The NVM (Node Version Manager) is a shell script used for installing and managing Node.js on a Linux based system. The macOS users can install NVM using the homebrew.
This tutorial help you to install NVM on your macOS system and manage Node.js versions.
Prerequisites
You must have macOS desktop access with administrator privileges.
Login to the macOS desktop system and install Homebrew on your system (if not already installed)
ruby -e "$(curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Homebrew/install/master/install)"
For more instruction visit Homebrew installation tutorial.
Step 1 – Remove existing Node Versions
If your system already have node installed, uninstall it first. My system already have installed node via Homebrew. So uninstalling it first. Skip if not already installed.
brew uninstall --ignore-dependencies nodebrew uninstall --force node
Now, you system is ready for the installation. Update the Homebrew package list and install NVM.
brew updatebrew install nvm
Next, create a directory for NVM in home.
mkdir ~/.nvm
Now, configure the required environment variables. Edit the following configuration file in your home directory
vim ~/.bash_profile
and, add below lines to ~/.bash_profile ( or ~/.zshrc for macOS Catalina or later)
export NVM_DIR=~/.nvm source $(brew --prefix nvm)/nvm.sh
Press ESC + :wq to save and close your file.
Next, load the variable to the current shell environment. From the next login, it will automatically loaded.
source ~/.bash_profile
That’s it. The NVM has been installed on your macOS system. Go to next step to install Node.js versions with the help of nvm.
Step 3 – Install Node.js with NVM
First of all, see what Node versions are available to install. To see available versions, type:
nvm ls-remote
Now, you can install any version listed in above output. You can also use aliases names like node for latest version, lts for latest LTS version, etc.
nvm install node## Installing Latest version nvm install 14## Installing Node.js 14.X version
After installing you can verify what is installed with:
nvm ls
If you have installed multiple versions on your system, you can set any version as the default version any time. To set the node 14.X as default version, simply use:
nvm use 14
Similarly, you can install other versions like Node 12.X or Node 15 and switch between them.
Conclusion
This tutorial explained you to how to install NVM and node.js on macOS system.
