Why don't you check if node-v0.x.x.tar.gz exists first?

[yuest]

If there is a node-v0.x.x.tar.gz in current directory, I think you can just use it.

[Port3M5]

It could have potentially not be completely downloaded. By downloading it freshly it (hopefully) ensures that the file should not be corrupt.

That is fine as default behaviour but maybe if a flag was added like --no-download that allowed you to do that, it could be potentially be a very helpful tool.

[ljharb]

Finally, this has been achieved in #1204.

If the file exists, and the checksum can be computed, and matches, it is used - otherwise it's downloaded from the server. nvm cache clear removes all cached tarballs.