How to Install Node.js in CentOS 8

Node.js is an open-source, cross-platform lightweight and powerful Javascript run-time environment for server-side programming, built on Chrome’s V8 JavaScript engine and used to create scalable network tools and web applications that require backend functionality.

Recommended Read: 18 Best NodeJS Frameworks for Developers in 2019

In this article, we will show you two different ways to install Node.js on a CentOS 8 Linux server so that you can get started.

Install Node.js from CentOS 8 Repositories

There are a few dependency packages such as C++, make, GCC etc., that you need to install from the default CentOS repositories in order to install the latest version of Node.js on CentOS 8 Linux.

To install these dependency packages, you need to install Development Tools in CentOS 8 using the following yum command.

# yum groupinstall "Development Tools" 

Now list the module that provides package Node.js package from the default CentOS repositories using the following command.

# yum module list nodejs

From the above output, there are four different profiles available, but you need to install only the default profile that highlighted with [d] installs a common set of runtime packages.

To install the default Node.js package on your CentOS 8 system, run the following command.

# yum module install nodejs

If you are a developer, you can install the development profile that will install additional libraries that allows you to build dynamically loadable modules as shown.

# yum module install nodejs/development

After installing the Node.js package, you can verify the version and location using the following commands.

# node -v
# npm -v 
# which node 
# which npm 

This is the easiest way to install the Node.js environment on CentOS 8 Linux from the CentOS repositories.

Install Node.js on CentOS 8 Using the Node Version Manager

Another easiest way of installing Node.js is using NVM, the Node version manager – is a bash script that allows you to install, uninstall and maintain multiple Node.js versions on the system.

To install or update NVM on CentOS 8 system, use the following cURL or Wget command to download the recent version of the installation script.

# curl -o- https://raw.githubusercontent.com/nvm-sh/nvm/v0.35.2/install.sh | bash
OR
# wget -qO- https://raw.githubusercontent.com/nvm-sh/nvm/v0.35.2/install.sh | bash

The above installation script, install the nvm to your user account. To start using it, you need to first source your .bash_profile.

# source ~/.bash_profile

Now, you can list the available Node.js versions using ls-remote.

# nvm list-remote

Sample Output

...
 v12.2.0
        v12.3.0
        v12.3.1
        v12.4.0
        v12.5.0
        v12.6.0
        v12.7.0
        v12.8.0
        v12.8.1
        v12.9.0
        v12.9.1
       v12.10.0
       v12.11.0
       v12.11.1
       v12.12.0
       v12.13.0   (LTS: Erbium)
       v12.13.1   (LTS: Erbium)
       v12.14.0   (Latest LTS: Erbium)
        v13.0.0
        v13.0.1
        v13.1.0
        v13.2.0
        v13.3.0
        v13.4.0
        v13.5.0

Now you can install a specific version of Node by typing any of the releases you see. For example, to get version v13.0.0, you can type.

# nvm install 13.0.0

Once installation completes, you can list the different versions you have installed by typing.

# nvm ls

You can switch between Nodejs versions by typing.

# nvm use v12.14.0

You can also set the default Nodejs version and verify it by running.

# nvm alias default v12.14.0
# nvm ls
OR
# node --version

In this article, we have explained two different ways of installing Node.js on your CentOS 8 server. If you are facing any problems with the installation, do ask for help in the comment section below.