If you get this error, this fix should work:

In your hyper config file (~/.hyper.js) add this:

config: {
  ...
  shell: '/bin/zsh' // Or the shell you use
  ...
}

To find out which shell you are currently using, you can do this (on macOS): echo $0.

Confirmed : config: { shell: '/bin/bash' }

=> Issue fixed.

Node: v7.4.0 Npm: 4.1.2 Hyper: 1.2.1.1528 on macOS 10.12.3

for me, changing the shell configuration from ‘’ to ‘/bin/zsh’ fixed the problem

Tried completely uninstalling node and reinstalling through brew, though I still get the “Error updating plugins” at every launch.

I have the same issue except my plugins don’t work. Is there anything I can do to provide more information since the npm-debug.log file doesn’t exist?

What I’ve done to “fix” the issue on Windows 10 is:

• Trigger the notification via the menu Plugins -> Update All Now
• Open the Action Centre from the bottom right of the screen
• Right click on the error notification and choose Turn off notifications for this group

I don’t think there’s a lot of useful notifications using that system anyways, so I generally just block most annoying notifications like that.

Also, I don’t receive the message on load, but if I go to Plugins -> Update All Now, then I receive the error.

Ah that makes perfect sense. I’m using nvm and had no system version of node running. Installing a version of node with homebrew looks to have fixed the problem. Not sure if this is something that can be fixed from the app perspective? It would need to bundle npm along with itself?

I’m still periodically having this problem, but I’m not 100% sure if it’s the same issue. For some reason when updating plugins, I often get an error:

Error: ENOTEMPTY: directory not empty, rmdir 'C:\Users\Jacob\.hyper_plugins\node_modules\electron\dist\resources'

If I go and delete that folder myself, everything works just fine. It’s like there’s something running out of order or something.

# in your hyperterm-extension
npm link

# in ~/.hyperterm-plugins
npm link hyperterm-extension

then in HyperTerm -> View -> Reload to debug

Note for Windows 10:

If you need to update or install new plugins you need to use shell: 'C:\\Windows\\System32\\cmd.exe'. And after you install new plugins you can use shell: 'C:\\Windows\\System32\\bash.exe' again. I think this happens because hyper terminal installed on Windows and Windows Subsystem for Linux work like Linux PC and can not “know” path to hyper plugins directory in Windows filesystem.

Also note that WSL for access to disk C:/ uses /mnt/c/

The above works for me on Windows 10 1607 14393.693 and Hyper 1.2.1

Same issue here. I installed node using brew and manage versions using n. Also, have yarn installed through brew.

Node: v7.4.0 /usr/local/bin/node Npm: 4.1.2 /usr/local/bin/npm Hyper: 1.2.1.1528 on macOS 10.12.3

We are working on it here and here

@bitkomponist @freeall this fixed it for me too, thanks!

OSX Nvm using node 6.9.2 and npm 3.10 - I did a fresh install and tried adding a plugin and as soon as I saved the hyper.js file it threw the error about unable to update plugins and the npm debug log it says to review does not exist. None of the plugins I add are working either. uninstalling for now…

I was able to fix and update the plugins by doing cd ~/.hyperterm-plugins && npm i but I still get a failed to update plugins message on startup.

I use Windows 10 Build 14393.693 and Hyper 1.2.1 and shell: 'C:\\Windows\\System32\\cmd.exe', in .hyper.js config file fix startup error http://imgur.com/a/e1cid Error updating plugins

Please stop reporting the recent v1.2.x related bug phenomenon inside this issue.

This issue (#312) is primarily about the circumstance where the absence of a system-wide npm command will lead to the update error. There is currently no concrete idea yet on how to fix this properly within Hyper.

While the symptom appears to be the same, it’s unrelated with the recent v1.2.x breakage where the updating error message is showing up due to an already-identified configuration issue (#1513).

@freeall .bash_profile is not used by zsh if i recall correctly, take a look at ~/.zshrc

I had this problem using hyper 1.2.1 on w10 with node 6.9.3 and npm 4.2.0.

I fixed it by setting the “shell” property to “c:\windows\system32\cmd.exe”. By default on windows it’s set to “”, which works when starting hyper, but throws an error when trying to run npm (debugged that by starting hyper.exe from the command line)

Edit: If I try this with the shell property set to “c:\windows\system32\bash.exe” to run the WSL-bash, the error is back, but this time debugging complains about the following:

Error: Command failed: npm prune && npm install --production

    at ChildProcess.exithandler (child_process.js:218:12)
    at emitTwo (events.js:106:13)
    at ChildProcess.emit (events.js:191:7)
    at maybeClose (internal/child_process.js:877:16)
    at Process.ChildProcess._handle.onexit (internal/child_process.js:226:5)

So it seems to be two different errors.

same here, i had 1.2.1 freshly installed yesterday on macos 10.12.3. worked fine until i tried to install a plugin. installing any plugin never worked, had the error on first try and nothing goes. since then i get the error on each application start and when do “Plugins → Update All Now”. even getting rid of the error on start didnt work. (deleted all hyper related files) it is annoying, plz give this a high priority!

Node 7.4.0, /usr/local/bin/node npm 4.0.5, /usr/local/bin/npm macOS 10.12.3

I had this with hyper 1.0.0 on Windows. Problem was fixed after installing node (7.2.1) via chocolatey.

My issue was solved by uninstalling node and installing again in homebrew. I had conflicts between versions and npm versions as well. All fixed.

I tried almost every solutions so far, but what actually solved the problem was that I had only one instance of node.js running on WSL.

I totally could use node and npm with bash or zsh.

But as the Hyper User folder is located in the Windows filesystem (and I hadn’t installed node.js on Windows), the plugins couldn’t be updated.

So I just fixed it by installing node.js on Windows too. And it worked!

It seems to have an undocumented dependency on systemwide node being available

Hi, I had the same issue with the latest Hyper on Windows 10 with the latest update. i did not have nodejs installed, so once I did that, ran Hyper, I got the message again but I went to Plugins > Update All Now and it showed that plugins are updated, then I restarted Hyper. The message was gone from then.

changing the shell configuration from ‘’ to ‘/bin/zsh’ fixed the problem

@bitkomponist Where did you change this configuration?

I downloaded the archive, extracted, moved to Applications folder, and then ran. Got the error immediately. So didn’t have to install a plugin for it.

Does this work for anyone?