ts-node: ERR_UNKNOWN_FILE_EXTENSION since Node.js 18.19.0 (works fine with 18.18.2)

Workaround: You can use node --loader ts-node/esm file.ts instead of ts-node --esm file.ts (which causes a ExperimentalWarning: --experimental-loader may be removed in the future). It would be great if ts-node provided an entrypoint that calls register from node:module, which seems to be Node’s preferred way of registering loaders, now.

Same issue in node v20.10.0 (current LTS)

@michael42 thanks for the suggestion. This indeed works with both Node.js 18.18.2 and 18.19.0.

I will, however, hold back with applying that change for now, as this would require changes across a dozen or so repos. We’ve simply pinned Node.js to 18.18.2 for now to unblock us.

I still consider this to be a bug in ts-node.

Any update on this? This has rendered ts-node completely unusable and not fit for purpose. The node --loader ts-node/esm file.ts and similar workarounds do not always work, and break all existing projects that now have to temporarily implement the workaround while this gets fixed.

See #1997 - this sounds like a duplicate of that one.

I agree that #1997 and this one probably share the same root cause.

Yet, I think they differ in their implication: If ts-node changed the way it works on a major version bump of Node.js, I’d say that’s acceptable. But if ts-node suddenly stopped working on a minor version bump of Node.js, I’d say it’s a bug.

Workaround: You can use node --loader ts-node/esm file.ts instead of ts-node --esm file.ts (which causes a ExperimentalWarning: --experimental-loader may be removed in the future). It would be great if ts-node provided an entrypoint that calls register from node:module, which seems to be Node’s preferred way of registering loaders, now.

This does not seem to work for me: node --loader ts-node/esm -r tsconfig-paths/register ./scripts/deploy.ts

(node:129) ExperimentalWarning: `--experimental-loader` may be removed in the future; instead use `register()`:
--import 'data:text/javascript,import { register } from "node:module"; import { pathToFileURL } from "node:url"; register("ts-node/esm", pathToFileURL("./"));'
(Use `node --trace-warnings ...` to show where the warning was created)
/builds/ci-vct-dev/aws-platform-ci/aws-cdk/scripts/deploy.ts:1
import { AWS_DOMAIN } from '../shared-lib/src/environment/compile';
^^^^^^

node --loader ts-node/esm index.ts works for me

Does anyone know which version of node it works on ? Currently have this issue with node 20, running ts-node --esm in a module

@rreeves8 it works on Node.js 18.18.2. To my knowledge, any newer version runs into the problem described here (incl. Node.js 20). For following this kind of problem for Node.js 20, you may want to take a look at #1997 as well.

I’m using tsx with AWS CDK until this is resolved.

In cdk.json, change the app property to:

  "app": "npx tsx bin/app.ts",

See #1997 - this sounds like a duplicate of that one.