Options
Prettier ships with a handful of format options.
To learn more about Prettier’s stance on options – see the Option Philosophy.
If you change any options, it’s recommended to do it via a configuration file. This way the Prettier CLI, editor integrations and other tooling knows what options you use.
Print Width
Specify the line length that the printer will wrap on.
For readability we recommend against using more than 80 characters:
In code styleguides, maximum line length rules are often set to 100 or 120. However, when humans write code, they don’t strive to reach the maximum number of columns on every line. Developers often use whitespace to break up long lines for readability. In practice, the average line length often ends up well below the maximum.
Prettier’s printWidth option does not work the same way. It is not the hard upper allowed line length limit. It is a way to say to Prettier roughly how long you’d like lines to be. Prettier will make both shorter and longer lines, but generally strive to meet the specified printWidth.
Remember, computers are dumb. You need to explicitly tell them what to do, while humans can make their own (implicit) judgements, for example on when to break a line.
In other words, don’t try to use printWidth as if it was ESLint’s max-len – they’re not the same. max-len just says what the maximum allowed line length is, but not what the generally preferred length is – which is what printWidth specifies.
Default | CLI Override | API Override |
---|---|---|
80 | --print-width <int> | printWidth: <int> |
(If you don’t want line wrapping when formatting Markdown, you can set the Prose Wrap option to disable it.)
Tab Width
Specify the number of spaces per indentation-level.
Default | CLI Override | API Override |
---|---|---|
2 | --tab-width <int> | tabWidth: <int> |
Tabs
Indent lines with tabs instead of spaces.
Default | CLI Override | API Override |
---|---|---|
false | --use-tabs | useTabs: <bool> |
(Tabs will be used for indentation but Prettier uses spaces to align things, such as in ternaries.)
Semicolons
Print semicolons at the ends of statements.
Valid options:
true
- Add a semicolon at the end of every statement.false
- Only add semicolons at the beginning of lines that may introduce ASI failures.
Default | CLI Override | API Override |
---|---|---|
true | --no-semi | semi: <bool> |
Quotes
Use single quotes instead of double quotes.
Notes:
- JSX quotes ignore this option – see jsx-single-quote.
- If the number of quotes outweighs the other quote, the quote which is less used will be used to format the string - Example:
"I'm double quoted"
results in"I'm double quoted"
and"This \"example\" is single quoted"
results in'This "example" is single quoted'
.
See the strings rationale for more information.
Default | CLI Override | API Override |
---|---|---|
false | --single-quote | singleQuote: <bool> |
Quote Props
Change when properties in objects are quoted.
Valid options:
"as-needed"
- Only add quotes around object properties where required."consistent"
- If at least one property in an object requires quotes, quote all properties."preserve"
- Respect the input use of quotes in object properties.
Default | CLI Override | API Override |
---|---|---|
"as-needed" | --quote-props <as-needed|consistent|preserve> | quoteProps: "<as-needed|consistent|preserve>" |
JSX Quotes
Use single quotes instead of double quotes in JSX.
Default | CLI Override | API Override |
---|---|---|
false | --jsx-single-quote | jsxSingleQuote: <bool> |
Trailing Commas
Default value changed from none
to es5
in v2.0.0
Print trailing commas wherever possible when multi-line. (A single-line array, for example, never gets trailing commas.)
Valid options:
"es5"
- Trailing commas where valid in ES5 (objects, arrays, etc.)"none"
- No trailing commas."all"
- Trailing commas wherever possible (including function arguments). This requires node 8 or a transform.
Default | CLI Override | API Override |
---|---|---|
"es5" | --trailing-comma <es5|none|all> | trailingComma: "<es5|none|all>" |
Bracket Spacing
Print spaces between brackets in object literals.
Valid options:
true
- Example:{ foo: bar }
.false
- Example:{foo: bar}
.
Default | CLI Override | API Override |
---|---|---|
true | --no-bracket-spacing | bracketSpacing: <bool> |
JSX Brackets
Put the >
of a multi-line JSX element at the end of the last line instead of being alone on the next line (does not apply to self closing elements).
