Using the CLI

Running tsc locally will compile the closest project defined by a tsconfig.json, you can compile a set of TypeScript files by passing in a glob of files you want.

sh
# Run a compile based on a backwards look through the fs for a tsconfig.json
tsc

# Transpile just the index.ts with the compiler defaults
tsc index.ts

# Transpile any .ts files in the folder src, with the default settings
tsc src/*.ts

# Transpile any .ts files in the folder src, with the compiler settings from tsconfig.json
tsc --project tsconfig.json src/*.ts

Compiler Options

If you’re looking for more information about the compiler options in a tsconfig, check out the TSConfig Reference beta available in the v2 site.

Option	Type	Default	Description
--allowJs	boolean	false	Allow JavaScript files to be compiled.
--allowSyntheticDefaultImports	boolean	module === "system" or --esModuleInterop	Allow default imports from modules with no default export. This does not affect code emit, just typechecking.
--allowUmdGlobalAccess	boolean	false	Allow accessing UMD globals from modules.
--allowUnreachableCode	boolean	false	Do not report errors on unreachable code.
--allowUnusedLabels	boolean	false	Do not report errors on unused labels.
--alwaysStrict	boolean	false	Parse in strict mode and emit "use strict" for each source file
--assumeChangesOnlyAffectDirectDependencies	boolean	false	Have recompiles in ‘—incremental’ and ‘—watch’ assume that changes within a file will only affect files directly depending on it
--baseUrl	string		Base directory to resolve non-relative module names. See Module Resolution documentation for more details.
--build -b	boolean	false	Builds this project and all of its dependencies specified by Project References. Note that this flag is not compatible with others on this page. See more here
--charset	string	"utf8"	The character set of the input files.
--checkJs	boolean	false	Report errors in .js files. Use in conjunction with --allowJs.
--composite	boolean	true	Ensure TypeScript can determine where to find the outputs of the referenced project to compile project.
--declaration -d	boolean	false	Generates corresponding .d.ts file.
--declarationDir	string		Output directory for generated declaration files.
--declarationMap	boolean	false	Generates a sourcemap for each corresponding ‘.d.ts’ file.
--diagnostics	boolean	false	Show diagnostic information.
--disableSizeLimit	boolean	false	Disable size limitation on JavaScript project.
--downlevelIteration	boolean	false	Provide full support for iterables in for..of, spread and destructuring when targeting ES5 or ES3.
--emitBOM	boolean	false	Emit a UTF-8 Byte Order Mark (BOM) in the beginning of output files.
--emitDeclarationOnly	boolean	false	Only emit ‘.d.ts’ declaration files.
--emitDecoratorMetadata[1]	boolean	false	Emit design-type metadata for decorated declarations in source. See issue #2577 for details.
--esModuleInterop	boolean	false	Emit __importStar and __importDefault helpers for runtime babel ecosystem compatibility and enable --allowSyntheticDefaultImports for typesystem compatibility.
--experimentalDecorators[1]	boolean	false	Enables experimental support for ES decorators.
--extendedDiagnostics	boolean	false	Show verbose diagnostic information
--forceConsistentCasingInFileNames	boolean	false	Disallow inconsistently-cased references to the same file.
--generateCpuProfile	string	profile.cpuprofile	Generates a cpu profile at the given path. Passing an existing directory name instead of a file path will cause a timestamp-named profile to be generated in that directory instead.
--help -h			Print help message.
--importHelpers	boolean	false	Import emit helpers (e.g. __extends, __rest, etc..) from tslib
--incremental	boolean	true if composite is on, false otherwise	Enable incremental compilation by reading/writing information from prior compilations to a file on disk. This file is controlled by the --tsBuildInfoFile flag.
--inlineSourceMap	boolean	false	Emit a single file with source maps instead of having a separate file.
--inlineSources	boolean	false	Emit the source alongside the sourcemaps within a single file; requires --inlineSourceMap or --sourceMap to be set.
--init			Initializes a TypeScript project and creates a tsconfig.json file.
--isolatedModules	boolean	false	Perform additional checks to ensure that separate compilation (such as with transpileModule or @babel/plugin-transform-typescript) would be safe.
--jsx	string	"preserve"	Support JSX in .tsx files: "react", "preserve", "react-native". See JSX.
--jsxFactory	string	"React.createElement"	Specify the JSX factory function to use when targeting react JSX emit, e.g. React.createElement or h.
