node v17.2.0 / npm 8.1.4
node 16.10.0 / npm 7.24.0

I do have AV Defender installed, which I can't disable due to it being a company installed anti-virus software. I was also running Fiddler4 and haven't seen any HTTP errors related.

I then switched to a git bash terminal and was able to run npm install 3 times with version 16.13.1/8.1.2 and no hangs. I also ran npm ci 3 times with no hangs.

My git version installed on windows was 2.17.1.windows.2.

[darkartswizard]

I'm documenting my adventures in npm. Never occurred to me to switch from ZSH to Bash or use Git Bash. Good post!

[begroff]

Thanks. I was also able to reproduce the stuckness using PowerShell too. Now if I could figure out how to get my azure pipeline to run git bash I'll be golden. I'm going to try to use the bash task https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/devops/pipelines/tasks/utility/bash?view=azure-devops

[begroff]

In case anyone is having this issue when running azure pipelines with a self-hosted agent. Below is a solution that worked for me. The only requirement for the server/computer that is running the pipeline is to have git for windows installed so you can access the sh.exe

  - task: CmdLine@2
    displayName: Restore NPM Packages
    inputs:
      script: '"C:\Program Files\Git\bin\sh.exe" --login -c "npm ci"'
      workingDirectory: '' # Directory location where the package.json file is 
      failOnStderr: false
    timeoutInMinutes: 15

[stacy-rendall]

I have also been seeing this issue since NPM 8 (initially on Node.js 14 and more recently on Node.js 16), Windows 10

It is kind of intermittent, seems to happen more frequently on Bash (from Git for Windows) than PowerShell or CMD

The only workaround I have been able to identify is a complete restart of the system, manually delete node_modules and package-lock.json then run npm i

[CFT-Chris]

I've found the reason and a workaround for my particular scenario. In my case, I had a dependency on a package from a git repo, which also had a git repo dependency, and it set off an npm install fork bomb, causing out of memory conditions on my machine.

I've logged the specific bug, proposed solution and workaround here: npm/pacote#127 (comment)

[jumpmouse]

I have this problem for a while now. I thought it that was some problem with my project's node_modules or npm version mismatch problem.

Just now, I tried to install one package globally, and encountered exact same problem.
nodejs 14.18.1
npm 8.1.4

not sure if this helps: with -verbose enabled, this is what I've noticed:

• npm freezes randomly
• no relation with cache hit status
• everything noted before, plus
• if I wait forever, it takes exactly 143 seconds (!) to move onto next line (don't have screenshot, trust on my word :) ). After 5-10 lines, it continues with normal speed and eventually finishes.

And this is only one package (bigger one, with dependencies).
I've tried with next random one, same thing.

[ljharb]

@jumpmouse npm 8.1.4 is very old; can you try with v8.5.3?

[jumpmouse]

@ljharb thanks, I've updated to 8.5.3

Unfortunately, same behavior.
This time I've tried npm i on my medium size Angular project (removed node_modules and cleared cache).

It runs fast, then slows down and freezes.
if I terminate (Ctrl+C) process on freeze and start again, it freezes on same spot.
if I wait forever, it freezes on same line and then on couple more. Each freeze lasts for 2-3 minutes.
Eventually, instalation finishes (after about 7-8 minutes).

[darkartswizard]

I've had no issue since posting. I was able to narrow down one issue an old wdio and current webdriverio package installed. I removed the sync (fibers) package as well. Then I used ncu to find conflicting package versions. Then ncu -u to update the package. Followed by npm i to create the package-lock. Aside from an occasional unexplained issue with a port-in-use package, my Mac has been relatively stable ever since. Hope this helps.

[rayeaster]

I am getting this error as well on a windows PC using the command prompt (cmd.exe). I've tried the following combinations and was able to reproduce the stuckness each time (I was using nvm for windows to switch versions):

node v16.13.1 / npm 8.1.2 node v17.2.0 / npm 8.1.4 node 16.10.0 / npm 7.24.0

I do have AV Defender installed, which I can't disable due to it being a company installed anti-virus software. I was also running Fiddler4 and haven't seen any HTTP errors related.

I then switched to a git bash terminal and was able to run npm install 3 times with version 16.13.1/8.1.2 and no hangs. I also ran npm ci 3 times with no hangs.

My git version installed on windows was 2.17.1.windows.2.

similar issue on windows10 and took nearly more than one hour to complete

$ node --version
v16.13.2

$ npm --version
8.1.2

...npm timing npm Completed in 4213666ms...

