sindresorhus/open

Health v2 · maintenance only

Adoption not part of the score

3497 stars · 257 forks observed · 2026-08-28

What it is AI-extracted, prompt v1, taxonomy v1, 2026-08-29, confidence not recorded

A Node.js library that opens URLs, files, and executables with the platform's default application, using `open` on macOS, `start` on Windows, and `xdg-open` on Linux. It supports specifying apps and arguments, waiting for the opened app to exit, and WSL paths.

Use cases

• open a url in the default browser from a node script
• launch a file in its default application cross-platform
• open a url in a specific browser like firefox or chrome
• open chrome in incognito mode with arguments
• launch an executable or app from a cli tool
• wait for the opened app to quit before continuing

When to choose

• you need to open URLs, files, or apps from a Node.js CLI tool or script
• you want cross-platform behavior without writing per-OS shell commands
• you need to pass arguments to the opened application or wait for it to exit

When to avoid

• you are building an Electron app (use shell.openPath instead)
• your project uses CommonJS without dynamic import, since this package is ESM-only
• you need to open untrusted input without sanitizing it first

Facets

library · maturity stable

developer-tools cli developer-tools cross-platform cross-platform windows open-url open-files default-app xdg-open esm automation nodejs macos linux

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