ECMAScript 2022 (ES13) dropped on June 22, codifying the latest batch of new features for JavaScript. Every technology specification is a milestone in an ongoing dance with real-world usage. As developers use JavaScript, we continually discover opportunities and push the language into new territory. The ECMAScript specification responds by formalizing new features. These, in turn,
Node.js 16 was released on April 20, adding Apple Silicon binaries and additional stable APIs to the popular JavaScript runtime.
The release is the first to ship with prebuilt binaries for Apple Silicon. While Node.js will provide separate tarballs for the Intel and Arm architectures, the MacOS installer will be shipped as a “fat” (multi-architecture) binary. Node.js 16 follows the October 2020 release of Node.js 15.
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Other new features and improvements in Node.js 16:
The Timers Promises API is stable, providing an alternative set of timer functions that return Promise objects, removing the need to use
util.promisify().
The Google V8 9.0 JavaScript/WebAssembly engine serves as the underpinning of Node.js 16, upgraded from V8 8.6 in Node.js 15. The upgrade features the ECMAScript RegExp Match Indices, which provide the start and end indices of the captured string.
This blog was written by Bethany Griggs, with additional contributions from the Node.js Technical Steering Committee.
We are excited to announce the release of Node.js 16 today! Highlights include the update of the V8 JavaScript engine to 9.0, prebuilt Apple Silicon binaries, and additional stable APIs.
nvm install 16. The Node.js blog post containing the changelog is available at https://nodejs.org/en/blog/release/v16.0.0.
Initially, Node.js 16 will replace Node.js 15 as our âCurrentâ release line. As per the release schedule, Node.js 16 will be the âCurrentâ release for the next 6 months and then promoted to Long-term Support (LTS) in October 2021. Once promoted to long-term support the release will be designated the codename âGalliumâ.