# alangpierce/sucrase

Super-fast alternative to Babel for when you can target modern JS runtimes

Repository: https://github.com/alangpierce/sucrase
Canonical: https://ross.abutalabs.com/products/sucrase
Homepage: https://sucrase.io
Language: TypeScript
License: MIT
License Family: permissive
Topics: typescript, jsx, javascript, compiler, es-modules
Last push: 2025-11-19T17:12:45+00:00

## Health v2 (maintenance only)
Score: 56/100 (v2, computed 2026-09-02T17:46:02.011165+00:00)
- activity 53, release rhythm 35, longevity 100
- inputs: {"age_days": 3256, "days_push": 287, "days_rel": null, "gap_med": null, "n_releases_24m": 0}
- flags: no_releases
- formula: round(0.45*activity + 0.35*rhythm + 0.20*longevity); archived -> min(score, 10)

## Adoption (not part of the score)
Stars 5870, forks 155 (observed 2026-08-28T04:09:31.818800+00:00)

## What it is
Sucrase is a super-fast JavaScript transpiler, forked from Babel's parser, that compiles non-standard syntax like JSX, TypeScript, and Flow instead of downleveling modern JS features. It targets recent browsers and Node.js runtimes, achieving roughly 20x faster builds than Babel for development workflows.

## Use cases
- transpile JSX and TypeScript quickly during development
- replace Babel for faster dev builds when targeting modern runtimes
- run TypeScript files directly with node via sucrase/register
- integrate a fast transpiler into ts-node
- compile Flow-typed code to plain JavaScript
- speed up building large JavaScript codebases

## When to choose
- you need fast development builds and can target modern browsers or Node.js
- your build bottleneck is Babel's transform speed
- you only need JSX, TypeScript, or Flow transforms rather than broad syntax downleveling
- you want a lightweight transpiler with a small install size

## When to avoid
- you need to support legacy browsers like Internet Explorer
- you rely on Babel's extensive plugin ecosystem or custom transforms
- you need production builds with full syntax downleveling and polyfills
- you need highly extensible or configurable transform pipelines

## Facets
- artifact type: library
- maturity: active
- function: compiler, build-tool, developer-tools
- domain: web-development, frontend, developer-tools, programming-languages
- platform: cross-platform
- tags: transpiler, jsx, typescript, flow, es-modules, babel-alternative, dev-builds, nodejs, javascript

## Member repositories
- alangpierce/sucrase (main) score 56

## Provenance
- Observed fields: from GitHub, fetched 2026-08-28T04:09:31.818800+00:00.
- Health v2: computed from the inputs above; adoption is never an input.
- Inferred fields (summary, facets, guidance): AI-extracted, prompt v1, taxonomy v1, on 2026-08-29T17:51:35.990037+00:00, confidence not recorded.
  - readme: https://github.com/alangpierce/sucrase (fetched 2026-08-28T04:09:31.818800+00:00, sha f36ef8666c98)
  - homepage: https://sucrase.io (fetched 2026-08-29T08:47:22.154796+00:00, sha 329e3a51f221)
  - registry_npm: https://registry.npmjs.org/sucrase (fetched 2026-08-29T08:47:22.163558+00:00, sha 6ab71253424b)
- Data as of 2026-08-30T08:39:29.467469+00:00.