prettier-plugin-uncomment

A Prettier plugin that strips comments from JavaScript, TypeScript, JSX and Flow files — every // and /* … */ — except comments that mean something to tooling, JSDoc that documents your code, or comments a developer has explicitly flagged to keep.

Install

npm install --save-dev prettier prettier-plugin-uncomment

Usage

On-demand, without installing (recommended)

Stripping comments is destructive, so you usually want to run it deliberately — not on every format. Use Prettier's --plugin flag, which applies the plugin only for that one command and never persists to your config. npx fetches Prettier and the plugin transiently (nothing is added to package.json):

npx --package prettier --package prettier-plugin-uncomment -- \
  prettier --plugin prettier-plugin-uncomment \
  --write "src/**/*.{js,jsx,ts,tsx}"

If Prettier and the plugin are already installed in the project, the same run is just:

prettier --plugin=prettier-plugin-uncomment --write "src/**/*.{js,jsx,ts,tsx}"

Your existing Prettier config (print width, semicolons, …) is still read and applied — --plugin only adds this plugin on top for that run.

If you run it often, wrap it in a package.json script. This lives in scripts (not in your Prettier config), so it never triggers on a normal format — only when you invoke it:

{
  "scripts": {
    "uncomment": "prettier --plugin=prettier-plugin-uncomment --write"
  }
}

Pass the files to strip when you run it: npm run uncomment -- "src/**/*.ts".

Always-on, via config

If you really do want comments stripped on every format, add it to your Prettier config instead:

{
  "plugins": ["prettier-plugin-uncomment"]
}

Then run Prettier as usual (npx prettier --write .). As with any Prettier run, list the folders you never want touched in .prettierignore; see also uncommentIgnorePaths below.

What is kept

Everything else is removed. Comments matching any of the following survive:

Tooling / linter / type-checker directives

• eslint-disable*, eslint-enable, eslint-env
• @ts-ignore, @ts-expect-error, @ts-nocheck, @ts-check
• /// <reference … /> (triple-slash directives)
• prettier-ignore, biome-ignore, deno-lint-ignore, stylelint-ignore, oxlint-ignore, rome-ignore
• coverage pragmas: v8 ignore, c8 ignore, istanbul ignore, node:coverage ignore

Build-tool "magic" comments (removing these changes runtime behaviour)

• webpack magic comments (webpackChunkName, webpackPrefetch, webpackIgnore, …)
• @vite-ignore
• //# sourceMappingURL= / //# sourceURL=
• /*#__PURE__*/, /*#__NO_SIDE_EFFECTS__*/

Compiler / runtime pragmas & legal banners

• @jsx, @jsxRuntime, @jsxImportSource, @jsxFrag
• @flow, @noflow
• @license, @preserve, @copyright, and /*! … */ banner comments

JSDoc that documents your code (the docs that feed TS/editor hover info)

• /** … */ blocks containing a recognized JSDoc tag — @param, @returns, @type, @typedef, @template, @satisfies, @callback, @enum, @deprecated, @see, @example, and the like.
• Detection uses the same /**-prefix rule TypeScript and editors use to identify a doc comment — no substring guessing. Prose-only /** … */ blocks (doc-comment delimiters with no tag) are still stripped by default; tune this with uncommentJsdoc.

Developer-flagged comments (case-insensitive)

• @hc, @hn, @Hacker Note, @Hacker Comment
• TODO, FIXME

Options

Option	Type	Default	Description
uncommentIgnorePaths	string[]	node_modules, dist, build, out, .next, .nuxt, .svelte-kit, coverage, vendor	Path segments whose files are left untouched. Setting this replaces the default list.
uncommentKeep	string[]	[]	Extra case-insensitive substrings; any comment containing one is kept (extends the keep-list).
uncommentJsdoc	"tagged" | "all" | "off"	"tagged"	How to treat /** … */ blocks. tagged: keep only blocks with a recognized JSDoc tag. all: keep every doc block. off: strip them unless another rule keeps them.

{
  "plugins": ["prettier-plugin-uncomment"],
  "uncommentIgnorePaths": ["node_modules", "dist", "generated"],
  "uncommentKeep": ["@keep", "IMPORTANT"],
  "uncommentJsdoc": "tagged"
}

How it works

Prettier reads the top-level ast.comments array to attach and print comments. The plugin wraps the built-in babel, babel-ts, babel-flow, typescript and flow parsers and filters that array after parsing — dropping every comment except the ones on the keep-list, so the rest are simply never printed. Node locations are left untouched, so the AST stays valid.

Scope & caveats

• Covers the JS/TS parser family (.js, .jsx, .ts, .tsx, Flow). CSS, HTML, Markdown, YAML, GraphQL and other languages are not touched.
• Removing a comment that sat alone on its own line can leave the blank line it occupied — the same blank-line behaviour Prettier applies to any gap.

License

ISC