--keyofStringsOnly	boolean	false	Resolve keyof to string valued property names only (no numbers or symbols).
--useDefineForClassFields	boolean	false	Emit class fields with ECMAScript-standard semantics.
--lib	string[]		List of library files to be included in the compilation. Possible values are: ► ES5 ► ES6 ► ES2015 ► ES7 ► ES2016 ► ES2017 ► ES2018 ► ESNext ► DOM ► DOM.Iterable ► WebWorker ► ScriptHost ► ES2015.Core ► ES2015.Collection ► ES2015.Generator ► ES2015.Iterable ► ES2015.Promise ► ES2015.Proxy ► ES2015.Reflect ► ES2015.Symbol ► ES2015.Symbol.WellKnown ► ES2016.Array.Include ► ES2017.object ► ES2017.Intl ► ES2017.SharedMemory ► ES2017.String ► ES2017.TypedArrays ► ES2018.Intl ► ES2018.Promise ► ES2018.RegExp ► ESNext.AsyncIterable ► ESNext.Array ► ESNext.Intl ► ESNext.Symbol Note: If --lib is not specified a default list of libraries are injected. The default libraries injected are: ► For --target ES5: DOM,ES5,ScriptHost ► For --target ES6: DOM,ES6,DOM.Iterable,ScriptHost
--listEmittedFiles	boolean	false	Print names of generated files part of the compilation.
--listFiles	boolean	false	Print names of files part of the compilation.
--locale	string	(platform specific)	The locale to use to show error messages, e.g. en-us. Possible values are: ► English (US): en ► Czech: cs ► German: de ► Spanish: es ► French: fr ► Italian: it ► Japanese: ja ► Korean: ko ► Polish: pl ► Portuguese(Brazil): pt-BR ► Russian: ru ► Turkish: tr ► Simplified Chinese: zh-CN ► Traditional Chinese: zh-TW
--mapRoot	string		Specifies the location where debugger should locate map files instead of generated locations. Use this flag if the .map files will be located at run-time in a different location than the .js files. The location specified will be embedded in the sourceMap to direct the debugger where the map files will be located. This flag will not create the specified path and generate the map files in that location. Instead, create a post build step that moves the files to the specified path.
--maxNodeModuleJsDepth	number	0	The maximum dependency depth to search under node_modules and load JavaScript files. Only applicable with --allowJs.
--module -m	string	target === "ES3" or "ES5" ? "CommonJS" : "ES6"	Specify module code generation: "None", "CommonJS", "AMD", "System", "UMD", "ES6", "ES2015" or "ESNext". ► Only "AMD" and "System" can be used in conjunction with --outFile. ► "ES6" and "ES2015" values may be used when targeting "ES5" or lower.
--moduleResolution	string	module === "AMD" or "System" or "ES6" ? "Classic" : "Node"	Determine how modules get resolved. Either "Node" for Node.js/io.js style resolution, or "Classic". See Module Resolution documentation for more details.
--newLine	string	(platform specific)	Use the specified end of line sequence to be used when emitting files: "crlf" (windows) or "lf" (unix).”
--noEmit	boolean	false	Do not emit outputs.
--noEmitHelpers	boolean	false	Do not generate custom helper functions like __extends in compiled output.
--noEmitOnError	boolean	false	Do not emit outputs if any errors were reported.
--noErrorTruncation	boolean	false	Do not truncate error messages.
--noFallthroughCasesInSwitch	boolean	false	Report errors for fallthrough cases in switch statement.
--noImplicitAny	boolean	false	Raise error on expressions and declarations with an implied any type.
--noImplicitReturns	boolean	false	Report an error when not all code paths in function return a value.
--noImplicitThis	boolean	false	Raise error on this expressions with an implied any type.
--noImplicitUseStrict	boolean	false	Do not emit "use strict" directives in module output.
--noLib	boolean	false	Do not include the default library file (lib.d.ts).
--noResolve	boolean	false	Do not add triple-slash references or module import targets to the list of compiled files.
--noStrictGenericChecks	boolean	false	Disable strict checking of generic signatures in function types.
--noUnusedLocals	boolean	false	Report errors on unused locals.
--noUnusedParameters	boolean	false	Report errors on unused parameters.
--out	string		DEPRECATED. Use --outFile instead.
--outDir	string		Redirect output structure to the directory.
--outFile	string		Concatenate and emit output to single file. The order of concatenation is determined by the list of files passed to the compiler on the command line along with triple-slash references and imports. See output file order documentation for more details.
paths[2]	Object		List of path mapping entries for module names to locations relative to the baseUrl. See Module Resolution documentation for more details.