[robertwbradford]

We have multiple developers in our org (mostly on Macs) also seeing issues like this after going to Node 16. npm ci seems to be especially problematic, but we have noticed it in other commands as well. For example, in one project (a lerna monorepo) we have a "setup" script that runs npm ci and then some various lerna execs. It has got to the point where no one can run it anymore. It just freezes the whole machine and we have to do a hard restart. If you view the "Activity Monitor" while its going, there doesn't seem to be any indication of a problem. The machine just stop responding. Not sure how to even debug this.

[adipascu]

I think this is a duplicate of #3078, the fix for this was released in npm v8.6.0

[batressc]

In my experience, this behavior ocurrs when execute npm install or npm uninstall in a windows console that not is maximized (cmd, powershell, nodejs command prompt, etc.). I don't know why ocurrs this error, but if we can maximize terminals before execute these commands we can avoid the freezing behavior.

I hope this can help you guys.

Best regards from El Salvador.

[robertwbradford]

npm@8.6.0 did not solve this for us :(

[leoNavarro95]

I am getting this error as well on a windows PC using the command prompt (cmd.exe). I've tried the following combinations and was able to reproduce the stuckness each time (I was using nvm for windows to switch versions):

node v16.13.1 / npm 8.1.2 node v17.2.0 / npm 8.1.4 node 16.10.0 / npm 7.24.0

I do have AV Defender installed, which I can't disable due to it being a company installed anti-virus software. I was also running Fiddler4 and haven't seen any HTTP errors related.

I then switched to a git bash terminal and was able to run npm install 3 times with version 16.13.1/8.1.2 and no hangs. I also ran npm ci 3 times with no hangs.

My git version installed on windows was 2.17.1.windows.2.

Thanks a lot to mention the git bash terminal solution this save me. I am also ran into this problem that the npm get stuck forever while running on the Windows 10 powershell. So I just ran the npm install in git bash and solved inmediately without any issue.

Now, I wonder why this happens. Please, if anyone knows, I would greatly appreciate it the explanation.

[fengyufuchen]

Any progress on this question？

[smittynewton]

I removed snapd from ubuntu and rebooted then it works. sudo apt remove snapd. Checked the process usage with top command and saw snapd was using 99% of cpu after trying to install node modules.

[relign]

Works on MacOS if I set IPV6 to Link-local (from Automatically). Thanks for the help.
I found this solution in #3359

[cwarren]

I was running into this trying to get the amplify cli installed via windows powershell. Turning off ipv6 did not work, at least not on it's own. I then downgraded npm to v6 (npm install -g npm@6) and that did work (I still had ipv6 turned off as well).

Good luck out there!

[PolarisPyra]

Just wanted to confirm that running npm install -g npm@6 solved the issue for me as well... I have no idea why though!

[mmiretsky]

@cwarren, @PolarisPyra - does it work for you guys with npm 10?

[cwarren]

Nope - npm 10 did not work for me

[Florin-Popescu]

Doesn't work on steam deck. Not if disabling ipv6, not if rolling back to npm 6

[wellrundigital]

Ran into a similar problem with npm v10.2 and node v20.10. Installing locally helped (omitted the -g modifier).

[AniJadeja]

I know this is an old issue. But i was having the same issue and stumbled across this. So, I am mentioning a summary. If good old restart doesn't work then ,

1. Try these steps mentioned by @kcjonesevans. Most of the time for some weird issues, caches can create new issues. So try clearing it.

in case this helps anyone looking, bc removing ipv6 is not a solution, though using a legacy version of npm might not be a solution for you either. Verified that this worked with node v16 and v18

npm install npm@8.11.0 -g
npm cache clear -f
npm i

2. Try clearing cache force fully and setting up the registry again.

npm cache clear --force
npm config set registry http://registry.npmjs.org

4. Try reinstalling the node from scratch. These instruction could help.

   https://stackoverflow.com/questions/20711240/how-to-completely-remove-node-js-from-windows

5. If none of these works then try yarn.

 npm install yarn
 yarn install

• if yarn works then my conclusion is something must be broken in windows powershell. I observed this issue in another pc and after resetting the pc, npm i was working fine. However, not everyone can afford to reset pc so, temporarily use yarn and then prepare for a reset. Go for the soft reset first where you would not loose your data.

Hope this helps.

