You can install an older version of node.js like this: node_modules/.bin/npm install -save-dev which will then add this version of node.js to the project. Since you have made this version of npm the one for this project, when you use npm in your scripts it will use 6.14.15 and not the global version. If you type node_modules/.bin/npm -v you will get 6.14.15 If you type npm -v at this point you will get your global version. Npm i -save-dev will put the earlier version of npm into the node_modules/.bin which will let you run it in relation to this project.

I am running node 16.8.0 and I have npm 7.21.0 but I want to use an earlier version of npm but just for a project: What is even more interesting is you can install a local version of node.js in a project and use it too! This will install the latest version that will run with the node.js you have installed.Īdditionally you can install a specific version of npm to your package.json in a project like this npm install and you can use it locally.

The command is npm install -g to install it globally. Stability is not worth ignoring a security risk. This is a best practice for all software.

Of course, as node.js advances and adds features so too does npm so there is some limit for npm depending on node.js but you SHOULD update npm as much as you can because there are important security patches and bug fixes. You can update npm without installing another version of node.js and npm is not tied to versions of node.js specifically.

Npm version