Valid options:
true
- Example:
<button
className="prettier-class"
id="prettier-id"
onClick={this.handleClick}>
Click Here
</button>
false
- Example:
<button
className="prettier-class"
id="prettier-id"
onClick={this.handleClick}
>
Click Here
</button>
Default | CLI Override | API Override |
---|---|---|
false | --jsx-bracket-same-line | jsxBracketSameLine: <bool> |
Arrow Function Parentheses
First available in v1.9.0, default value changed from avoid
to always
in v2.0.0
Include parentheses around a sole arrow function parameter.
Valid options:
"always"
- Always include parens. Example:(x) => x
"avoid"
- Omit parens when possible. Example:x => x
Default | CLI Override | API Override |
---|---|---|
"always" | --arrow-parens <always|avoid> | arrowParens: "<always|avoid>" |
At first glance, avoiding parentheses may look like a better choice because of less visual noise. However, when Prettier removes parentheses, it becomes harder to add type annotations, extra arguments or default values as well as making other changes. Consistent use of parentheses provides a better developer experience when editing real codebases, which justifies the default value for the option.
Range
Format only a segment of a file.
These two options can be used to format code starting and ending at a given character offset (inclusive and exclusive, respectively). The range will extend:
- Backwards to the start of the first line containing the selected statement.
- Forwards to the end of the selected statement.
These options cannot be used with cursorOffset
.
Default | CLI Override | API Override |
---|---|---|
0 | --range-start <int> | rangeStart: <int> |
Infinity | --range-end <int> | rangeEnd: <int> |
Parser
Specify which parser to use.
Prettier automatically infers the parser from the input file path, so you shouldn’t have to change this setting.
Both the babel
and flow
parsers support the same set of JavaScript features (including Flow type annotations). They might differ in some edge cases, so if you run into one of those you can try flow
instead of babel
. Almost the same applies to typescript
and babel-ts
. babel-ts
might support JavaScript features (proposals) not yet supported by TypeScript, but it’s less permissive when it comes to invalid code and less battle-tested than the typescript
parser.
Valid options:
"babel"
(via @babel/parser) Named"babylon"
until v1.16.0"babel-flow"
(same as"babel"
but enables Flow parsing explicitly to avoid ambiguity) First available in v1.16.0"babel-ts"
(similar to"typescript"
but uses Babel and its TypeScript plugin) First available in v2.0.0"flow"
(via flow-parser)"typescript"
(via @typescript-eslint/typescript-estree) First available in v1.4.0"css"
(via postcss-scss and postcss-less, autodetects which to use) First available in v1.7.1"scss"
(same parsers as"css"
, prefers postcss-scss) First available in v1.7.1"less"
(same parsers as"css"
, prefers postcss-less) First available in v1.7.1"json"
(via @babel/parser parseExpression) First available in v1.5.0"json5"
(same parser as"json"
, but outputs as json5) First available in v1.13.0"json-stringify"
(same parser as"json"
, but outputs likeJSON.stringify
) First available in v1.13.0"graphql"
(via graphql/language) First available in v1.5.0"markdown"
(via remark-parse) First available in v1.8.0"mdx"
(via remark-parse and @mdx-js/mdx) First available in v1.15.0"html"
(via angular-html-parser) First available in 1.15.0"vue"
(same parser as"html"
, but also formats vue-specific syntax) First available in 1.10.0"angular"
(same parser as"html"
, but also formats angular-specific syntax via angular-estree-parser) First available in 1.15.0"lwc"
(same parser as"html"
, but also formats LWC-specific syntax for unquoted template attributes) First available in 1.17.0"yaml"
(via yaml and yaml-unist-parser) First available in 1.14.0
Custom parsers are also supported. First available in v1.5.0
Default | CLI Override | API Override |
---|---|---|
None | --parser <string> --parser ./my-parser | parser: "<string>" parser: require("./my-parser") |
Note: the default value was "babylon"
until v1.13.0.
File Path
Specify the file name to use to infer which parser to use.
For example, the following will use the CSS parser:
cat foo | prettier --stdin-filepath foo.css
This option is only useful in the CLI and API. It doesn’t make sense to use it in a configuration file.
Default | CLI Override | API Override |
---|---|---|
None | --stdin-filepath <string> | filepath: "<string>" |
Require Pragma
First available in v1.7.0
Prettier can restrict itself to only format files that contain a special comment, called a pragma, at the top of the file. This is very useful when gradually transitioning large, unformatted codebases to prettier.
