Babel (transcompiler)

Last updated
Babel
Original author(s) Sebastian McKenzie
Developer(s) Contributors
Initial releaseSeptember 28, 2014;10 years ago (2014-09-28) [1]
Stable release
7.26.9 / February 14, 2025;3 days ago (2025-02-14) [2]
Repository
Written in JavaScript
Operating system Linux, macOS, Solaris, FreeBSD, OpenBSD, AIX, Microsoft Windows
Type Compiler
License MIT [3]
Website babeljs.io

Babel is a free and open-source JavaScript transcompiler that is mainly used to convert ECMAScript 2015+ (ES6+) code into backwards-compatible JavaScript code that can be run by older JavaScript engines. It allows web developers to take advantage of the newest features of the language. [4]

Contents

Developers can use new JavaScript language features by using Babel to convert their source code into versions of JavaScript that a Web browser can process. [5] Babel can also be used to compile TypeScript into JavaScript. [6] The core version of Babel was downloaded 5 million times a month in 2016, and this increased to 16 million times a week in 2019. [7] [8]

Babel plugins transform syntax that is not widely supported into a backward-compatible version. For example, arrow functions, which are specified in ES6, are converted into regular function declarations. [9] Non-standard JavaScript syntax such as JSX can also be transformed. [10] [11]

Babel can automatically inject polyfills provided by core-js [12] for support features that are missing entirely from JavaScript environments. For example, static methods such as Array.from and built-ins such as Promise are available only in ES6 and above, but they can be used in older environments if core-js is used.

See also

References

  1. ↑ "first commit". Babel Github. Retrieved 2021-01-26.
  2. ↑ "Changelog v7.26.9 (2025-02-14)". GitHub.
  3. ↑ "babel/LICENSE at master". GitHub. Retrieved 12 May 2018.
  4. ↑ "Technology Radar | Emerging Technology Trends for 2017 | ThoughtWorks". www.thoughtworks.com. Retrieved 2018-05-12.
  5. ↑ "Why Babel Matters | codemix". codemix.com. Retrieved 2018-05-12.
  6. ↑ Using Babel with TypeScript, TypeScript official website
  7. ↑ "The State of Babel · Babel". babeljs.io. Retrieved 2018-05-12.
  8. ↑ "Babel's Funding Plans · Babel". babeljs.io. Retrieved 2020-08-01.
  9. ↑ "Plugins · Babel". babeljs.io. Retrieved 5 July 2019.
  10. ↑ "Introducing JSX - React". reactjs.org. Retrieved 2018-05-12.
  11. ↑ "Using React and building a web site on Azure". Microsoft Faculty Connection. Retrieved 2018-05-12.
  12. ↑ "core-js". GitHub .
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