How do I update devDependencies in NPM?

Question

npm update seems to just update the packages in dependencies, but what about devDependencies.

Right now you can install devDependencies by running npm install ., but this doesn't work for npm update .

Any ideas?

Answer 1

I ran into the same problem as OP had, and found no solution, so I decided to write a Grunt plugin that will auto-update my devDependencies..

It's on Github, I'd love to get some input and collaborations in order to make it the best tool that NPM hasn't provided.

Basically it will auto-update your outdated development dependencies with a simple Grunt Task.

https://github.com/pgilad/grunt-dev-update

Answer 2

What worked for me is installing individual dev dependencies like this

npm install react-test-renderer@15.6.1 --save --only=dev

Answer 3

Install npm-check-updates (https://www.npmjs.org/package/npm-check-updates), then jump into your project folder and run:

npm-check-updates

And to update and save changes to your package.json file:

npm-check-updates -u

Answer 4

To update package.json in addition to the local modules, run

npm update --save-dev

Alternatively, the same command to save time

npm update -D

You can view the full detail of update, or any command for that matter through

npm help <cmd>

Answer 5

If you are using outdated npm version it might be the problem. So before any other commands execute:

sudo npm install npm -g

or (if above doesn't work):

sudo npm update npm -g

Then relaunch the console (in order for changes to take effect). Now you can check your new npm --version and if it is up to date execute:

npm update

or (if you prefer):

npm update --save-dev

Answer 6

One (slow) way to do force the update, is to remove the node_modules directory, and then do npm install again.

This was a known bug of the npm update command, which has been fixed on the development branch of npm, see here: https://github.com/isaacs/npm/pull/3863

It should land on the latest stable version of npm pretty soon.