For example, a file with the following as its first comment will be formatted when --require-pragma
is supplied:
/**
* @prettier
*/
or
/**
* @format
*/
Default | CLI Override | API Override |
---|---|---|
false | --require-pragma | requirePragma: <bool> |
Insert Pragma
First available in v1.8.0
Prettier can insert a special @format marker at the top of files specifying that the file has been formatted with prettier. This works well when used in tandem with the --require-pragma
option. If there is already a docblock at the top of the file then this option will add a newline to it with the @format marker.
Default | CLI Override | API Override |
---|---|---|
false | --insert-pragma | insertPragma: <bool> |
Prose Wrap
First available in v1.8.2
By default, Prettier will wrap markdown text as-is since some services use a linebreak-sensitive renderer, e.g. GitHub comment and BitBucket. In some cases you may want to rely on editor/viewer soft wrapping instead, so this option allows you to opt out with "never"
.
Valid options:
"always"
- Wrap prose if it exceeds the print width."never"
- Do not wrap prose."preserve"
- Wrap prose as-is. First available in v1.9.0
Default | CLI Override | API Override |
---|---|---|
"preserve" | --prose-wrap <always|never|preserve> | proseWrap: "<always|never|preserve>" |
HTML Whitespace Sensitivity
First available in v1.15.0
Specify the global whitespace sensitivity for HTML files, see whitespace-sensitive formatting for more info.
Valid options:
"css"
- Respect the default value of CSSdisplay
property."strict"
- Whitespaces are considered sensitive."ignore"
- Whitespaces are considered insensitive.
Default | CLI Override | API Override |
---|---|---|
"css" | --html-whitespace-sensitivity <css|strict|ignore> | htmlWhitespaceSensitivity: "<css|strict|ignore>" |
Vue files script and style tags indentation
First available in v1.19.0
Whether or not to indent the code inside <script>
and <style>
tags in Vue files. Some people (like the creator of Vue) don’t indent to save an indentation level, but this might break code folding in your editor.
Valid options:
"false"
- Do not indent script and style tags in Vue files."true"
- Indent script and style tags in Vue files.
Default | CLI Override | API Override |
---|---|---|
false | --vue-indent-script-and-style | vueIndentScriptAndStyle: <bool> |
End of Line
First available in v1.15.0, default value changed from auto
to lf
in v2.0.0
For historical reasons, there exist two common flavors of line endings in text files.
That is \n
(or LF
for Line Feed) and \r\n
(or CRLF
for Carriage Return + Line Feed).
The former is common on Linux and macOS, while the latter is prevalent on Windows.
Some details explaining why it is so can be found on Wikipedia.
When people collaborate on a project from different operating systems, it becomes easy to end up with mixed line endings in a shared git repository.
It is also possible for Windows users to accidentally change line endings in a previously committed file from LF
to CRLF
.
Doing so produces a large git diff
and thus makes the line-by-line history for a file (git blame
) harder to explore.
If you want to make sure that your entire git repository only contains Linux-style line endings in files covered by Prettier:
- Ensure Prettier’s
endOfLine
option is set tolf
(this is a default value since v2.0.0) - Configure a pre-commit hook that will run Prettier
- Configure Prettier to run in your CI pipeline using
--check
flag. If you use Travis CI, set theautocrlf
option toinput
in.travis.yml
. - Add
* text=auto eol=lf
to the repo’s.gitattributes
file. You may need to ask Windows users to re-clone your repo after this change to ensure git has not convertedLF
toCRLF
on checkout.
All modern text editors in all operating systems are able to correctly display line endings when \n
(LF
) is used.
However, old versions of Notepad for Windows will visually squash such lines into one as they can only deal with \r\n
(CRLF
).
Valid options:
"lf"
– Line Feed only (\n
), common on Linux and macOS as well as inside git repos"crlf"
- Carriage Return + Line Feed characters (\r\n
), common on Windows"cr"
- Carriage Return character only (\r
), used very rarely"auto"
- Maintain existing line endings (mixed values within one file are normalised by looking at what’s used after the first line)
Default | CLI Override | API Override |
---|---|---|
"lf" | --end-of-line <lf|crlf|cr|auto> | endOfLine: "<lf|crlf|cr|auto>" |