I’m having trouble running npm and npx commands on my system without using sudo. Every time I try to execute commands like creating a new project or installing packages, I get permission errors. This only happens when I run the commands as a regular user. When I use sudo, everything works fine but I know this isn’t the recommended way to use npm. I’ve seen this issue with various commands including project generators and package installations. Has anyone else encountered this problem? What’s the proper way to fix npm permissions so I don’t need sudo for basic operations? I’m worried about potential security issues from always using root privileges for package management.
This happens because npm got installed globally with root ownership. I hit the same issue after installing Node.js through my system’s package manager. Instead of messing with permissions, just use a Node version manager like nvm - it’s way cleaner. nvm installs everything in your user directory, so no more permission headaches. Install nvm, then run nvm install node to reinstall Node.js. Your npm and npx commands won’t need sudo anymore, plus you can easily switch Node versions later.
i had this too! changing the npm directory helped. just do npm config set prefix '~/.npm-global', then add export PATH=~/.npm-global/bin:$PATH to your .bashrc or .zshrc. restart the terminal, and u should be good to go without sudo!