--preserveConstEnums	boolean	false	Do not erase const enum declarations in generated code. See const enums documentation for more details.
--preserveSymlinks	boolean	false	Do not resolve symlinks to their real path; treat a symlinked file like a real one.
--preserveWatchOutput	boolean	false	Keep outdated console output in watch mode instead of clearing the screen
--pretty	boolean	true unless piping to another program or redirecting output to a file	Stylize errors and messages using color and context.
--project -p	string		Compile a project given a valid configuration file. The argument can be a file path to a valid JSON configuration file, or a directory path to a directory containing a tsconfig.json file. See tsconfig.json documentation for more details.
--reactNamespace	string	"React"	DEPRECATED. Use --jsxFactory instead. Specifies the object invoked for createElement and __spread when targeting "react" JSX emit.
--removeComments	boolean	false	Remove all comments except copy-right header comments beginning with /*!
--resolveJsonModule	boolean	false	Include modules imported with .json extension.
--rootDir	string	(common root directory is computed from the list of input files)	Specifies the root directory of input files. Only use to control the output directory structure with --outDir.
rootDirs[2]	string[]		List of root folders whose combined content represent the structure of the project at runtime. See Module Resolution documentation for more details.
--showConfig	boolean	false	Rather than actually execute a build with the other input options and config files, show the final implied config file in the output.
--skipDefaultLibCheck	boolean	false	DEPRECATED. Use --skipLibCheck instead. Skip type checking of default library declaration files.
--skipLibCheck	boolean	false	Skip type checking of all declaration files (*.d.ts).
--sourceMap	boolean	false	Generates corresponding .map file.
--sourceRoot	string		Specifies the location where debugger should locate TypeScript files instead of source locations. Use this flag if the sources will be located at run-time in a different location than that at design-time. The location specified will be embedded in the sourceMap to direct the debugger where the source files will be located.
--strict	boolean	false	Enable all strict type checking options. Enabling --strict enables --noImplicitAny, --noImplicitThis, --alwaysStrict, --strictBindCallApply, --strictNullChecks, --strictFunctionTypes and --strictPropertyInitialization.
--strictBindCallApply	boolean	false	Enable stricter checking of the bind, call, and apply methods on functions.
--strictFunctionTypes	boolean	false	Disable bivariant parameter checking for function types.
--strictPropertyInitialization	boolean	false	Ensure non-undefined class properties are initialized in the constructor. This option requires --strictNullChecks be enabled in order to take effect.
--strictNullChecks	boolean	false	In strict null checking mode, the null and undefined values are not in the domain of every type and are only assignable to themselves and any (the one exception being that undefined is also assignable to void).
--suppressExcessPropertyErrors	boolean	false	Suppress excess property checks for object literals.
--suppressImplicitAnyIndexErrors	boolean	false	Suppress --noImplicitAny errors for indexing objects lacking index signatures. See issue #1232 for more details.
--target -t	string	"ES3"	Specify ECMAScript target version: ► "ES3" (default) ► "ES5" ► "ES6"/"ES2015" ► "ES2016" ► "ES2017" ► "ES2018" ► "ES2019" ► "ES2020" ► "ESNext" Note: "ESNext" targets latest supported ES proposed features.
--traceResolution	boolean	false	Report module resolution log messages.
--tsBuildInfoFile	string	.tsbuildinfo	Specify what file to store incremental build information in.
--types	string[]		List of names of type definitions to include. See @types, —typeRoots and —types for more details.
--typeRoots	string[]		List of folders to include type definitions from. See @types, —typeRoots and —types for more details.
--version -v			Print the compiler’s version.
--watch -w			Run the compiler in watch mode. Watch input files and trigger recompilation on changes. The implementation of watching files and directories can be configured using environment variable. See configuring watch for more details.

• ^[1] These options are experimental.
• ^[2] These options are only allowed in tsconfig.json, and not through command-line switches.

Related

• Setting compiler options in tsconfig.json files.
• Setting compiler options in MSBuild projects.