If you’ve encountered difficulties while trying to install the Node.js canvas library on macOS, I’m here to help you resolve the issue.

When attempting to execute npm install canvas, you might have received error messages similar to the following:

npm ERR! code 1
npm ERR! path /Users/flaviocopes/dev/old/generate-images-posts/node_modules/canvas
npm ERR! command failed
npm ERR! command sh -c node-pre-gyp install --fallback-to-build
npm ERR! Failed to execute '/opt/homebrew/Cellar/[email protected]/bin/node /opt/homebrew/Cellar/[email protected]/lib/node_modules/npm/node_modules/node-gyp/bin/node-gyp.js configure --fallback-to-build --module=/Users/flaviocopes/dev/old/generate-images-posts/node_modules/canvas/build/Release/canvas.node --module_name=canvas --module_path=/Users/flaviocopes/dev/old/generate-images-posts/node_modules/canvas/build/Release --napi_version=8 --node_abi_napi=napi --napi_build_version=0 --node_napi_label=node-v93' (1)
npm ERR! node-pre-gyp info it worked if it ends with ok
npm ERR! node-pre-gyp info using [email protected]
npm ERR! node-pre-gyp info using [email protected] | darwin | arm64
npm ERR! node-pre-gyp WARN Using request for node-pre-gyp https download
npm ERR! node-pre-gyp info check checked for "/Users/flaviocopes/dev/old/generate-images-posts/node_modules/canvas/build/Release/canvas.node" (not found)
npm ERR! node-pre-gyp http GET https://github.com/node-gfx/node-canvas-prebuilt/releases/download/v2.6.1/canvas-v2.6.1-node-v93-darwin-unknown-arm64.tar.gz
npm ERR! node-pre-gyp http 404 https://github.com/node-gfx/node-canvas-prebuilt/releases/download/v2.6.1/canvas-v2.6.1-node-v93-darwin-unknown-arm64.tar.gz
npm ERR! node-pre-gyp WARN Tried to download(404): https://github.com/node-gfx/node-canvas-prebuilt/releases/download/v2.6.1/canvas-v2.6.1-node-v93-darwin-unknown-arm64.tar.gz
npm ERR! node-pre-gyp WARN Pre-built binaries not found for [email protected] and [email protected] (node-v93 ABI, unknown) (falling back to source compile with node-gyp)
npm ERR! node-pre-gyp http 404 status code downloading tarball https://github.com/node-gfx/node-canvas-prebuilt/releases/download/v2.6.1/canvas-v2.6.1-node-v93-darwin-unknown-arm64.tar.gz
npm ERR! gyp info it worked if it ends with ok
npm ERR! gyp info using [email protected]
npm ERR! gyp info using [email protected] | darwin | arm64

To resolve this issue, please follow these steps:

  1. Open your terminal and run the following command:
brew install pkg-config cairo pango libpng jpeg giflib librsvg
  1. Once the installation is complete, you can try running npm install canvas again.

By following these instructions, you should be able to successfully install the Node.js canvas library on your macOS machine. Happy coding!