UPDATE

It is quite possible that the project is using some library and that library has problems. Try to create a new project and then run npm i again. In my case, I thought I may have broken something in powershell, however when I created a new project, npm i is running fine.

When I went back to my initial project, it still had problems with npm i. But this time I waited for a while, and ultimately it did finish installing the libraries.

I can't come to a conclusion, as the same repo was having problems in local machine but then on codespaces it worked like a charm. At the end, I would suggest anyone who is facing the same problem to use codespace for temporary development solution.

[mirek]

I suspect the issues I've seen may be related to mixing pnpm with npm - ie. if you use both, in some cases it may be impacting npm. I don't have any proof to back it up.

[AniJadeja]

That could be the case. But in my case, It all started wit npm ci. I ran npm ci and then suddenly the powershell window is getting frozen whenever i run npm i or npm ci. I recently had some changes in windows OS, ie. fixing broken services. But, i suspect that I may have broken something else which is preventing npm install commands.

in my case yarn is working fine. When I ran the commands on codepaces with the same repo to identify if I actually somehow changed package files which are causing some library issues, codespace ran just fine. so I must have mistakenly broken some service(s) related to the powershell not npm. Because npm is running fine on codespace.

I am preparing for a soft reset as of now. So, I think that for my case, i know the issue.

[Riekr]

I tried with npm install -g npm@6 and worked but I noticed that while installing angular I've got the prompt

Would you like to share anonymous usage data with the Angular Team at Google...

I cancelled the job and reinstalled 10.4.0 but set export NG_CLI_ANALYTICS=ci (as pointed here), cleaned node_modules and did a cache verify... it worked again.

May it be that versions following npm@6 broke stdin handling?

[flensrocker]

If I have to guess, I would say this is a ipv4/ipv6 problem. If the connection uses ipv4 it works, and if it picks ipv6 it doesn't. And it's random.

[simonweikl]

I had the same issue. For me deleting the ".npmrc" fixed it

[AbhijithKizhakkepat]

I had the same issue.
I followed the following steps to fix the issue:

• Uninstall node using Windows-> Add or Remove Programs.
• Uninstall npm by running "npm uninstall -g npm"
• Download node install msi file from
  https://nodejs.org/en/download: https://nodejs.org/dist/v20.11.0/node-v20.11.0-x64.msi
• Install the msi (do not install the additional tools). This automatically installs the npm also.
• Check versions:
  node --v
  npm --version

The following versions are compatible and I don't see npm hanging issue:
node v18.18.2 and npm v10.2.4
Hope this is helpful.

[leonp5]

I have the same issue
quitting works when i press CTRL + C twice.
node 20.11.0
npm 10.4
Docker 25.0.1
in a docker container on a Linux machine
until now i didn't find a solution and nothing from the proposals above worked.

[matkoniecz]

In my case np install was failing before npm cache clear -f and worked afterwards. Note that I am not entirely sure was it coincidence that it started working after this, or is it a viable workaround.

[jinbe0]

Still not working on slow network or high-latency network such as bulletproof VPN or Tor. There is no workaround except installing on fast network environment and create tar ball of node_modules, then copy to local and extract it.
Please test on slow network + no IPv6 before next release.

[danaYatsuta]

NodeJS version: 21.7.0
npm version: 10.5.0

npm install hangs at npm sill reify moves {} for a very long time before continuing, probably around 10 minutes. Downgrading npm to 8.11.0 solves the issue.

[pavelloz]

FWIW I've found this issue today because of having exact same issue (node 20.11.1, npm 10.2.4), this is what fixed it for me:

• rm -rf node_modules from the project
• npm cache clear --force
• Removed outdated scope from ~/.npmrc - probably not necessary

[mayhew3]

Same issue for me. Was running Node v20.12.0, npm 10.5.0.
Reinstalling didn't work, removing node_modules didn't work, clearing the cache didn't work. Only thing that worked was downgrading to Node v18.20.0, npm 8.11.0.

[heiliuer]

I have a same problem! Finaly i find some host of 'package.lock.json' resovle url can not be access(ssl timeout), replace it soveled.

[rharkor]

Same problem here..

[sameerfa]

@batressc bro! this worked for me. i tried everything else and decided to also give this a shot as much as this sounds unconventional. but it worked! thanks a ton! 🙏🏼

[zharvey-wae]

Same problem for us, downgrading to Node 18 solved the problem, that's a bummer. Always a fail when downgrading is the solution :-/